The Board consists of eight members from A3's affiliated association boards.

(Ann Arbor, Michigan, USA - January 22, 2014) - The Association for Advancing Automation (A3) 2014 Board of Directors was announced today during the A3 Business Forum in Orlando, Florida. Dean Elkins, Sr. General Manager, Yaskawa Motoman, is the new Chairperson of the Board.

"It is truly an honor to be named as Chair of A3," said Elkins. "The chance to help proliferate automation along side extremely talented industry advocates representing robotics, vision, and motion control is an exciting opportunity. I look forward to furthering the A3 mission of demonstrating a very strong business case of why it is imperative to automate processes across a wide variety of industries in order to remain globally competitive. Supporting RIA, AIA, and MCA in spreading their respective messages of how to automate will be a very satisfying opportunity."

The Board consists of eight members from A3's affiliated association boards. Representing the Robotic Industries Association (RIA) along with Elkins is Catherine Morris, ATI Industrial Automation and Stu Shepherd, KUKA Robot Group. Representing AIA - Advancing Vision + Imaging is Greg Hollows, Edmund Optics; Steve Mott, Components Express, Inc.; and Rusty Ponce de Leon, Phase 1 Technology and Vice Chair of the A3 Board. Representing the Motion Control Association (MCA) is John Hegel, American Control Electronics and Bill Steury, Cross Automation. Jeff Burnstein, A3 President, is also a member of the Board.

Elkins is replacing as Chair Michael Cyros, President, Allied Vision Technologies, Inc., who is retiring from the board after more than a decade of dedicated service to A3.

About Association for Advancing Automation (A3)

The Association for Advancing Automation is the global advocate for the benefits of automating. A3 promotes automation technologies and ideas that transform the way business is done. A3 is the umbrella group for Robotic Industries Association (RIA), AIA - Advancing Vision + Imaging, and Motion Control Association (MCA). RIA, AIA, and MCA combined represent 750 automation manufacturers, component suppliers, system integrators, end users, research groups and consulting firms from throughout the world that drive automation forward.

For more information, please visit our websites: A3, RIA, AIA, MCA.