DotAsia Board Elections 2022

• December 27, 2021 (Mon) – Seating of the Board Election Committee
• December 28, 2021 (Tue) – Nomination Period Begins (4 weeks)
• January 25, 2022 (Tue) – Nomination Period Ends
• January 30, 2022 (Sun) – Nominations Report sent to the Board
• January 31, 2022 (Mon) – Voting Period Begins (2 weeks) (if necessary)
• February 4, 2022 (Fri) – Call for Annual General Meeting (AGM)
• February 14, 2022 (Mon) – Voting Period Ends

• February 27, 2022 (Sun) – Annual General Meeting
• February 27, 2022 (Sun) – New elected Board members assume office

Arthur CHANG

Candidacy Statement | SOI

I am humbled and honored by my nomination to the DotAsia Board of Directors, which should enable me to contribute to the development of an interesting community-based Top Level Domain.

I have had over 30 years of experience in the Information Technology Industry, starting as the first Asian-Pacific Managing Director for Versign (and its previous Network Solution Inc.), and culminating in various Entrepreneurial Ventures. My most recent startup, UCO Cosmetics Ltd. is a beauty e-commerce company with (annual) Gross Merchandise Volume of USD3 Billion+ in 2021 and over 3000 staff.

As a director, I hope to help DotAsia to operate more cost effectively, work with the ccTLDs to provide greater incentives to promote .ASIA and with ICANN Registrars to sell both .ASIA and its Member ccTLDs globally.

In a time of rapid consolidation in the Industry, I hope to help steer Dotasia and advise its member ccTLDs through the perils and pitfalls of a fast evolving industry, from moving Registries to the cloud, outsourcing tasks for greater efficiency, and finding new Revenue streams.

As a serial entrepreneur with vast experience in working with multiple partners, board of directors and shareholders, I well understand and appreciate the role played by a Board of Directors. It should be a confederacy of co-thinkers, professionals and champions of the company they were elected to lead. I will do my best to ensure that the boardroom is going to be a venue for balanced, well thought out, and substantiated decisions in pursuance of the community’s best interests.

It goes without saying that being a Director means complying with the highest ethical standards and I would like to assure you that it has always been my credo- I would hardly imagine a corporate success story not based on genuine integrity.

I regard my nomination as a credit of trust on the community’s part and will be happy to repay it to the best of my humble ability.

I am greatly looking forward to the Board elections and hope for the community’ kind support.

Che-Hang CHANG (Arthur)
2022 Jan

Candidate BIO

Mr. Chang has over 30 years of sales, marketing and general management experience in the information technology and internet industries. He is also a serial entrepreneur with 3 companies found in the mobile, Internet and E-commerce arena.

Prior to founding the latest eBeauty Group, which is a USD3Billion+ GMV e-commerce company with over 3000 staff, Mr. Chang served as the Vice President of Global Sales at Alibaba.com Limited, a leading e-commerce company in China which was listed on the Stock Exchange with stock code 1688 prior to its privatization (“Alibaba.com”). Before joining Alibaba.com in January 2008, Mr. Chang was an executive director and chief executive officer of Green Tomato Limited, a company specializing in mobile enterprise solutions. Prior to that, he was Managing Director, Asia Pacific at VeriSign (Nasdaq: VRSN) from 1999 to 2002 and General Manager at General Data Systems Co. Ltd., a joint venture of GEIS International Inc..

Mr. Chang received a bachelor’s degree in computer studies from the University of Hong Kong and a master’s degree in business administration (MBA) from the Chinese University of Hong Kong in Hong Kong, in November 1988 and December 1996 respectively.

Leonid TODOROV

Candidacy Statement | SOI

Dear dotAsia Sponsor Members:

This is to express my profound gratitude for your confidence in me and encouragement to stand for the dotAsia Board.

I believe that my experience in the government, private sector and academia and the one at APTLD in particular should enable me to serve on the dotAsia Board to benefit the dotAsia community in quite a number of areas:

Corporate governance: Thanks to my 7 year-long experience with APTLD and great mentors on its Board, I have got a clear vision of how to engineer changes at the Board and organization’s level to promote the best corporate governance practices in the boardroom and the executive management levels. I will be happy to share my knowledge with, and contribute with my skills to, dotAsia for the betterment of its policy and operational environment.

Also, it is imperative to bring back the community consultation and review mechanisms such as, "the collaborative community-based, bottom-up approach that has made the Asia Pacific Internet groups …. so successful… and… Critical issues that affect the community (e.g. decision on surplus allocation) may also be open for public commenting". If elected, I will suggest further steps to promote an open and participatory decision-shaping process.

Lastly, I believe that the Board oversight mechanisms should be reviewed to have it exercise a due control on the community’s behalf over the executive management’s activities, and I will be happy to promote respective good practices, including the much-needed checks and balances system.

Back to the roots: at its onset, DotAsia Organisation claimed that it was going to be a membership based corporation and I believe dotAsia should renew its pledge and become truly responsive, accountable and member-oriented, and I will be happy to support the process to the best of my ability.

Leveraging reputational challenges. Regretfully, dotAsia’s reputation appears to have been battered recently by a number of conflicts and disputes. As a Board Director, my focus will also be on developing and promoting broad consensus within the Board to restore the company’s public image and renew the community’s trust in it. The community should enjoy the right to know each Board Director’s opinion on each specific matter, which should bolster the community’s trust in the Board and its commitment to transparency and accountability.

Focus on the core operation. While dotAsia org can be highly commended for an active contribution to the promotion of IG processes across the region, the number of registrations in
.Asia TLD has been in decline. The case should be further examined to identify ways and means of reversing the disturbing tendency based on the Sponsor Members’ rich experience.

In conclusion, I regard your proposal for me to stand for the dotAsia Board and the nomination and seconding as a vote of confidence, and I will be keen to meet your expectations. I guess you know me well enough to agree that I am always keen to deliver on what I promise.

You can always reach me on these and other matters at lovtodor123@yandex.ru

Candidate BIO

Leonid Todorov earned his M.A. in Linguistics from Moscow State Pedagogical and completed postgraduate studies in international relations, management and business leadership, and economics in Denmark, Taiwan and the US.

Since the onset of the Russian reforms, he served for more than a decade as Chief of Staff to the late PM Yegor Gaidar. His background also includes private sector and academic activities.
In 2008, he joined the Сoordination Сenter for .RU top level domain as Head of Government and International Relations and contributed to the successful launch of the Cyrillic-script IDN ccTLD .РФ and the launch of new gTLDs . ДЕТИ (kids) and .TATAR.

In February 2015, he was appointed as General Manager of the Asia Pacific Top Level Domain Association (APTLD).

As a member of the RIGF Organizing Committee, Leonid has also been engaged in creation and promotion of the Russian Internet Governance Forum. He was also sitting on the Multistakeholder Steering Group of the Asia Pacific Regional Internet Governance Forum (APrIGF) until 2020. In 2013-2014, he sat on the ISOC Advisory Business Council and currently holds membership in a number of community councils including the CCNSO Standing Committee on ICANN Strategic and Operational Plan, the dotAsia Registry Advisory Council, and the High-Level Advisory Council of the World internet Conference (China, among others.)

Leonid also is a faculty member of the European Summer School on Internet Governance and the Asia Pacific Internet Governance Academy, and an advisor to the Asia Pacific Internet School on Internet Governance .

Leonid’s focus is on ccTLDs’ operation, Internet governance, new gTLDs, public policy and international cooperation in the ICT area, and cybersecurity. He has authored and coauthored a number of publications on these issues, and presented at various national and international events.

He is married and resides with his wife and family in Moscow, Russia.

Maureen HILYARD

Candidacy Statement | SOI

I have been on the Board of DotAsia since 2016 and I have been very honoured to be part of a vibrant organisation working with people who care about the business of promoting the DotAsia domain, as well as supporting community projects across the Asia-Pacific region. A couple of years ago, I worked with Atsushi Endo of JPRS to establish a more formal governance structure to ensure that the voices of individual Board members can contribute to Board Governance, Finance and Community Project activities. I have been very proud of the work that the Board and the Organisation have done during my time on the Board, and also to have had the opportunity to be the Chair of DotAsia. It hasn’t been the easiest past two years, but I would like to continue as a Board member to complete some activities that are still outstanding. I know that I already have a good team and would appreciate working with them again in whatever capacity the Board decides. If you have any questions I’d be happy to respond at hilyard@oyster.net.ck .

Candidate BIO

Maureen Hilyard’s former career was in primary teaching which led to moving to the NZ Correspondence School (TCS) in 1989. She started at a time when the internet was first being introduced to connect distance learners with their teachers, based at the school in Wellington. Her role as a Regional Representative based in Auckland was to introduce distance learners – from preschool to adults, including people with disabilities – to the “virtual classroom”. After 15 years with TCS, Maureen moved to the Cook Islands Ministry of Education in 2004 as a distance learning facilitator. This required working with the local telecom to connect the 13 outer islands schools to the internet; negotiating with TCS to redesign their programmes to meet the needs of distance learners of another culture; and training government Ministry personnel and school staff on technical and governance issues relating to the internet as a communication and learning tool.

Maureen joined the Internet Society following her first PacINET in Samoa in 2006 where she met Vince Cerf whose continued support has been a real asset for internet development in the Pacific. She coordinated a PacINET in 2008 on Rarotonga, and joined the PICISOC Board in 2009. She was their Board Chair from 2011-2014 with her main focus being to advocate for global support for affordable and sustainable internet connectivity in the Pacific.

Maureen attended her first IGF as a Fellow with the Diplo Foundation at Hyderabad in 2008, and then was an ISOC Ambassador at Sharm el Sheik in 2009. She helped to coordinate the first Pacific IGF in Noumea in 2011 as well as a number of PacINET meetings and training workshops in various Pacific countries during her term on the Board. She attended previous APrIGFs in Japan (2012) and Korea (2013). In 2014 she was selected as a Pacific participant in a Policy Diplomacy programme organised by the Diplo Foundation. In 2015 she represented the Pacific to work with other Asian NGOs and CSOs to put together and submit the Asia-Pacific WSIS+10 Non-paper to the UN.

She attended her first ICANN meeting as a Fellow in 2010 in Cartegena and became involved in At-Large policy development up until her next meeting in Costa Rica in 2012. She became the ccNSO Liaison to the ALAC in 2013 when she was elected onto the ALAC. Maureen is currently in her second term on the ALAC representing the Asian, Australasian and Pacific Islands Organisation (APRALO). She is a member of the ALAC Leadership Team.

On Rarotonga, she is the President of the Cook Islands Internet Action Group which lobbies government about internet issues and supports IT graduates to undertake projects in their interest areas. She is a member of the Telecommunications Advisory Committee which meets with the Minister to advise him about internet and telecommunications issues.

Maureen’s day job is a development consultant mainly working with the Development Cooperation (Aid) Division of the Ministry of Finance. She is the UNESCO Commissioner for Information and Communication. Development projects she have managed were attached to the Office of the Prime Minister (eGovernment), the National Environment Service (Hazardous chemicals) and the Ministry of Internal Affairs (Gender equality and women’s economic empowerment). She also worked as a Development Programme Coordinator with the NZ High Commission on Rarotonga.

Maureen has an Advanced Diploma in Teaching, Bachelor of Business, Post-Graduate Diploma in Business and Administration and Master of Management.

Murad IBRAGIMOV

Candidacy Statement | SOI

I am honored to have been nominated for the dotAsia Board and pleased to have an opportunity to present my vision on its development and my role in the process.

I am also proud to be the first ever representative of Central Asia to be nominated for the dotAsia Board. If I am elected, I hope to bring up the voice of the region which despite its name had until recently been a remote periphery in the internet development and Internet Governance areas. I believe dotAsia will benefit from yet another voice in the very diverse chorus across Asia Pacific.

For quite a while, dotAsia was out of touch with quite a number of its founding Members and I have found its recent attempts to be a positive development. However, engagement efforts should be guided by a clear understanding of an ultimate objective, which has not been demonstrated as yet. I am sure there are many positive things we can do together and as a Board Director I will be happy to set up such a goal (s).

As a seasoned expert in journalism, marketing and PR I noticed a number of shortcomings in dotAsia’s communications with the community and I will be happy to assist in increasing their efficiency and making them more targeted and relevant for both the membership and the world.
Witnessing various community and corporate governance initiatives and policy making both at my organization and APTLD, I hope to share my knowledge with the dotAsia fellow Directors and staff to build on such success stories and ensure a meaningful contribution to the Board’s activities in these areas.

I would also like to help dotAsia expand and streamline its capacity building efforts to make sure all the community members can equally benefit from them.

Finally, if elected, I pledge to serve on the Board diligently and objectively, and perform my fiduciary duties in accordance with the best corporate practices and in strict compliance with the spirit and letter of the Hong Kong law. I will remain open and accessible, and responsive to the community’s inquiries, requests and recommendations, which I will certainly convey to fellow Board members and if necessary, translate into dotAsia’s action.

Candidate BIO

Born in 1972 in Tashkent, Uzbekistan, Murad quite early displayed a keen interest in media. At the age of 10 he published first reports for a local youth newspaper and later worked at a local radio station as a reporter and RJ.
After enrollment in the Department of Journalism of the Tashkent State University he began to work at the National TV company as a news reporter and pioneered the local media market with his own show Computer Asia .

His TV journalism career was topped by the position of Editor-in-Chief of a nationwide TV channel.

His expertise and marketing skills took him to the hi-tech area in which he introduced to the Uzbekistani market such global players as Intel, Microsoft, and Fujitsu and was later running a local office of a large international system integrator.

Presently, Murad is the Chief Marketing Officer and Policy Lead of UZINFOCOM, a State System Integrator and the ccTLD registry for .UZ . In that capacity he has contributed to an explosive growth of the ccTLD, which expanded nearly 4-fold in just a two-year span, and to a successful deployment of DNSSEC in Uzbekistan.

Murad is fluent in Uzbek, Russian and English

He is married and resides with his wife and children in Tashkent, Uzbekistan

Nicole CHAN

Candidacy Statement | SOI

As an Internet and ICT Industrial Consultant and Lawyer, currently Board Director of Dot Asia, former Regulator of Taiwan (2016~2019), and also have engaged in these areas, including Domain Names business and ADR, from different roles for many years, I truly believe that we can work together to promote trustworthy environment, technological innovation, consumer interests, and advanced usage of DN and Internet on an universal acceptance and benefits basis.

I am a qualified Practicing Lawyer with 30 years of experience and also play different and important roles in various departments and organizations which includes private sectors, academia and even the Government Regulator. Currently I am also the ICANN ASO/AC (reappointed by APNIC and serving until Dec.2022) and within the duration worked as the Board director of DotAsia (2020~2021) and ICANN ASO/AC(2021) in the past few years, I helped the achievements including completing the Governance Documents of DotAsia, processing the collaboration projects with Internet Communities, and
the election of No.9 seat of ICANN Board.

I believe, in these pandemic and probably endemic and new normal times, the Asia-Pacific region working together to support the regions Internet
community is more important than ever, and the Internet Society can also play more important roles to help the world for the recovery and transformation into
Digital Economy.

I believe that I will be able and ready for the DotAsia’s mission implementation. With my experience, I would like to contribute to the DotAsia
and Internet community to build and promote best practices and an accountable governance structure.

Candidate BIO

Nicole T. I. Chan is an attorney at law and industrial consultant. Current position and engagement includes Board director of Dot Asia (serving until Feb. 2022), ICANN ASO/AC (reappointed by APNIC and serving until Dec.2022), Vice Chair of Digital Transformation Association, as well as many distinguished positions in the areas of Internet and Technology law, policy making and strategy.

Nicole is a frequent speaker, panelist and moderator of domestic, regional and global Internet, technology, and digital transformation related conferences, such as APNIC and APrIGF, TWNIC, APNIC and ICANN Engagement Forum, APSIG, SIGGRAPH, etc. Previous roles have included Chairperson of National Communications Commission (NCC), Taiwan.

When she took the position of Chairperson of NCC Taiwan, Nicole was responsible for planning the 5G and IoT regulatory development of Taiwan, coordinating the National high level of Security Strategic Project, and also co-working with TWNIC for promoting and implementing the Internet Governance and multi-stakeholders model within Taiwan and connect to the APNIC, ICANN, and other Internet International Organizations. And also deeply involved in the Internet and technology development issues raised and discussed by the Internet society,

When Ms. Chan worked as the Board director of Dot Asia and ICANN ASO/AC in the past few years, she helped the achievements including completing the Governance Documents of DotAsia, processing the collaboration projects with Internet Communities, and the election of No.9 seat of ICANN Board.

Nicole’s areas of expertise include Internet Law, Intellectual property law, international cyberspace law and jurisdiction, internet governance, cybersecurity, Regulatory Mechanism, and many vertical domain Industries such as Electronic, Health Care, Audiovisual and film, etc, and the relationship with Internet Organizations making her an excellent candidate to offer academic and practical knowledge to the DotAsia. Especially, she has been dedicating to the promotion of law-making on Digital Convergence Regulations in Taiwan so that she has consolidated her highest level of understanding on the Internet-based industries.

Nicole is a graduate of University of LONDON, UK and National Taiwan University, qualified as a lawyer in Taiwan. Her areas of expertise include Science & Technology Law, Intellectual Property Law, Telecommunication Regulations and Policy, Internet Jurisdiction and Policy, Internet Governance, Cybersecurity Governance, Internet & e-Commerce Regulation, Creative Industry Regulation and Management, Hi-tech & creative Industry Policy, Enterprise Investment & Management…, etc.