The Australasian Association for Information Systems (AAIS) was formed to connect this region’s vibrant Information Systems activities to the global IS community.
At a special meeting of the Australasian-based AIS members, held at ACIS 2001 hosted by Southern Cross University Coffs Harbour and chaired by Professor Michael Vitale (at that time the Immediate Past-President of the AIS), an Executive was elected for a new multinational AIS Chapter to represent the Australasian IS Community. The AAIS Executive met for the first time in Sydney in February 2002, to discuss how the group should proceed and what activities should be undertaken. The AAIS represents Australia, New Zealand and many nations in Oceania- 19 countries in all within AIS Region 3.
Pre-dating the formation of the AAIS, two significant community activities were already well established in Australia- an Australian-based conference and journal. Both were renamed as ‘Australasian’ to better represent this region. The management of both the Australasian Journal of Information Systems and eventually the Australasian Conference on Information Systems was inevitably transferred to AAIS as the only entity in the Australasian IS Ecosystem representing a global IS constituency.