Automated Imaging Association elects Rusty Ponce de Leon 2010 chairman

JANUARY 21, 2010--Rusty Ponce de Leon, president of Phase 1 Technology (Deer Park, NY, USA) has been elected 2010 chairman of the Automated Imaging Association (AIA; Ann Arbor MI, USA). Ponce de Leon succeeds Mike Cyros at Allied Vision Technologies (Newburyport, MA, USA), whose two-year term as chairman expired on January 21, 2010. Cyros remains on the AIA Board as Immediate Past Chairman. Greg Hollows, director of machine vision Solutions at Edmund Optics (Barrington, NJ, USA), was elected as Vice Chairman, a newly-created Board position. “It is a privilege and an honor to serve as Chairman of the AIA Board,” said Ponce de Leon. “The organization has had several dedicated and passionate individuals hold this position during the past two decades, and I hope to live up to the legacy they have left. Our outgoing Chairman, Mike Cyros, being one of those individuals, has launched several new initiatives to enhance the value of AIA membership. My intention is to build upon these initiatives to expand AIA’s global role as the authority for all vision applications inside and outside of the factory environment. My goal is to generate more awareness for the industry and to promote additional sales for companies that belong to the association. “As the economy begins a slow recovery, I believe it is imperative that our organization plays an integral part in the rebirth of manufacturing in the U.S. The only way to accomplish this is to be competitive in the global marketplace,and the only way to be competitive is through automation. We are the visual processing component of automation, and therefore, the association must be responsible for making our collective technologies more visible to emerging, as well as existing markets.” “We’ve launched a new website, which is more conducive to supporting new and inexperienced customers. It has a much greater marketing capability, and will offer education opportunities later in the year. We are now looking to have members involved in board subcommittees, so more people can contribute and be responsible for long term planning. Last but not least, we will be focusing this year on supporting system integrators, as they are our first responders to emerging markets, and thus they demonstrate to entire industries the technologies available in solving new and complex applications,” Ponce de Leon explained. Ponce de Leon, Hollows, and Cyros are joined on the AIA Board by: * Jørgen Andersen, President & CEO, JAI * George Chamberlain, President, Pleora Technologies * Markku Jaaskelainen, Executive Vice President, Cognex Corporation * John Jennings, Chief Commercial Officer, Basler Vision Technologies * John Merva, Executive Vice President, Advanced Illumination * Amir Novini, President/CEO, Applied Vision Corporation * Keith Reuben, President, DALSA Asia-Pacific * Ed Roney, National Account Manager, Intelligent Robotics, FANUC Robotics America * Peter Tang, VP Innovation Technology, ATS Automation Tooling Systems * Kyle Voosen, Business Development Manager, National Instruments Founded in 1984, AIA currently represents some 275 machine vision suppliers, distributors, system integrators, end users, consulting firms, and educational institutes. For more information about AIA and its activities, contact Jeff Burnstein, president of the AIA, at 734-994-6088. Posted by Vision Systems Design