DSL Forum

In early 1994, a meeting took place in New York at the offices of the International Copper Association. At that meeting were Alec Campbell of Gorham & Partners, consultants to the ICA, Debbie Sallee and Ciaran Connell of Motorola. After the formal meeting, the conversation centred on the need for a Forum to bring together all those individuals, companies and organisations with interests in developing and promoting ADSL.

The result was an agreement between Gorham & Partners and Motorola to organise an initial meeting in the summer or fall of 1994 to bring together all the key people active in ADSL in order to see what interest there was in creating an ADSL Forum. Alec Campbell asked one of his colleagues, David Greggains, to work on this with Debbie Sallee.

Motorola had already set-up, and were continuing to develop, a database of people active in ADSL. Debbie Sallee passed these names to David Greggains who started making telephone contact with the people around May of 1994. Quite quickly, it became obvious that there was great interest in developing a Forum. As a result, David Greggains started looking for a suitable place and time to hold an initial meeting.

Eventually, he found a venue in the centre of London close to the Houses of Parliament and Westminster Abbey, Church House, where the General Synod of the Church of England has its headquarters. The date of October 7th 1994 was agreed and invitations were sent to all those who had expressed interest in attending the first meeting. Thus a Forum working at the leading edge of technology held its first exploratory meeting in the shadow of the 900 year old Abbey and the A Mother of Parliaments.

Fifty-four people attended that first meeting, representing 43 organisations from 14 countries. Gorham & Partners put together an introductory program with a number of volunteer speakers; David Greggains Chaired the meeting, assisted by Debbie Sallee:

Welcome and Introduction
The Need for a Forum
The ADSL Market
Initial Proposals for Activities
Discussion Groups
Organisation Structure for a Forum
Selection of First Officers
Future Meetings - Proposals
Wrap-up

The Gorham staff led the four discussion groups which reviewed the proposed Forum activities and considered what other activities were needed.

The meeting ended with the nomination of a 14-person Interim Steering Group and a firm plan to hold the first full meeting of the Forum in San Antonio, Texas three months later in December 1994. The members of that initial Steering Group were:

Kim Maxwell	Independent Editions	Chairman
David Greggains	Gorham & Partners	Secretary
Dawn Diflumeri-Kelly	AT&T/Paradyne
Timothy Kreps*	Amati
Mark Handzel*	Orckit
Earl Langenberg	US West
Bill Rodey	Westell
Debbie Sallee	Motorola
Kamran Sistanizadeh	Bell Atlantic
Tom Starr	Ameritech
Alan Stewart	Network Interface Corp
Greg Whelan	Analog Devices
Gavin Young	BT
Federico Vagliani	Italtel

Peter Chow* and Izhak Tamir* had volunteered to join the Interim Steering Group but both were represented at the Chicago meeting by alternates as noted above.

The Interim Steering Group then met in Chicago on November 7th 1994. At this key meeting, the following actions were agreed:

Antitrust guidelines for Forum activities;
Appointment of Tom Furlong of Gary, Cary Ware and Friedenrich as Attorney;
A Mission Statement and Objectives;
Incorporation of the Form as a legal body;
Bylaws for the Forum;
Membership Dues;
The need for a Secretariat.

At this point in time, the Forum began to exist as a real entity and "the ball began to roll". The first formal Meeting then took place in San Antonio, Texas in December 1994.

At the next Meeting, held in London, in March 1995, the first elections took place for the Directors. The result of this election was the following Board:

At the Board election held in March 1996, Dan Arazi replaced Mark Handzel.

At the Board election in March 1997, Kim Maxwell resigned as Chairman and Director of the Forum and Martin Jackson of ATML and John Shelnutt of Alcatel were elected to the Board, Earl Langenberg having resigned when he left USWest; Hans-Erhard Reiter was elected President and Chairman and Bill Rodey was elected Vice-President and Treasurer.

Meetings of the Forum have continued to be held quarterly alternating between the USA and Europe. For locations and number of attendees, please click HERE (access is for members only)

A fact worthy of note is how closely the current work and organisation of the Forum continues to follow the proposals and outlines put forward at that first exploratory meeting held in London in October 1994!

In late 1999, the Board of Directors of the Forum, having widely consulted with the Membership, concluded that it would be more appropriate for the Forum to change its name to DSL Forum, dropping the "A" from the name. It felt that the adoption of the new name would demonstrate more clearly that the Forum is the all-embracing worldwide body covering all the varieties of DSL. The need for this change was underlined earlier in the year when the Forum agreed to set up a Symmetrical DSLs Working Group.

At the November 1999 Meeting of the Forum, held in Montreux, Switzerland, the Membership voted overwhelmingly in favor of the change of name. The actual change took place early in January 2000 with the ratification of the new name by the State of California where the Forum is legally registered as a corporation.

At the Fourth Quarter 2004 meeting in Orlando, Florida, past presidents met to talk about the past, present, and future of the DSL Forum. Click the link below to see their thoughts.

10 Year Anniversary: Forum Presidents' Reflections Paper - PDF