The STAR eXchange

STAR Meeting Wrap-Up

Written by Steve Zadoorian on February 12, 2010 – 2:39 pm

Well… I have never blogged. It may be hard to believe, and if you continue to read it will most likely become very clear that I am a blog virgin!

The day began with a cup of coffee and an early meeting with the STAR steering committee (I am the communications chair) to review our presentations for the day – thanks to Ghezal for keeping the SC organized. It was uneventful in process even though this member-funded and member driven organization is suffering through a difficult financial situation.

OK – so far “so boring”.

The STAR is like most meetings with an agenda and presentations. This general meeting was one of the better held in the last 3 years. Open discussion from members from VW, Toyota and PBS passionately stated their positions on the following:

How to increase membership, revenue and participation.
What direction should STAR move? Continue down a technical path or possible change the approach to business type services.
Should the standards be “sold”, or remain an Open Standard.
It is imperative that the “third party” service providers see value in STAR, and are enticed to join.

Guest speaker Shuvo Bhattacharjee from SAE presented an opportunity to develop a standard integration that would help dealers and OEM’s support the customer at an exceptionally high level by communicating diagnostic information from a vehicle directly to a dealership. This was well received by member OEM representatives.

There were many more ideas and discussions – many with merit and spirit.

Keynote speaker Chuck Allen presented many lesson’s learned from his involvement with HR-XML consortium and shared many lessons learned from working in and with other standards organizations.
At the end of the day the important take-away from this meeting: Member’s are confident that STAR is a valuable organization with much work to do, and effectively will thrive and survive as technology evolves within the Automotive Industry. There are many opportunities to “build the better mousetrap”, and STAR should lead the way.

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