Dear colleagues, fellow professionals, engineers, scientists and practitioners,

COVID has presented us with some challenging times and, as a result, our way of working and delivering our professional activities has probably changed for good.  We are fortunate that advancing technology is at the heart of IEEE’s mission, vision and values and this has enabled our Section to continue to serve our membership with conferences, workshops and webinars, whether fully online, hybrid or in-person, with great success.

In 2022, we ensured that our membership continued to have the opportunity to access our Section meetings which were held in Scotland and Ireland.  In 2023 we plan to continue that philosophy with meetings in Wales and England, ensuring that when my time as Chair comes to an end, we will have demonstrated our commitment to our four main geographic areas.

It was my great pleasure to collect multiple awards on behalf of our Section at the IEEE Region 8 meeting in Cairo in October 2022.  These awards recognise the dedication and commitment of our ExCom and Section Officers for all their hard work, support and enthusiasm.

We had an excellent end to 2022, with Dr Hayaatun Sillem delivering the Section’s traditional Christmas Lecture, “An Engineering Profession Fit for the Future” which was an eye-opener for what awaits the engineering profession.

In 2023, we shall continue our commitment to Diversity, Equality and Inclusion (DEI) as well as our strong support for our Young Professionals and Student branches who will become our leaders and ambassadors of the future.

As Chair, I am immensley proud to lead the UK and Ireland Section of IEEE and I look forward to working with you all in 2023.

Prof Izzet Kale
Chair, IEEE UK and Ireland Section