ONVIF, the global standardization initiative for IP-based physical security products, held its annual gathering of members in late November. Featuring the election of a slate of new officers and committee chairmen, the meetings set the stage for continued progress toward interoperability of IP security devices in 2013.

Held in Coral Gables, Florida, USA, ONVIF's annual meeting brought together representatives from many of ONVIF's nearly 430 member companies, representing nearly every region of the world. Keynote speaker Farzin Aghdasi, PhD, Director, Pelco by Scheider Electric, spoke to the crowd about the standardization landscape for the global market. Aghdasi stressed the importance of striking a delicate balance between standardization and innovation to continue to advance technology integrations and drive growth. Geetha Dabir, General Manager, Physical Security Business Unit, Cisco Systems, addressed the IT industry's transformative effects on the physical security over the past decade.

The four-day event also played host to meetings of the ONVIF Technical, Technical Services, Communication and Steering committees. ONVIF committee chairmen also provided technical and organizational briefings, as well as updates on the forum's milestones and roadmap for 2013, including the releases of ONVIF Profile G for video storage and Profile C for access control. Profile S, which encompasses video streaming, was released in early 2012.

"With our focus on Profiles for video streaming, video storage and access control, ONVIF remains dedicated to streamlining and simplifying the implementation of our specification," said Per Björkdahl of Axis Communications, who was elected Chairman of the Steering Committee. "Along with ONVIF's growing membership numbers, these profile introductions are visible signs that ONVIF is maintaining momentum in its mission of achieving widespread interoperability in the market."

Along with Björkdahl, who has served as director of business development for Axis for more than a decade, several other new representatives were also elected to each of ONVIF's four committees to serve throughout 2013. Etsumi Kanaya from Panasonic and Ray Still from Pelco by Schneider Electric were elected as new members to the Technical Committee, Neelendra Shandari of Honeywell and Scott Hudson of Pelco by Schneider Electric joined as new representatives of the Technical Services Committee, and Stuart Rawling of Pelco by Schneider Electric and Mike Mao of Honeywell were chosen to serve on the Communications Committee. Ichiro Ogawa of Panasonic and Michael Luetzeler of Siemens were re-elected as members of the Steering Committee for an additional one-year term.

The 2013 ONVIF annual meeting is scheduled for November in conjunction with the CPSE show in Shenzhen, China to ensure that ONVIF's global members have the opportunity to attend and participate in the forum's annual meetings.