HP and the OpenMPE advocacy group took steps to eliminate a conflict of interest by changing the status of HP’s representative on the OpenMPE board of directors. Jeff Vance, HP 3000 software engineer and the current co-chair of the SIG-Itanium special interest group, will now become the HP liaison to the board and relinquish his vote in matters before the OpenMPE group. Jon Backus, the OpenMPE board’s chairman, said that Vance and the board decided on the shift together. “The OpenMPE Board, including Jeff, decided it would be best to transition him to a non-voting HP Liaison to the board,” he said. “In my bi-weekly conference call with HP, it was decided that it would be best to make a change before it became a large problem.”

The problem with the board’s current composition was being observed both inside and outside HP, Backus added. “There has been increasing chatter within the OpenMPE community about the potential, or at least perceived, conflict of interest by having an HP employee as a full-fledged voting member of an organization that came to be because of an HP decision to end MPE sales and support,” he said. “Both OpenMPE Board members and people within HP were hearing these concerns.”

The OpenMPE board didn’t want to reduce its voting membership by one seat, however. So the group has named a new board member to replace Vance’s vote. John Wolff, a CIO and HP 3000 advocate who fell just a few votes short of earning a board seat in the latest OpenMPE election, has joined the OpenMPE board. “Since John ran in the last OpenMPE board election and was the next highest vote getter without having been elected, we decided to extend an offer to him,” Backus said. The chairman added that a vote at the OpenMPE board meeting of May 28 made the board membership changes official. Vance is continuing to work with the board in his new capacity.