WARRENDALE, PA-Mark P. Zachos, founder and CEO of DG Technologies (DG), was honored with the SAE International L. Ray Buckendale Lecture Award during the SAE 2010 Commercial Vehicle Engineering Congress and Exhibition, held last fall in Rosemont, IL.

In addition to receiving the award, Zachos had the honor of delivering the lecture, which deals with automotive vehicles for on-or off-road operation in commercial or military service. Established in 1953, the award honors the memory of L. Ray Buckendale, 1946 SAE President, who had a strong desire to develop the potential abilities in young people. In his honor, the lecture is directed primarily to the needs of young engineers and students.

Zachos based his presentation on the SAE International technical paper, “Merge Ahead: Integrating Heavy-Duty Vehicle Networks with Wide Area Network Services.”

At DG Technologies, Zachos is responsible for the company's overall operating business as well as promoting, selecting, developing and integrating advanced enabling technologies that support all of DG Technologies’ programs and strategic initiatives. He is also responsible for new technology "mining" and commercialization, and for the technical direction of all DG products and services.

Zachos was elected to SAE International’s Board of Directors in 2010 for a three year term, responsible for redefining SAE's strategic direction, providing leadership that links SAE International’s members to the operating organization and ensuring organizational performance on a macro level. He has been very active in SAE Technical Committee work for more than 20 years; he serves as vice chairman of both the Vehicle E/E Diagnostics Committee and the Vehicle Systems Network Architecture Committee, and is a contributing member of the SAE Truck and Bus Communications Sub-Committee. Also, Zachos is chairman of the J2602, J2561, J2411, J2178, J1699-3, J1939-82 and J1939-84 Task Forces.

Zachos has had direct involvement with the development of more than 20 technical standards relating to vehicle networking; organized, authored, and co-authored dozens of technical papers and led technical sessions at the SAE World Congress and other SAE International and industry events; participated with SAE Internationals and industry in the development of OBD-2 technology providing the U.S. EPA and the California Air Resources Board (CARB) with new technical standards for diagnostics of vehicle emission systems; organized an SAE TOPTEC on Future Technology for Vehicle Communications; actively recruited new SAE International members; and contributed on behalf of SAE International to other technical organizations including many ISO Working Groups and IEEE.

Zachos is a past recipient of SAE International’s Forest R. McFarland Award and the Technical Standards Board Outstanding Achievement Award. SAE International is a global association of more than 128,000 engineers and related technical experts in the aerospace, automotive and commercial-vehicle industries. SAE International's core competencies are life-long learning and voluntary consensus standards development. SAE International's charitable arm is the SAE Foundation, which supports many programs, including A World In Motion® and the Collegiate Design Series.