Summary of the updates:

• Upcoming events and conferences (incl. ECSA CPD ones)
• IEEE Day 2019 – celebrate, have fun
• IEEEXtreme – a global programming challenge
• US$1 for ComSoc membership for students (and a unique opportunity to set up new Student Branch Chapters)
• New (5th) IEEE Fellow in South Africa
• New Senior Member in the Section
• IEEE South Africa received 2019 MGA Outstanding Medium Section Award – our heroes

 

Here are the details:

Upcoming events

• Distinguished Lecture: “Recent Results and Open Problems In Evolutionary Multiobjective Optimization”, to be held at Stellenbosch University, Stellenbosch on 16 Aug 2019 from 13:00-14:00. Free registration: https://events.vtools.ieee.org/m/202868
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• Distinguished Talk "Cognitive Radio for Wireless Communications: Concepts and Applications" by IEEE Distinguished Speaker Prof Jae Hong Lee, to be held at CSIR in Pretoria on 22 Aug 2019 from 09:00-11:00: Free registration at https://events.vtools.ieee.org/m/203043

Upcoming conferences

• 2019 IEEE 2nd Wireless Africa Conference (WAC), Pretoria, South Africa, 19 - 20 August 2019: https://events.vtsociety.org/wirelessafrica2019/ .
  • Includes workshops and keynotes:
    • 5G Technology/Business Forum
    • “Implementing Industry 4.0”
    • “V2X Networks for Connected and Automated Vehicles”
    • “5G & Spectrum Sharing”
    • “Cognitive Radio for Wireless Communications: Concepts and Applications”
    • Workshop “Spectrum Sensing and Sharing for 5G Cognitive Radio Networks”
  • The event is registered for ECSA CPD points.
• 2019 International Multidisciplinary Information Technology and Engineering Conference (IMITEC), Vanderbijlpark, 21 - 22 November 2019: http://www.vut.ac.za/imitec2019/ .
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• 2019 Open Innovations (OI), Johannesburg, South Africa, 2 - 4 October 2019.  http://www.africaopen.org/ . Paper submission deadline: 15 Aug 2019.
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• 2019 6th International Conference on Soft Computing & Machine Intelligence (ISCMI), Johannesburg, South Africa, 19 - 20 November 2019. http://www.iscmi.us/.
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• 2020 Conference on Information Communications Technology and Society (ICTAS), Durban, South Africa, 11 - 12 March 2020. http://www.ictas2020.com/ . Submission deadline: 4 October 2019.
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• 2020 IEEE 23rd International Conference on Information Fusion (FUSION), Rustenburg, 6 - 9 July 2020

 

IEEE Day 2019 – celebrate, have fun

IEEE Day honours the roles IEEE members play in their local communities and their work toward the vision of advancing technology for the benefit of humanity and is officially on the first Tuesday in October which is October 1st this year.
Celebrations are planned for the first 2 weeks of October from the 1st till the 14th of October 2019! There is an opportunity for you to participate, have fun, be creative and win prizes!
The Section can assist with some funding (although it will be limited to R500 for most cases, except if your ideas and impact really impress us). Please also provide us with a copy of the registration form.
Join the IEEE Milestone Showcase Contest! For more details check https://ieeeday.org/milestone-contest/
Planning an event for IEEE Day? Got queries? Please contact the section’s 2019 IEEE Day Ambassador, Michael Tarerefa (tarebimike@ieee.org)

 

IEEEXtreme – a global programming challenge

Compete and win! Prove that South Africa’s skills in programming are great!
Required: Teams of up to three collegiate students each (who are current IEEE student members), and a willing Proctor. A university can have multiple teams.
The Grand Prize is a trip to the IEEE conference of your choice, anywhere in the world.
Practice here: https://csacademy.com/ieeextreme-practice/ and use the archive of problems here: https://csacademy.com/contest/archive/
IEEEXtreme 13.0 will take place on October 19, 2019
More details and registration at https://ieeextreme.org/

 

US$1 for ComSoc membership for students

We are pleased to announce that beginning 16 August 2019 IEEE Student and Graduate Student members will be able to join the IEEE Communications Society (ComSoc) for just one dollar!

Existing ComSoc Student and Graduate Student members can renew their ComSoc membership for $1 as well, beginning on 3 September 2019.

Becoming a member of ComSoc means joining a global professional community of engineers, enthusiasts, educators, learners, leaders and collaborators around the globe to advance and create cutting-edge communications and networking technologies for the betterment of humanity.

Please visit www.comsoc.org/membership to discover the professional, educational, and technical benefits ComSoc provides!

US$1 --> Unique Opportunity to set up new Student Branch Chapters

If you work or study at a university, please consider setting up a new Student Branch Chapters. Using the above offer, getting the minimum required number of student members (6+) for the  Communications Society (ComSoc) Chapters will be very easy.

Some details may be found here: https://mga.ieee.org/resources-operations/geographic-unit/chapters/how-t...

The initiation is at https://www.ieee.org/communities/forms_petitions.html

 

New (5th) IEEE Fellow in South Africa

Congratulations to Professor David George Dorrell of the University of KwaZulu Natal (UKZN) on becoming elected to the IEEE Fellows class of 2019 "for contributions to time efficient design methodology of rotating electrical machines".

The IEEE Fellow Award is a special recognition for members with extraordinary accomplishments in the IEEE technical fields. To ensure that the recognition is extraordinary, the total number of recipients each year cannot exceed 0.1% of the total higher grade membership. Last year, South Africa had only 4 Fellows, out of over 1000 members.

Some information on how to become a Fellow of IEEE is available here.

In South Africa, Prof Dorrell has a B2 NRF rating as an internationally acclaimed researcher, is a Professor of Electrical Machines with UKZN, the Director of the UKZN EPPEI Specialization Centre in HVDC and FACTS on the Westville campus of UKZN, which is funded by Eskom.

Prof Dorrell has over 100 journal papers, the vast majority being in IEEE Transactions, and over 250 conference papers in major international conferences, with an H-factor of 35 on Scopus (March 2018). He was awarded an IEE Premium for his PhD work and has won three IEEE IAS Machines Committee prizes. He has supervised many PhD, Masters and Bachelors student projects, carried out consultancy with several international companies and has visited several universities as a visiting scholar. He has carried out editorial work for several IEEE Transactions. While his primary research is electrical machines he also works in the area of renewable energy, particularly wave energy, and smart grids.

 

New Senior Member in the Section

Congratulations to

• Udochukwu Akuru,
• Johan Beukes,
• OdunAyo Imoru,
• Lesedi Masisi, and
• Willie Nel

on achieving, through a significant performance during the professional experience, to become the top 10% of IEEE membership! 

Here is the list of the recently added Senior members

 

IEEE South Africa received 2019 MGA Outstanding Medium Section Award - heroes

IEEE has 339 Sections worldwide, with a Section typically associated with a country. IEEE Member and Geographic Activities (MGA) Outstanding Large, Medium, and Small Section Awards are awarded to one large Section, one medium Section, and one small Section each year, for their successful efforts in fulfilling the educational and scientific goals of IEEE for the benefit of the public by maintaining, enhancing, and supporting the Student Branches, Technical Chapters, and Affinity Groups within their geographic boundaries.

Additional details may be found at https://mga.ieee.org/awards/mga-awards-and-recognition-program/mga-outstanding-section-awards/mga-outstanding-large,-medium,-and-small-section-award-recipients

Thank you to our volunteers organizing the events, conferences, meetings, participation in competitions. The IEEE South Africa would not have been able to achieve this without your efforts!  Some of the names (from 2018 and 2017 reports, in random order):

• Komla Folly, David Oyedokun, Riana Geschke, Lindokuhle Shongwe, Michael Tarerefa, Craig Plaatjes, Mqhele E Dlodlo, UCT
• Dirk de Villiers, PG (Gideon) Wiid, Philip Strydom, Jaco Versfeld, Alford Sibanda, Udochukwu Bola Akuru, Dawie van den Heever, SUN
• BodhaswarTJ (Sunil) Maharaj, Reza Malekian, Tinus Stander, Jacques van Wyk, Gerhard Hancke, Herman Myburgh, UP
• Seyi Olokede, Reolyn Heymann, Marcel Sagming, Ian Jannasch, UJ
• Darryn Cornish, Yuval Odhiambo Genga, Ling Cheng, WITS
• Upasana Singh, Thomas Afullo, Dauda Ayanda, UKZN
• Andre Henney, Stephanie Agenbag, UWC
• Albert Lysko, Benjamin Rosman, Sabelo Dlamini, Mpho Nkosi, CSIR
• Shaun Kaplan, Meera Joseph, Wynand Lambrechts (SAAB Grintek Defence), Moin Hanif, Nwabisa Letsoha, Alex Mhungu, Rina Peach, Ajay Mishra(UNISA), Tinashe Mutsvangwa, Shyama Pada Chowdhury (TUT), Lebogang Madise

 

 

If you have any questions or suggestions, please do not hesitate to contact us: www.ieee.org.za , especially the Acting Section Chair David Oyedokun (as Darryn Cornish is currently on leave).

 

Best regards

IEEE South Africa Section