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John K. Lowell |
The Spring 2000 AdCom meeting of EDS was opened by President Cary Yang on May 21st at the ATRIA Mercure Hotel, Toulouse, France, in conjunction with the IEEE International Symposium on Power Semiconductor Devices & ICs (ISPSD).
After the approval of the addendum to the minutes of the December 1999 meeting, Cary announced that the 2001 Spring AdCom meeting will be held in Singapore in conjunction with the IEEE International Symposium on the Physical and Failure Analysis of Integrated Circuits (IPFA). He also reviewed the list of members awarded the IEEE Millennium Medal winners by EDS. A complete list of the winners from all IEEE entities is available at www.ieee.org/organizations/society/eds/millennium.html. He also reviewed the status of IEEE's "new financial model" which has been discussed in earlier meeting summaries. At present, the model has not been approved by TAB, so no immediate actions are being taken. A motion to change the EDS Constitution and ByLaws to give EDS technical committee chairs voting rights and bring the documents up-to-date to reflect current AdCom practices could not be approved at this meeting, since there was not a 2/3 majority of full EDS AdCom voting members in attendance. The changes will be acted on at the December meeting.
Lu Kasprzak gave the society financial report for the new Treasurer, April Brown, who was unable to attend. In 1999, membership revenue increased due to an increase in members electing permanent membership. Circuits & Devices Magazine contributed unexpected revenue of $22K and is doing very well at present as a general publication. There were also non-budgeted returns from the Journal of Microelectromechanical Systems, Transactions on Semiconductor Manufacturing and the Journal of Lightwave Technology in the amounts of $60.8K, $44.4K, and $10.6K, respectively. The Executive Office budget was more than expected, due to the addition of a staff person to support EDL. Due to very favorable market conditions, the EDS return of long-term investments was about $1.2 million which was excessively more than budgeted. The 1999 surplus for EDS was $1.5M, and the Society's reserves have doubled over the last five years. Amidst the financial crisis of IEEE, EDS is doing well.
Executive Director, Bill Van Der Vort, reported that his office continues to be busy with numerous projects. They were instrumental in the process of approving and notifying the winners of the Millennium Medal, as well as issuing them invitations to the December EDS luncheon. The EDS Membership Directory has been completed and mailed. They also collaborated with IEEE publications to put the EDS member roster on the Web with quarterly updates. In addition, Bill's office worked with Steve Hillenius, Publications Chair, and Dexter Johnston, Electronic Products Chair, to produce the 1999 EDS CD ROM Package, established home pages for EDL & T-ED (now on-line) and created a database for EDS conferences. Upcoming projects include working with IEEE's History Center to coordinate the development of the booklet and display for EDS' 50th anniversary, collaborating with Division I & IV Directors for the Divisions I & IV Region 8 Meeting (in Paris in October) and partnering with Hiroshi Iwai and Jim Clemens to coordinate the Regions 1 Š 7 & 9 Chapters Meeting in San Francisco in December. The Executive Office will also soon begin to provide administrative support for the Editor-in-Chief and Editors of T-ED, as well as the new all electronic Transactions on Device and Materials Reliability.
Hiroshi Iwai, Regions/Chapters Chair, reported that 5 new chapters were formed in 1999, and so far, in 2000, one more has been formed with additional new chapters under discussion. The Region Champions and Chapter Partners Programs are not working as well as had been expected. Indeed, many chapters have requested that their respective partners be more active. On the other hand, many chapters have not been responsive to partner interaction. To address these issues, the Regions/Chapters Committee has formed a subset of their group called the Regional Chapter Coordination Committee (RCCC). This sub-committee will consist of a chair and vice chair along with chapter chairs and partners for the following 5 regional breakdowns: Regions 1-3 & 7; Regions 4-6; Region 8; Region 9; Region 10. The current region champion and chapter partner assignments will be discontinued. The RCCC will contact chapter chairs directly and discuss topics with them and the possibility of assigning a partner. A chapter will be allowed to refuse the assignment of a partner. On the other hand, multiple partner assignments for a given chapter will be allowable. Also, having the assignment of partners be optional, puts the focus on the ones that need assistance. AdCom approved the motion "To support the new structure of the committee and have a budget of $25K for the partners travel." Iwai also mentioned that the new structure will necessitate a change in the Chapter of the Year Award, whereby chapters can be self-nominated by their chairs, as well as by any voting member of AdCom.
James Kuo, Membership Chair, reports that in 1999, EDS achieved an all time high membership of 12,977. The number of permanent EDS members has been growing rapidly and now totals 3,500. The percentage of EDS membership outside the U.S. continues to increase, with the figure now being 41%. Despite these numbers, James' committee needs to worry about how to grow new membership. Several of their ongoing projects include: membership promotions at major EDS technical meetings; mailing to non-EDS members with an interest in EDS' technical field; and distribution of promotional materials to EDS sponsored conferences. The committee will introduce new efforts, such as: direct mail campaign to non-IEEE member attendees of selected EDS conferences, encouragement of EDS chapters to develop their own web pages and holding a contest for best website; production of a Russian language membership brochure; and an offer of a free one year EDS membership to IEEE members who are not EDS members.
In December, the decision was made to have the Vice President be the overall coordinator of the ten EDS technical committees. Therefore, new coordinator, Steve Hillenius, reports that he has received a lot of input from the technical committee chairs, and more is expected. He suggests that the chairs attend the AdCom meeting (particularly at IEDM) to increase participation. In addition, they can utilize the Executive Office support for arranging meetings, conference calls, mailings and creating web sites. The current technical interest profile (TIP) was reviewed, and it was agreed to have it more in line with the technical committee interests.
Following a short report from the host conference, Educational Activities Member, Arlene A. Santos, remarked that the committee membership has almost doubled since December due to the significant number of activities in progress. One of the primary initiatives of EduCom is to establish a series of short courses independent of conferences concerning leading edge technology. For this first year, the courses will remain domestic, with a goal to be international and web-based in 2001. This initiative will help accomplish one of the Society's goals to reach out to the practicing engineers by going to them locally.
Current Publications Chair, Steve Hillenius, announced he will step down by the next AdCom meeting, and Renuka Jindal will become the new chair. Current activities of the Publications Committee include the selection of the winner of the Rappaport Award, the transfer of the Editorial office for T-ED to the EDS Office in Piscataway and the administrative support at the EDS Office for reduction in the cycle time for EDL and T-ED. It is expected that the centralization of administrative support at the EDS Office for EDL and T-ED will help to accomplish this goal. Doug Verret of Texas Instruments will replace Renuka Jindal as Editor-in-Chief of T-ED and the new manuscript system and administrative support for T-ED will be implemented in October.
Following the approval of the Repeat Meetings List, AdCom recommended that a line be added on the conference budget forms for student travel. It will not be a requirement, but it will at least make the conferences consider this use of funds and EDS will be able to see which conferences employ this practice. Tom Pearsall recommended that conferences contact the National Science Foundation, which provides funding to students studying in the US to attend conferences. The conference can apply for the funds, then pass them on to the students. The Fellows Committee reported that 49 nominations were received and advice was sought from 42 EDS Fellows. The selection of Fellows for 2001 will be made by IEEE in November. Nominations & Elections Chair, Bruce Griffing, called to everyone's attention that the deadline for nominations for officers and AdCom members for 2001 is October 20th. Nominations should be sent to the EDS Office.
Next on the agenda was a discussion of the proposed EDS Graduate Fellowship. It is intended to be a one year fellowship in various technical disciplines. The initiative is budgeted at a maximum of $10K per award winner with about 4-5 fellowships per year, making a maximum annual allocation of $50K. There will be a requirement that at least one fellowship be awarded to a student residing in Regions 1-7&9, Region 8 & Region 10. It is proposed that $1K will be granted to the studentÕs department, $1K to the student's advisor, $5K to the student, and up to $3K in travel grants. To qualify, the student and their sponsor must be an IEEE and EDS member. The fellowships will first be awarded in July 2001. The AdCom unanimously approved the motion to establish the EDS graduate fellowship program.
Progress on a proposal to develop an ISDRS/IEDM winter meeting was reported by Agis Illiadis, Program Chair for the ISDRS last year. As proposed, the ISDRS would be held either right before or right after the IEDM. The idea is also to have the ISDRS be sponsored by EDS. Requesting EDS financial sponsorship is not an issue, but AdCom did not want to vote on having the ISDRS with the IEDM until the IEDM is approached and they agree with this proposal. Agis Illiedo was asked to pursue this matter with the IEDM. The Compound Semiconductor Technical Committee has proposed satellite workshop. At this point there is little to go on since they are still evaluating how much potential interest there may be the proposal will be revisited in December. The next item was a report on Hiroshi Iwai & Renuka Jindal's trip to India in February 2000. Dr. Iwai gave DL's to both the Bombay and Dehli chapters. The India Chapter is doing a very good job, evidenced by its "Chapter of Year Award" in 1998.
In 1999, AdCom proposed that after the 2000 occurrence, it will no longer financially sponsor the Device Research Conference (DRC) unless it complies with IEEE's policies. The DRC's decision whether to comply with IEEE policies will be made in June at the 2000 DRC. If they decide to stay with EDS, they will have to return their surplus to EDS and ask for seed money every year. At the last AdCom meeting, EDS decided to sponsor a new publication, T-DMR, or Transactions on Device and Materials Reliability. It was approved by the various IEEE committees and will be co-sponsored with the Reliability Society (RLS). It will be electronic and web-based, with first issue due to be out in 2001 and free to the entire IEEE membership. The EDS Office will be providing administrative support for this new publication. AdCom received an update on the Historical Electronics Museum (HEM) Project in Baltimore, MD. The museum has opened Pioneer Hall, which contains a gallery of pioneers and supporting societies. The ED/SSC Baltimore chapter provides technical input, solicits donations locally, recognizes new exhibits and acts as a liaison to EDS and SSCS for donations. Its next exhibit, in the components gallery, will focus on miniaturization and integration. The estimated cost is $10K and they are currently working on a proposal for grants from EDS and SSCS to support it. The IEEE Coordinator's Meeting was held by TAB and had sessions on best practices, society-chapter communications, etc. Arlene Santos, who attended this meeting on behalf of EDS, reported that two societies, Power Engineering and Engineering Management had many different best practices to offer. Many chapters recommended such activities as holding regional chapter chair meetings, and developing a chapter handbook. President Cary Yang then outlined his EDS Goals starting with the importance of the Graduate Fellowship Program. Cary feels the program opens up a crucial avenue for student interest and more globalization. Implementing the Independent Short Course Program is also extremely important as well.
The Vacuum Devices Technical Committee would like to see the International Vacuum Electronics Conference (IVEC) develop an international IEEE Award. The current award is just a US award connected with the military establishment. IEEE USA – Technology Policy Council committee deals with only policies from the US viewpoint. They are a body with no power except to persuade through communication. They provide the IEEE position of issues currently before Congress and other policy-making bodies. Their most significant contributions to date have been in the development of HDTV Standards in collaboration with the FCC and involvement with Congress on Spectrum issues. On their current agenda are the evolution of the US Telecommunications infrastructure over the next decade, and software license and liability issues.
The ED Novosibirsk Student Branch was founded on March 8, 1999. It is the first student branch in Novosibirsk. There are 12 faculties, 50 chairs and more than 12,000 students in the Novosibirsk State Technical University (NSTU). The IEEE Student Branch keeps strong scientific technical connections with the other IEEE chapters in the Siberian and Russian Regions. The ED/MTT France Chapter, with 561 members, held two workshops in 1999. In 2000, they are sponsoring the International Symposium on Power Semiconductor Devices (ISPSD), the International Summer School, and the European Microwave Week. The ED/SSC University of Nis Student Branch Chapter is recovering after the problems in Yugoslavia, but to their surprise, membership is increasing. They established a desk with promotional materials in the beginning of the semester, and had a lecture by Ninoslav Stojadinovic on why students should join IEEE and EDS, as well as a dinner on the occasion of Faculty Day. They have joined with the older ED/SSC Yugoslavia Chapter for meetings and sponsored one DL (Vijay Arora). Both chapters organized the International Microelectronics Conference (MIEL). The ED Japan Chapter plans to have a domestic workshop and conference support. Its annual briefing session on the IEDM after the conference is planned for Jan 2001 in Tokyo. It gives an opportunity to hear the IEDM results to most Japanese researchers and engineers who do not have a chance to attend. The chapter plans to increase the number of Japanese DLs, and to design a "Young Researcher Encouragement Award".
The next AdCom meeting will be on Sunday December 10th at the San Francisco Hilton & Towers in conjunction with the 2000 IEDM.
John K. Lowell
Oracle Corporation
Irving, TX