It is my greatest honor to serve as IEEE Kansai Section Chair for 2021/2022. First of all, I would like to express my sincere appreciation to all past Chairs, Officers and Executive Committee Members for their dedicated voluntary works since the foundation of this section. As the 12th Chair of Kansai Section, I really hope to take great responsibility for supporting regional activities and contributing all members of this section.
IEEE, Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, is one of the largest institutes based in the US and covering electrical and electronics engineering fields worldwide. The name of IEEE may remind many people of technical activities such as publication of technical journals, international conference proceedings, and standardization (e.g. IEEE 802.11 Standard for wireless LAN) etc. IEEE organization consists of, in addition to Technical Activities Board supporting above-mentioned technical activities, Member and Geographic Activities Board to support member services and regional activities. Regional activities organizations include Region 10 handling the Asia-Pacific region, Japan Council covering the whole members in Japan, and Kansai Section, the nearest and closest organization to the members in Kansai region.
Formerly, IEEE activities in Japan was operated by one organization, Tokyo Section. In November 1998, the IEEE organization in Japan was changed into eight section structures with the aim of improving member services. Kansai Section is one of the eight sections established in 1998, and has been contributing and providing wide range of member services since then. Those services include enhanced Chapter activities, various awards established for encouraging younger members, Student Branch activities for servicing Student Members, and Women in Engineering (WIE) affinity group established for supporting women members’ activities. The number of members in Kansai Section has currently been increasing from about 1,300 in 1998 to more than 2,200.
Academic institutes, including IEEE, currently face with worrying situation that company researchers are somewhat hesitant about engaging in academic institute activities. Also, under expanding COVID-19 disaster, rapid advancement of IT and/or SNS has enabled us to obtain lots of technical information remotely and electronically without participating in academic conferences or activities in a face-to-face manner. However, please be reminded that information obtained in-person in academic community would often be exclusively beneficial for daily activities not only for academia but also for company researchers. Younger members, whether academia or industrial, are also encouraged to eagerly obtain information from communities other than their own universities, colleges, and workplaces, thereby look back on their own activities with third persons’ points of view. So now, please join our activities in Kansai Section and get all benefits through mutual communication between members with diverse background.
Kansai Section, with its staffs, Officers and Executive Committee Members, is continuing to provide wide range of these communities useful and beneficial to all members, especially targeting more industrial members in 2021/2022. We would highly appreciate your kind cooperation.
Yutaka Hata
IEEE Kansai Section Chair