Last November, the Small Business Standards (SBS) General Assembly elected new Board members for the 2022-2025 mandate. At the occasion, Fernando Sigchos Jiménez was elected as a Board member in his quality of former EBC Projects & Communication Manager, which has been confirmed after his nomination as the EBC Secretary General since 01 January 2022.
This new Board gathered for the first time on 20 January 2022 for an extraordinary meeting, with the purpose of electing the new SBS President, Vice-Presidents and Treasurer. Following the vote, Gunilla Almgren (SMEunited, the European association of SMEs) was re-elected as the SBS President until the end of 2025, while Samuele Broglio (Confartigianato Imprese, the Italian Association of Crafts and SMEs) became the new External Affairs Vice-President, and both Gérard Bobier (CMA France, the French Assembly of Craft Chambers) and Tim Krögel (ZDH, the German Confederation of Skilled Crafts) were re-appointed respectively as Vice-President Internal Affairs and as SBS Treasurer.
Since its creation in 2013, SBS established itself as the voice of European SMEs in standardisation, growing and becoming a key player in the standardisation community. With more than 60 experts in several fields, among which construction under the coordination of EBC, SBS today relies on a high-level of technical expertise and knowledge on national, European and international standards. The ambition is now to play an important role in the digital and green transition by putting efforts in increasing the SME representation in the development of standards that are key to the twin transition.
According to the SBS study “Key areas of standardisation for SMEs” published earlier in January, construction is part of the priority sectors for SMEs regarding standards-making, with at the top of the agenda topics such as the digital transformation, BIM, Augmented Reality, smart houses, eco-design and resource efficiency. The study confirmed the vital role of SBS to represent SMEs’ interest in standardisation, participating in Technical Committees at the European (CEN, CENELEC, ETSI) and international (ISO, IEC) levels, as well as the need to reinforce structurally to maintain and increase the level of efforts required to develop standards that are SME-friendly.
For more information on the new SBS Board, click here
For more information on the SBS Study “Key areas of standardisation for SMEs”, click here
