Elias Rafoul, Vice-President of the Accreditation Services Branch at the Standards Council of Canada (SCC) has been elected Treasurer of the InterAmerican Accreditation Cooperation (IAAC). He has also been made a member of IAAC’s Executive Committee.
IAAC was created in 1996, in Montevideo, Uruguay. Its mission is to promote cooperation among accreditation bodies and interested parties of the Americas, aiming at the development of conformity assessment structures to achieve the improvement of products, processes and services. IAAC is a not-for-profit body that functions on the basis of cooperation by its members and interested parties.
“Engaging in international accreditation forums brings value to Canada,” said Chantal Guay, Chief Executive Officer at SCC. “Standards and accreditation cross borders and touch people and industries around the world. It is therefore important for SCC to be actively involved with organizations such as IAAC. This strengthens Canadian business and the national economy.”
At SCC, Elias is responsible for the Accreditation Services Branch. Previously, he was Director General, Business Management Support, at the National Research Council (NRC) for three years. Prior to that, he was Managing Director for Nexus Telecom (Americas) Inc., a Swiss-based telecommunications company with operations in Canada, and has worked for several leading Canadian high-tech companies, including Nortel and Newbridge Networks.
Elias holds a Master of Computer Science degree from the Telecommunication Software Engineering Program at the University of Ottawa, and a Bachelor of Science degree with Honours, also from the University of Ottawa.