San Francisco, California (March 25, 2003) - The International Cooperation for the Integration of Processes in Prepress, Press, and Postpress (CIP4) today announced the appointment of James E. Harvey to the position of Executive Director.
To date, public communication regarding CIP4's activities and its Job Definition Format (JDF) specification for print and publishing process automation had been managed primarily by volunteers from member companies. With increasing demand for more information and communication regarding the development of JDF, the CIP4 Advisory Board recognized the merit of having professional representation. In his capacity as Executive Director, Harvey will represent CIP4 at key industry events, developing presentations and technology updates on JDF, educational seminars to clarify issues related to JDF development and product implementation, user case studies to promote adoption of the JDF standard and an international outreach program to bring JDF programs to users at the local level.
"At this critical juncture of JDF implementation, it was important to bring on an executive director who is conversant with JDF," said CIP4's CEO Martin Bailey. "James Harvey more than fills this requirement with his history of working with CIP4 on the Job Definition Format specification. He not only has background with JDF and process automation, having written articles about JDF for various industry publications and given presentations on JDF at industry events, but also has a vast array of experience in standards implementation for various industry segments."
"I think this will be an exciting assignment," Harvey added. "I'm greatly impressed by the strong commitment vendors are putting into JDF development, and even more impressed by the degree of cooperation I've seen between vendors. I believe this will result in huge gains for our industry and look forward to working with both vendors and users through this transition to JDF. In two years the science of print production and publishing is going to look a lot different than its does today."
Harvey is president of Media4TheWorld, LLC, a technical and management consulting company serving the printing and publishing industries, in the metropolitan Washington, DC area. Since founding his business in early 2001, he has worked on new program development for the Technical Association of the Graphic Arts. Prior to starting Media4TheWorld, Harvey served as vice president of Spectrum Operations at Graphic Communications Association (now IDEAlliance), and was responsible for management of GRACoL (General Requirements for Applications of Commercial offset Lithography), the CtP Users' Group, the Industry Architecture Project, SPACE (Specifications for Agency Publisher Communications Exchange) and numerous other technical activities. He also managed many industry events include the Spectrum, Direct!, Impact!, ColorConnections, Meterology Workshops, and the Digital Smart Factory conference programs. Prior to GCA, Harvey was a business development manager at Volt Information Sciences where he pioneered SGML services and applications, CD-ROM publishing and hypermedia, and object-oriented document management for major publishers, corporations and federal agencies.
"CIP4 is pleased to have Jim working with us to communicate the need and potential of JDF to the industry." continued Bailey. "His experience working with the Technical Association of the Graphic Arts, Graphic Communications Association, Digital Ad Lab and other organizations will be critical to CIP4's success in raising awareness of, and interest, in JDF and JDF products, as well as implementing our strategic plan to promote the CIP4 agenda through other international organizations."