Governance
PICMG is a 501(c) 6 non-profit consortium incorporated in the state of Delaware. It has been operating since 1994 and its purpose is to develop open standards for the embedded (non-desktop) computing market.
It has four officers, elected bi-annually. The current roster is:
President and CEO: Jessica Isquith
Chief Technology Officer: Douglas Sandy
Secretary: Dylan Lang
Treasurer: Dylan Lang
Marketing Officer: Valerie Andrew
Co-Marketing Officer: Brandon Lewis
To contact any of the Officers or our administration team, please email in**@pi***.org with your specific question or request.
The approximately 50 Executive Members constitute the Board of Directors. They elect officers and approve budgets, major expenditures, and governance documents. PICMG is intentionally a very “flat” organization with no single member or small group of members performing these functions and thereby dominating the organization.
Dues are kept low. An Executive Membership costs $3000 USD per year. An Associate Membership costs $2250 USD per year. Associate Members have all of the privileges associated with standards development and approval, but they do not function as the Board of Directors or provide governance. We believe that having a large number of members – made possible by low dues – is essential to creating a broad and diverse skill set and engineering expertise. This philosophy has been a key element of PICMG’s success.
There are three main governing documents:
- The Bylaws. These define how the organization is to be run and the duties of officers and members. Review Bylaws
- The Intellectual Property Policy. This Policy defines the responsibilities of anyone from a member company engaged in a standards development committee. It is designed to identify intellectual property early in the development process and procure licensing commitments, should that be appropriate. Members are required to identify IP they are personally aware of during the standard development process. The development committee can choose to incorporate it or not. IP that the owner is unable or unwilling to license under RAND (Reasonable and Non Discriminatory) terms is rejected. All PICMG members are required to offer RAND licensing of their IP to anyone if it is included in a standard. We do not expect any single member individual to know their company’s entire IP portfolio, but should some be discovered at some future date, the RAND licensing requirement ensures that implementers can’t suddenly be left out in the cold. Review IPR Policy
PICMG does not get involved in any actual licensing negotiations, but ensures that it is done. IP declarations are reviewed at several stages of the development process and again when the final ratification vote is taken.
- Policies and Procedures. This document defines the PICMG standards development process, which is very structured. It includes such things as technical committee officers and their duties, voting rules, disclosure rules, and the entire standards development process from beginning to end. Review Policies and Procedures
