International. ONVIF, the world's leading standardization initiative for IP-based physical security products, held its annual member assembly and elections in late October, offering members an update on ONVIF's activities and achievements over the past year.
Attendees from around the world heard presentations on activities such as the development and publication of two new release candidates in 2015, the launch of the tool to report false compabilities on the ONVIF website, and the increasing number of members of the organization and compatible products.
Attendees at the annual meeting, which was held via webinar, were welcomed by the Chairman of the ONVIF Steering Committee, Per Björkdahl, who shared with them how ONVIF had recently reached several milestones as an organization, with its 500 member companies and more than 5,000 ONVIF-compatible products, currently available in the physical security market.
On behalf of the ONVIF Steering Committee, Björkdahl unveiled the objectives and strategies for the coming year, calling on member companies to participate more in ONVIF's work, and inviting members to share their success stories with ONVIF. He also highlighted the growing acceptance by the industry at large.
"ONVIF has made great strides since our inception in 2008," said Björkdahl. "Together, we have developed five profiles, offered education and networking opportunities to thousands of people, and gained wide acceptance in the physical security industry. Above all, we are a member-driven group, so we thank all our members for their great work and dedication," said Björkdahl.
Election results for ONVIF committees were also announced. Mayur Salgar of Honeywell was appointed to the Steering Committee, along with Kim Loy of Pelco by Schneider Electric. Ramesh Subbaiah of Honeywell, Steve Wolf of Pelco of Schneider Electric, Hasan Ozdemir of Panasonic, and Surech Krishnamurthy of Siemens were elected to the Technical Committee. Bob Dolan of Anixter was re-elected to the Technical Services Committee, along with committee members Fen Chen of Hikvision and Andrew Downs of Pelco by Schneider Electric. The newly elected members of the Communications Committee are Mike Mao of Honeywell, Greg Alcorn of Oncam Grandeye, Jason Spielfogel of Pelco of Schneider Electric, and John Ballantyne of VerifEye Technologies.
Bosch's Hans Busch, Head of the ONVIF Technology Committee, spoke to members about ONVIF's latest set of network interface specifications and informed them of an upcoming new specification release, which will cover video-related features. Sony's Andreas Schneider, Director of the Technical Services Committee, shared the schedule for the next profile releases through 2018 and talked about the 13th Developer Plugfest being held November 11-13, 2015, in Hangzhou, China. ONVIF Communications Director Stuart Rawling of Pelco for Schneider Electric closed the assembly with a summary of ONVIF's presence at various trade shows throughout 2015, the forum's public relations and social media efforts, and the results of an ongoing survey on the market's knowledge of ONVIF and its different profiles.
Founded in 2008, ONVIF now has more than 500 member companies on six continents and more than 5,000 profile-compatible products. With profile S for video streaming; the Profile G for recording and storage; Profile C for physical access control, Profile A Release Candidates for access control configuration, and Profile Q for easy installation and advanced security features, ONVIF continues to work with its members to expand the number of IP interoperability solutions that ONVIF-compatible products can offer.
More information about ONVIF's compatible products, including compatible manufacturers and models, is available on the ONVIF website: www.onvif.org
