December 2001 AdCom Meeting Summary

 

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President Cary Yang welcomed the attendees of the December meeting of the EDS Administrative Committee (AdCom) on Sunday December 2 at the Washington (D.C.) Hilton & Towers preceding the 2001 IEDM. As usual, prior to approving the minutes from the June 2001 meeting, those officers who are departing the AdCom received recognition. This year the following individuals were saluted: Cary Yang (President), April Brown (Treasurer, Elected AdCom Member), T.P Chow & M. Ayman Shibib (Elected AdCom Members), Krishna Shenai (Newsletter Editor-in-Chief), Mikael Ostling, S.C. Sun, Paul Yu, & Stephen Parke (Newsletter Editors), Werner Weber (VLSI TC Chair) and Kwok Ng (IEEE Press Liaison).

Officer Reports
In his opening address, Cary discussed the current budget situation within the EDS & the IEEE itself. The IEEE Board of Directors recently approved an interim budget for 2002 as it attempts to move toward a balanced budget and away from the deep financial assessments it has made within the various societies. EDS should have a higher visibility and stronger voice at the IEEE Board level, since Past EDS President, Michael Adler, will be the 2003 IEEE President, and Cary becomes the new Division I Director for 2002. In the ExCom summary, Vice President Steve Hillenius reported a bill of $109K from IEEE Xplore for the cost of offering EDS publications on-line. ExCom recommended to make the payment from our surplus and not increase dues or publication prices to cover the assessment. Seoul, Korea was selected as the site of the Spring 2003 AdCom meeting. It will be held in conjunction with the International. Vacuum Electronics Conference, May 28-30. The status of EDS’s offerings on Short Courses was hotly debated. The last two years, the courses lost money for a variety of reasons. Many have the opinion that EDS does not have the infrastructure to put such classes together and cannot compete with universities and professional services that do. The decision was reached to put future courses “on hold” pending further investigation into what role EDS should serve in this capacity. There was also no consensus on several of the proposed methods to revise the AdCom elections. Favoring an incremental approach, it was decided to evaluate changes to the EDS Constitution and Bylaws to elect AdCom members by the entire membership from a slate of candidates put forth by the nominating committee. Treasurer, April Brown, observed that our current 2001 budget projection ($213.2K) is close to the original estimate ($265K). The IEEE assessment for 2001 is expected to reduce EDS’ reserves by about $1,825K, which is a significant increase from last year’s payment of $879K. However, the total EDS reserves at the end of 2001 will still be at a very healthy figure of about $5M. For 2003, AdCom voted to maintain the price of EDS membership at $6 (regular) and $30 (permanent) and to continue providing free on-line access to the same 10 EDS sponsored publications. In addition, AdCom voted to maintain the same page counts and member prices for EDL and T-ED for 2003.

AdCom also received a visit from outgoing Division I Director, Ralph Wyndrum. Ralph’s comments underlined some of the accomplishments IEEE has made this year. Despite a tough economic period, IEEE membership is up driven by overseas and student memberships. The Board of Directors also voted to spend some of the surplus funds in such areas as the Xplore system, web membership software, and other internet improvements. However, due to the economic climate, the general size of the reserves diminished considerably. This resulted in budget cuts and assessments to the technical societies. Additional reductions are possible, most likely through job cuts, postponed raises, and the delay of scheduled projects. On the technical side, Ralph believes that IEEE must make a strong effort to support such initiatives as nanotechnology and SOC (system-on-a-chip), especially in the publications arena. The proliferation of new technologies inside and outside of Division I should also be addressed. However, Dr. Wyndrum feels that IEEE should not make new technical societies; but rather, find ways for existing ones to embrace and support new ideas. Electronic publishing continues to be an important issue. In a recent survey, IEEE found that the needs of academics and those of industry people with respect to electronic publication are not only different, but often, in opposition. Since many societies look to publications as major sources of income, IEEE must find a balanced business model in this area to be successful and supportive of university and industry requirements.

Since July, Executive Director, Bill Van Der Vort, and his staff have completed a number of projects. Among these are: the coordinated development of the EDS History booklet in honor of EDS’ 50th Anniversary; administrative support for the IEEE TAB Nanotechnology Committee; making arrangements for the biennial Region 9 Chapters Meeting; assistance with the short course pilot program; completing the implementation of the first graduate student fellowship award program; helping to revamp the Publications Committee; final transition of the T-ED Office to the IEEE Operations Center; and reestablishment of relations with IEEE Press. Upcoming projects for the Executive Office include: final development and distribution of the history booklet; developing a portable display for the anniversary festivities in San Francisco; preparation of the formal 50th Anniversary Celebration and help for the incoming EDS Newsletter Editor-in-Chief.

Standing Committee Chair Reports
As of October, EDS membership stands at 13,346, or 7892 regular members, 4057 permanent members, 1381 students, and 16 affiliates total according to James Kuo, Membership Chair. It is estimated that by year-end 2001 EDS membership will total about 13,650 (a 2.7% increase). Special promotions at conferences (ISSCC, IEDM) have been successful, as has the pursuit of IEEE members with EDS aligned TIP profiles. The special program to get members to apply for Senior IEEE membership has seen 104 members promoted to this level with EDS as their nominating society. Regions/ Chapters Chair, Hiroshi Iwai, and his team have completed the reconstruction of the chapters committee. The new structure has five “Subcommittees for Regions & Chapters” which streamlines the communication between chapter chairs, lecturers, partners, and the EDS Office worldwide. Each chapter and region is poised to participate fully in the DL program, help in the nomination of Senior Members & Fellows, and organize colloquia. The Region 8 Chapters Meeting, previously shared with other IEEE societies, will now be “EDS-only”. Since June, Iwai-san reports that new chapters in Cuba, Bangalore, and Shanghai, plus a student chapter in Tehran, have been formed, with additional ones in South Brazil, North Brazil and Argentina expected soon. The AP/ED Bombay Chapter was selected as the EDS “Chapter of the Year” for 2001.

Ilesanmi Adesida, Education Chair, and his committee have had a busy year. Directives on policy have been sent to all the DL lecturers informing them that they must perform one lecture within two years to remain in the program. Several lecturers combined their efforts to give invited mini-colloquia. In 2001, 45 participants for a total cost of $10.4K gave 81 lectures. Use of videotapes for chapter presentations declined. As previously mentioned, the Short Courses are at a crossroads. In addition to the financial losses and the lack of an established infrastructure for packaging such classes, some AdCom members feel that colloquia or industry-sponsored classes are preferable, and that EDS could be a vital source of information and contacts for their organization. However, the openness of company-based classes remains questionable as well as its effectiveness for members who do not work at the host firm. For the near term, however, no new courses are planned. This year’s Graduate Fellowship award has been a success, and plans for getting nominations for next year’s award are underway. Some on AdCom have asked if the awards could be reduced and given to more students, or perhaps given to a “Young Engineer” who has obtained a graduate degree and has already started a professional career. Both suggestions are being studied. Publications continue to do well, and the centralized support systems for EDL and T-ED have made major improvements for their respective authors. Renuka Jindal, Publications Chair, indicated that his committee has been expanded, with almost all members having a direct link with one of the EDS sponsored publications. In other news, this year the relations with IEEE Press have been renewed and strengthened. Joe Brewer is now the new liaison replacing Kwok Ng. The impact of EDS publications is high but Renuka observes that the influence of electronic publishing is changing things. For example, since both flagship pubs are available on the web the circulation numbers for both are dropping. While subscription costs may play a role, the total circulation has been going down by 10% compounded over the last five years, which coincides with the initial moves to electronic publishing by EDS. The long-term issues of this trend are unclear and merit further analysis. However, AdCom approved $5K for each of the next two years for the committee to examine the “Impact Factor” of both journals and how time, reviewer ratings, length, topic, special issues, citations, and web distribution affect it. A new best paper award, similar to the Rappaport Award, will be proposed this year for EDL’s best. Meetings Chair, Ken Galloway’s report discussed the reduction in attendance for EDS meetings following the events of September 11, as well as a mention that his committee has been expanded to include representatives from the technical committees.

Al MacRae and Dexter Johnston announced this year’s award winners. For the IEEE Field Awards, EDS winners included Dimitri Antoniadis (Andrew Grove Award), Supriyo Datta & Mark S. Lundstrom (Brunetti Award), and Ping Ko & Chenming Hu (Solid-State Circuits Award). H. Craig Casey received the EDS Distinguished Service Award, and the J.J. Ebers winner was Hiroshi Iwai. Al also exhorted the AdCom to nominate more members for the IEEE Field Awards saying many do not have sufficient numbers of nominees. A new, 1-page nomination form for these awards can be found on the IEEE website, and all nominations are welcomed. On the Fellows side, Lou Parrillo announced that 20 of the 46 members evaluated by EDS were elected as Fellows. Fifteen of these individuals were EDS members, while another 15 EDS members evaluated by other societies were also elected as fellows. In related news, the IEEE TAB has approved the formation of a Nanotechnology Council. Several members of the EDS Nanotechnology Technical Committee (TC) are prominently involved. The “50 Years of Electron Devices” historical booklet is nearing completion and should be distributed in the Spring of April 2002.

Technical Committee Chair Reports
Technical Committee Coordinator, Steve Hillenius, announced that he has asked all TC chairs, who are now voting members of AdCom, to take an increased role in the nominations for Senior Member/Fellow, and awards, the meeting approval process, and suggested topics for Special Issues. Electronic Materials TC chair, Jerry Woodall, discussed the overlap between meetings that are materials-related and those that appeal more to device specialists. His group is encouraging the ISDRS conference to adopt a “materials” theme to avoid any conflicts with the more device-related IEDM. The Semiconductor Manufacturing TC, under Rajendra Singh, sponsored a workshop at the ISSM on “Sub 70nm Manufacturing”. The meeting also generated a special issue of Transactions on Semiconductor Manufacturing (T-SM) on “Manufacturing Beyond the 70nm Node” to appear in May 2002. The committee also entertained a proposal from Applied Materials on single wafer processing and is looking to collaborate with the Nanotechnology and VLSI TC’s on topics of mutual interest. Herb Bennett’s Compound Semiconductor TC has combined their objectives with the Optoelectronic Devices TC lead by Chennupati Jagadish. Both plan to contribute to the new Compound Semiconductor ITRS, and are expanding their topics of interest to include modulation of semiconductor lasers to 40 Gbps, ultrawideband semi optical amplifiers, organic LED’s, long wavelength VCSELs using quantum dots or InGaAsN, nitride-based optical devices, ZnO-based devices and magnetic semiconductors. Special issues covering cross topics such as CMOS & VCSEL interconnect, and CMOS/HEMT-HBT ADCs & Photonic ADCs are proposed possibly in collaboration with the TC’s on Semi Manufacturing, & VLSI Technology.

Werner Weber’s VLSI Technology TC is sponsoring a discussion session on emerging technology at IEDM 2001, and contributing to a workshop on compact modeling at the Intl. Conf. On Modeling & Simulation of Microsystems. Their website (www.ieee.org/organizations/society/eds/groups.html) has also been launched this year. Jim Hutchby, the incoming VLSI TC chair, plans to solicit nominees for promotions and awards. EDS’ Nanotechnology TC has been very active in getting the IEEE Nanotechnology Committee established and remains actively involved. Chair, Alan Seabaugh, plans to participate in the IEEE Nano-2002 conference in August and to promote their new website (www.ieee.org/ organizations/society/nono.html). The Vacuum Devices TC Chair Jim Dayton reports that the IVEC conference has now emerged as a combination of the former US Power Tube Conf., and the ESA Space TWT/TWTA Workshop. IEDM Chair, Judy Hoyt, expressed optimism that despite the industry problems this year’s IEDM would be successful. Courses on sub-70nm technology, and advanced memory architectures were well subscribed, and the evening panel discussions are attractive. Estimates of a 50% reduction in attendees were based on low pre-registration numbers, and fewer hotel registrations than normal. To reduce expenses, there was no pre-conference mailing of the schedule, and some cutbacks in food.

Publications News
EDL Editor-in-Chief, Yuan Taur, reported that some major milestones for the publication were reached this year. The time-to-publication has now been reduced to an average of 5.2 months, a reduction of two months in a year’s time, and achieving his target of four months looks very promising. Outgoing EDS Newsletter Editor-in-Chief, Krishna Shenai, welcomed new editor, Nino Stojadinovic, and expressed his appreciation to all the Editors who have served under his editorship. Nino announced his new editors, Murty Polavarapu (Regions 1-3), Sunit Tyagi (Regions 5 & 6), Alexander Gridchin (Region 8 Eastern Europe/Former Soviet Union), and Andrzej Napieralski (Region 8 Scandinavia/Central Europe), and discussed a new author submission system through the IEEE Executive Office that will centralize newsletter operations similar to that of T-ED & EDL. After introducing Joe Brewer, IEEE Press Liaison Kwok Ng outlined the new agreement with Wiley. The publisher assumes responsibility for marketing, sales, production and promotion whereas IEEE handles acquisition, review and editorial issues. In a survey, Kwok found that there is no shortage of authors within the membership; however, the apparent lack of interest in IEEE Press by member/authors needs to be turned around.

Reporting on T-ED, Editor-in-Chief, Doug Verret, reported that things are rapidly improving with the recently installed editorial submission system in the Executive Office. Time-to-publication has been cut to 7-8 months, a 30% improvement within a year. The system has actually forced an exceeded page budget, for 2001 (3100 vs a budgeted 2600 pages) since more papers can be processed. However the average number of pages decreased over the same time. Tony Oates has seen the first IEEE fully electronic journal, Transactions on Device and Materials Reliability (T-DMR), through its initial start-up year. In 2001, it was available free to all IEEE members and non-members via IEEE Xplore. For 2002, it will continue to be free for all IEEE members. Of the 32 papers submitted, 21 were accepted in 2001. Each manuscript is posted on IEEE Xplore as a PDF file within 1-2 weeks after it is accepted for publication. Duane Boning is the new editor of Transactions on Semiconductor Manufacturing (T-SM)s. He announced that T-SM has been voted the top manufacturing journal on the basis of citations. Goals for the journal include increased paper submissions, exploration of new subjects, and a thorough evaluation of past issues to assess strengths and weaknesses. T-SM’s transition to all-electronic manuscript handling commences next year. Duane hopes to explore areas such as EHS, sub-70nm fabrication, and compound semiconductor manufacturing in future special issues. The Journal of Technology Computer Aided Design (J-TCAD) is likely to cease publication. An all-electronic journal started in 1996 under Mark Law, it has suffered from a dearth of submissions, small readership, and issues of being non-archival.

For 2002, the EDS President will be Steve Hillenius, Vice President, Hiroshi Iwai, Treasurer Paul Yu, and Secretary, John Lowell. Newly elected AdCom members include: Magali Estrada del Cuerto; Johnny K. O. Sin; and Nino Stojadinovic. Re-elected members include: Kenneth F. Galloway, Stephen J. Hillenius, Chennupati Jagadish and Rajendra Singh.

The next meeting of EDS AdCom will be on Sunday, June 9, 2002 in Honolulu, Hawaii prior to the 2002 Symposium on VLSI Technology.

John K. Lowell
Consultant
Dallas, TX, USA