OIC appoints board, announces new members

The Open Interconnect Consortium has appointed a board of directors and announced the joining of 27 new members for a total of 32 members. With a focus on openness and participation, companies like Cisco Systems, Intel, MediaTek and Samsung Electronics  are working together to define the connectivity requirements to improve interoperability between the billions of devices making up the Internet of Things (IoT).

Since Atmel, Dell, Intel, Samsung Electronics and Wind River founded the OIC in July, 27 new member companies have committed to establishing a standard with clear licensing terms to address current IoT challenges. New members include Acer, ActnerLab, Allion, Aepona, Cisco, Cryptosoft, Eyeball Networks, Global Channel Resource, Gluu, IIOT Foundation, InFocus, Laplink Software, Mashery, McAfee, MediaTek, Metago, NewAer, Nitero, OSS Nokalva, Realtek Semiconductor, Remo Software, Roost, SmartThings, Samsung Electro-Mechanics, Thug Design, VMC and Zula.

The OIC board of directors is drawn from companies that span a broad range of industry vertical segments including smart home and office solutions, consumer appliances and devices, telecommunications, enterprise technology and more. This diverse technology leadership will help ensure OIC specifications and open source implementations foster product designs that intelligently, reliably and securely manage and exchange information regardless of form factor, operating system or service provider.

"We are following a proven path of innovation with the OIC, by encouraging industry-wide collaboration, and our board members represent our commitment to provide a standard across a broad range of market sectors facing challenges from emerging IoT technology trends," said Jong-Deok Choi, EVP and Deputy Head of Software R&D Center, Samsung Electronics and OIC President. 

"Our leadership and growing membership will create a single standard to solve connectivity and interoperability challenges in order to support the billions of connected devices coming online."

Besides Choi as President, the Open Interconnect Consortium's board of directors includes:

• Vice President: Imad Sousou, VP, Software and Services Group and GM, Intel Open Source Technology Center, Intel 
• Secretary: Bernard Shung, GM, new business development, MediaTek
• Treasurer: Kip Compton, VP, IoT Systems and Software Group, Cisco 

Gluu, an open source security company, is one of the new members. Gluu CEO Mike Schwartz said: "The basic idea that a person or an organisation needs to centrally control access to something has not changed. By promoting the use of open Web standards we can ensure that the billions of devices connecting to the Internet implement strong, modern security."