Message from General Chairs

It is our great pleasure to welcome you all to APSIPA ASC 2021. This year's ASC will be held in a hybrid style due to COVID-19. This is the first challenge in the history of APSIPA ASC. The local venue is Ryogoku, Tokyo in Japan. To prevent the spread of infection, on-site participation will be limited to 100 participants. Under these circumstances, we were worried whether many people would submit papers and participate in the conference. Contrary to this, this year we received more than 440 submissions for both regular and special sessions, the largest number of submissions in the 13-year history of the APSIPA ASC. With the help of the reviewers and TC chairs, 182 papers were accepted for presentation and publication in the regular sessions. The acceptance rate is 67.5%. In addition, 31 special sessions were proposed, and 163 papers were accepted for presentation and publication. As a result, 343 papers will be presented in 47 sessions during the three days. All special sessions, keynotes, industry forum, women's event, and tutorials will be live streamed by zoom as real-time sessions. All presentations will also be recorded and uploaded to the virtual platform later. Meanwhile, all regular sessions, overview sessions, and research abstract sessions will be conducted as on-demand sessions on the virtual platform. Participants will be able to replay the recorded presentations and send questions to the authors on the virtual platform. For regular papers, there will be a live Q&A session at the virtual conference venue in gather.town. We hope that all presenters and audience will enjoy the sessions. At the closing ceremony, the best paper award will be announced.

This year, there will be three keynote lectures by distinguished scholars: Prof. Karlheinz Brandenburg, Prof. Shun-ichi Amari, and Prof. Min Wu. In addition, four overview sessions will feature 12 speakers who will present the latest information in specific technology areas. The day before the main conference, six tutorials on the theory and practice of technology will be offered. In addition, the Winter School will be held before the main conference.

Finally, we would like to thank all of the organizing committee members and volunteers who have worked so hard to make this conference a success. Although we will not be able to see all of you in person at the events and awards banquet, we hope that you will enjoy the entire program of APSIPA ASC 2021. Look forward to seeing you at APSIPA ASC 2022 in Chiang Mai!

General Chairs:
Yoshinobu Kajikawa, Kansai University, Japan
Toshihisa Tanaka, Tokyo University of Agriculture and Technology, Japan
Koichi Shinoda, Tokyo Institute of Technology, Japan
Anthony Kuh, University of Hawaii at Mānoa, USA