diff --git a/NEWS b/NEWS
index 67260778742..db41f732cad 100644
--- a/NEWS
+++ b/NEWS
@@ -7,6 +7,18 @@
 ##
 #
 
+## 1.8.1-RC1 (June 23, 2020)
+### Features:
+- Added binary release pipeline in Azure CI
+
+### Bugfixes:
+- Multiple fixes in testing environment
+- Fixes in InfiniBand DEVX transport
+- Fixes in memory management for CUDA IPC transport
+- Fixes for binutils 2.34+
+- Fixes in RPM SPEC file and package generation
+- Fixes for AMD ROCM build environment
+
 ## 1.8.0 (April 3, 2020)
 ### Features:
 #### UCX Core
diff --git a/configure.ac b/configure.ac
index 7e847280672..ed40bf02f7c 100644
--- a/configure.ac
+++ b/configure.ac
@@ -10,7 +10,7 @@ AC_PREREQ([2.63])
 
 define([ucx_ver_major], 1)
 define([ucx_ver_minor], 8)
-define([ucx_ver_patch], 0)
+define([ucx_ver_patch], 1)
 define([ts], esyscmd([sh -c "date +%Y%m%d%H%M%S"]))
 
 # This is the API version (see libtool library versioning)