OGC Announces New Leadership

The Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC) has announced new Consortium leadership, effective 1 March 2019. Dr Nadine Alameh is returning to OGC to serve as the CEO. She brings with her significant private-sector executive leadership experience, a strong background in standards development and deployment, and technical expertise across a range of domains including Earth observation, aviation, public safety and defence. As CEO, she has responsibility for creating and integrating the strategic direction and business plans of the organization in partnership with the OGC board, OGC members and staff.  

From 2009 through 2014 Alameh was a member of OGC staff, serving initially as a director, then executive director, of OGC’s Interoperability Program. Dr Alameh managed a diverse mix of testbeds, pilot initiatives and experiments as part of a global and unique hands-on agile prototyping and testing programme designed to unite users and technology providers in accelerating the development and innovation of standards-based interoperability. Dr Alameh is a graduate of MIT with a PhD in computer and information systems engineering, a master's in civil and environmental engineering, and a master's in city planning.

"I am excited to return to OGC as CEO and member of an exceptional leadership team. I look forward to working with OGC members, staff and the Board of Directors to channel our collective passion for interoperability, and to solidify OGC’s global position as an open collaboration forum that drives innovation for the location sector. We are living in an exciting and rapidly changing world where location continues to play an increasingly critical role," Nadine Alameh commented.

New OGC president and COO

Mr Bart De Lathouwer of OGC will become OGC president. He will assure the implementation of, and resourcing for, the OGC business plan and oversee OGC budget and finance administration, global member services, and business development. He will maintain his role as the general manager of OGC’s subsidiary operations in Europe.

Mr Scott Simmons of OGC will become OGC chief operations officer. Mr Simmons will focus on assuring day-to-day operational integrity and quality of OGC programmes and outputs so that they meet the needs of OGC’s membership and the global community. He assumes this position in addition to serving as executive director of OGC’s Standards Program. 

Dr Alameh, Mr De Lathouwer, and Mr Simmons will join Mr George Percivall, chief technology officer, and Mr. Jeff Burnett, VP for finance and administration, forming OGC’s senior leadership team.

“The Board of Directors is excited to announce the OGC leadership,” said The Honorable Jeffrey K. Harris, chairman of OGC. “Dr Alameh’s rich operational, analytic and domain-specific experience will position the Consortium to maintain its leadership role and mission in driving geospatial data interoperability. This leadership team is well qualified to leverage their experience to drive innovative solutions in support of the Consortium’s global community. The combined market, technology and mission expertise of this leadership is exceptional.”

Place-based understanding and decision-making

Since its inception in 1994, OGC has experienced significant growth and diversification in its mission activities, advancing freely available open geospatial standards and best practices worldwide. Through innovative development, testing and demonstration programmes, OGC has improved place-based understanding and decision-making for a range of social, environmental and economic domains.

OGC’s leadership will work with OGC members and the global community to build on its success in supporting the rapidly evolving market of location-enabled technologies, sensors and information sources, as well as the broadening array of communities of interest including public safety, water resources, environmental monitoring, energy, utilities, aviation, smart/resilient cities, indoor navigation and land administration.