1.Introduction

It is a great honor to be elected President by the members of this institute. After years of research activities at Osaka University, I had the opportunity to manage the university as its President. Currently, I am engaged in the management of a national research institute as the President of the National Institute of Information and Communications Technology (NICT), an incorporated administrative agency. Today, I would like to share with you my thoughts about what role the Institute of Electronics, Information and Communication Engineers (IEICE) should play in solving the problems that confront us in order to advance Japan's science in general, and electronics, information and communication engineering in particular. Although what I am going to say today will be nothing new, I still find it necessary to say it. The fact that I need to say it is actually the very problem that confronts Japan, and I believe that the first step in solving this problem, together with you through the IEICE, is to revive our awareness of this issue anew.

The science and technology problems that face Japan are so great that isolated attempts at solving them by individual universities and other educational organizations, national research institutes, R&D organizations within private enterprises, and engineering societies fall far short of what is needed. It is important that they work together in tackling these problems. It is important that individual organizations clearly recognize the roles they should play based on this premise. This is true whether we are working on human resource development, or strategies to improve international relations or R&D.

I will start by focusing my attention mainly on the transformation of national universities into incorporated administrative bodies, an endeavor I undertook as President of Osaka University. After that, I will introduce the activities of the National Institute of Information and Communications Technology, where I serve as President. Finally, drawing on my experiences in these activities, I will offer my thoughts on the roles this Institute should play, and the direction it should take.