Ecma Fellow award program – approved by the June 2018 Ecma GA – has been launched
1 Background
It was a repeated request in Ecma to have some sort of recognition and formal links to a few selected Ecma individuals who have served Ecma for a long time in an exceptionally outstanding fashion. Ecma should grant those individuals the status of an “Ecma Fellow” who – if they choose – would be able at no cost continue to participate in Ecma work as Emeritus members, with the only difference that they should not have any voting rights and if they have essential patents to the work they contribute to they should make them available in the Ecma standard on a RF basis. Regarding Ecma policies and rules they have to follow the relevant paragraphs of the Ecma policies and rules. This proposal was approved at the June 2018 Ecma GA:
2 Main points of the new Ecma Fellow award
- The Ecma fellowship award is a rare and prestigious distinction given to exceptional technologists, futurists, whose contributions shape both Ecma and our Industry as a whole. An Ecma Fellow award is granted for life. The Ecma GA has the right to withdraw a Fellow award in the event of a severe violation of the Ecma policies.
- The Ecma fellowship is granted to experts who have made outstanding technical contributions over several years.
- The Ecma fellowship award includes an emeritus membership (without voting rights) in the TC that submitted the nomination of the candidate (or its successor) for a duration of 10 years. The TC can submit a request to the GA to renew the emeritus membership for another period of 10 years.
- To start the process, a TC approves and submits a nomination proposal to the GA which contains a list of the outstanding contributions and achievements of the candidate with dates and other relevant details.
- If the Ecma Fellow – in their emeritus member capacity – chooses to participate and contribute to a standardization project in a TC then the Ecma Fellow shall commit to license all relevant essential patents they own related to that project of the TC on a RF basis.
- The proposal for an Ecma Fellowship award and its associated emeritus membership is submitted to the approval of the GA.
- The list of Ecma Fellows shall appear in a “Hall of Fame” on the Ecma web site.
3 Implementation and current status
- The Ecma Fellow award program has been approved on June 27, 2018 by the Ecma GA
- Ecma TCs have been requested to inform their members about the program and to start to nominate candidates for the award. This is an ongoing activity.
- It is expected that the Ecma GA will recognize the first Ecma Fellows at the December 2018 GA.
For more information: please contact Dr. Istvan Sebestyen, Secretary General of Ecma International. Email: istvan@ecma-international.org.