The Huddle 2021 - 5G and Beyond: The Wireless World in 2030

Nigel Jefferies is a senior standards manager with Huawei Technologies and Chairman of the Wireless World Research Forum, a global partnership between industry and academia to develop a research agenda for mobile communications. Previously he was Head of Academic Relationships within Vodafone Group Research & Development and a Principal Mathematician at Racal Research Ltd. In the past he led the European-funded IST project SHAMAN, which studied the security of future mobile systems, and ran the Secure Applications Steering Group for Mobile VCE. Other collaborative research projects on various aspects of security for mobile communications include 3GS3 in the UK-funded LINK programme, and ASPeCT and USECA in the European ACTS programme. His research interests include cryptography, security of systems and applications of mathematics to telecommunications. He received a PhD in functional analysis from Goldsmith’s College, London, and an MA in mathematics from the Queen’s College, Oxford, and is a visiting professor at Kingston University. He is a Fellow of the Institute of Mathematics and its Applications and a Chartered Mathematician.

Robert Ghiz is President and CEO of the Canadian Wireless Telecommunications Association (CWTA). He serves as an Advisor on numerous Boards including the Prince’s Trust Advisory Council, the True Patriot Love Foundation, the Librarian Archives of Canada Foundation, and he is also Chair of the Mobile Giving Foundation Canada. Twice elected Premier of Prince Edward Island, Robert’s many accomplishments include his successful stewardship of PEI’s economy through the 2008 global financial collapse and his contributions to its record-setting economic growth following the recession. While Premier, Robert also led successful trade missions in Europe, Asia, South America and the United States. Robert is proud to be the Canadian wireless industry’s champion in Ottawa, where he works to ensure the industry continues to enhance the personal lives and economic opportunities of Canadians across the country.

Bio will appear here shortly.

Doreen Bogdan-Martin was elected Director of the ITU Telecommunication Development Bureau in November 2018 and took office on 1 January 2019, and is the first woman in ITU history to hold one of the organization’s top elected management positions.

She is a strategic leader with more than 30 years’ high-level experience in international and inter-governmental relations, and a long history of success in policy and strategy development, analysis and execution. ​

She was an architect of the annual Global Symposium for Regulators, the pre-eminent global event for digital policy-makers, and leads ITU’s contribution to the EQUALS Global Partnership for Gender Equality in the Digital Age. For more than a decade she has served as Executive Director of the UN Broadband Commission for Sustainable Development, and is leading ITU’s collaboration with UNICEF on the Giga project to connect all the world’s schools.

Ms Bogdan-Martin is a frequent speaker at top-level international policy events, and is spearheading ITU’s new Youth Strategy to more actively engage with the young people who are driving the next wave of digital transformation.

She holds a Master’s degree in International Communications Policy from the American University in Washington, DC and a post-graduate certificate in Strategies for Leadership from the Institute for Management Development in Lausanne, Switzerland.

She is an affiliate of the Harvard University Berkman-Klein Center for Internet and Society, and is a Generation Unlimited Champion and a Champion of the EDISON Alliance led by the World Economic Forum. She serves on a number of advisory bodies, including the Geneva-Tsinghua Initiative, the SDG Lab Advisory Board, the UN Technology Innovation Labs, and the Alumni Expert Council of the Internet Governance Lab of the American University in Washington D.C. She is also a qualified amateur radio operator.

Ms Bogdan-Martin is married with four children

Luis Jorge Romero, Director General of ETSI, has 30 years of experience in the telecommunications sector.
At ETSI he has initiated a global standardization partnership for Machine to Machine communications, oneM2M. He has overseen the rapid development of ETSI’s Industry Specification Groups accelerating market penetration of new technologies and has enabled the first Open Source group in ETSI.

Luis Jorge has also successfully positioned the institute to take a leading role in 5G standardization through the 3GPP global partnership project and through initiatives such as ETSI’s Multi-access Edge Computing, Millimetre Wave Transmission and Network Functions Virtualization groups. He is now driving the implementation of the ETSI Strategy, an ambitious plan to prepare the institute for the future.

Previously he has held diverse Director positions in Spain, Morocco and Mexico, predominantly with Telefonica. As Global Director for International Roaming and Standards, and Director of Innovation and Standards, he oversaw Telefonica’s participation in global standardization activities, and participated directly in the work of the Next Generation Mobile Networks (NGMN) Alliance and in the GSM Association (GSMA). Before joining ETSI in July 2011, he held the position of Director General of Innosoft and was also a partner and board member of the Madrid-based Innology Ventures.

Dr Mike Short CBE , after 30 years in telecommunications with Telefonica, joined the Department for International Trade as the department’s first chief scientific adviser in December 2017.
Mike leads the science and engineering profession in the department and ensures its policy is informed by the best science, engineering and technical advice. He advises on the technical aspects of future trade deals as DIT looks to create new arrangements following Brexit, and works with the UK’s research, development and academic communities to boost scientific and engineering exports.
Mike has over 40 years’ experience in electronics and telecommunications and served as vice president of Telefonica, the parent company of the O2 mobile phone network, for 17 years to December 2016. In this post, he managed the launch of 2G (GSM) and 3G mobile technologies in the UK, and led research and development for Telefonica Europe. His career also includes the promotion of international technical standards in mobile technology, and he is also a former Chairman of the Global GSM Association, the UK Mobile Data Association, and president of the Institution of Engineering and Technology.
He is currently a visiting professor at the universities of Surrey, Coventry, Leeds, Lancaster and Salford, where in recent years he has led the development on collaborations in areas such as smart cities, digital healthcare, cybersecurity and driverless vehicles.
He was honoured with a CBE in 2012 for his services to the mobile industry.

Dr. Rawat is President and CEO of Expert Strategies International, a consulting firm, advising national and international entities on policies and regulations for wireless services and technologies. In 2014 she became an Officer of the Order of Canada (O.C.) for her “contributions to telecommunications engineering and for leadership in establishing the global regulatory framework for radio spectrum management”. In June 2019, Dr Rawat received an honorary doctorate from University of Ottawa, Canada. In 2020 she joined WWRF (Wireless World Research Forum) as a member.

Between 2011-14, Dr. Rawat worked as Vice President and Ambassador to ITU for BlackBerry. During 2004-11, Dr. Rawat was President of Communications Research Centre, the only Canadian federal government research lab conducting R&D in wireless technologies (terrestrial, satellite and broadcasting technologies). Before heading CRC, Dr. Rawat spent 28 years within the Canadian Government where she held executive positions managing programs related to radio frequency spectrum engineering, policy and regulations for wireless  services. 

Dr. Rawat has had many “firsts” in her career, a trail blazer, starting from first female PhD in 1973 in Electrical Engineering from Queens University, Kingston, Ontario, to being the first female (and first Canadian as well) ever to chair ITU’s (a United Nations body) highest level meeting WRC (World Radio Conference) in 2003 for which she was awarded ITU’s gold medal by the Secretary General.  Other key awards are: IEEE for Public Service in Communications – 2012; from the Govt of Canada the highest Public Service Award of Excellence – 2011; From Canadian Women in Communications’ Canadian Woman of the Year – 2004; Canadian Women’s Executive Network’s Canada’s Most Powerful Women, Top 100 (2005); and by ICOBC (Indo Canada Ottawa Business Chamber) Award of Excellence in 2014 and Professional Woman of the year in 2005.

Alex Roytblat is Vice President of Worldwide Regulatory Affairs at Wi-Fi Alliance, where he is responsible for the organization’s overall regulatory strategy. In his role, Alex works with Wi-Fi Alliance members and the executive team on the development of regulatory objectives and directs advocacy for the implementation of these objectives with governments, regulators and international organizations.

With over 20 years of experience in the field of international telecom regulations, Alex is an internationally recognized industry advocate. Prior to joining Wi-Fi Alliance, Alex served at the United States Federal Communications Commission (FCC), where he was involved in all phases of domestic and international radio spectrum management processes. Previously, Alex held technical roles for Stanford Telecommunications and Booz Allen & Hamilton. He holds a Master of Science in Communications Networks from Johns Hopkins University and a Bachelor of Science in Electrical Engineering (Eta Kappa Nu) from George Mason University.

Michèle Beck is Telesat’s Senior Vice President, Canadian Sales responsible for both Enterprise and Broadcast sales in Canada. Ms. Beck joined Telesat in 1987 where she began her career in engineering developing new products in digital video compression, HDTV and direct-to-home satellite services. She was then hired by the Canadian Cable Telecommunications Association serving as their Vice President Technology.

In 2006, Ms. Beck returned to Telesat as Director, Engineering responsible for all satellite service offerings including R&D, enterprise, broadband and broadcast. She soon was appointed Director, North American Enterprise and Government Sales where she built an impressive record enabling Telesat customers to achieve operational efficiencies and meet other business goals by applying her expertise in technical, commercial and regulatory matters.

Promoted to her current position in 2013, Ms. Beck holds a BA Sc., Electrical Engineering from the University of Ottawa.

As a CTO of Ericsson Silicon Valley, Dr Mallik Tatipamula leads evolution of Ericsson’s technology and champion the company’s next phase of innovation and growth. Prior to Ericsson, he held several leadership positions at F5 networks, Juniper networks, Cisco, Motorola, Nortel and Indian Institute of Technology (Chennai). During 30 years of his professional career, he has played a very unique leadership role in delivering industry’s most powerful innovations, standards contributions, products/solutions, design implementation of early real-world deployments working with telecom operators, and also innovating for the future, working with academia, by anticipating what might happen next, to accelerate the architectural transitions in the telecom industry. He has identified strategic opportunities, and implemented programs that have brought world-leading innovations to the telecom sector with a multi-billion dollars impact, launching over 50 products/solutions that are deployed in global telecom networks to enable these major network transitions from 2G to 5G.

Since 2011, he has been a visiting professor at King’s College London, where world’s 1st 5G network was demonstrated together with Ericsson and Vodafone. He is a Fellow of Canadian Academy of Engineering (CAE) and The Institution of Engineering and Technology (IET, UK). He received “Univ. of California, Berkeley’s Garwood Center for Corporate Innovation Award,” “CTO/Technologist of the year” award (sponsored by NTT) by World Communications Awards (WCA), “IEEE Communications Society (ComSoc) Distinguished Industry Leader Award,” “CTO of the year (2021) award from Silicon Valley Business Journal (SVBJ)”, and also “IET Achievement medal in telecommunications”, in recognition to his long-lasting impactful contributions to the telecommunication networks evolving from 2G to 5G and beyond. He has Ph.D. in Information and Communications Engineering from the Univ. of Tokyo, Japan, Master’s in Communication Systems from Indian Institute of Technology, Chennai, India and Bachelor’s in Electronics and Communications Engineering from NIT, Warangal, India. He delivered lectures and taught courses at UC Berkeley, Univ. of Tokyo, Stanford and other universities. He mentored over 100 undergrad/graduate students, delivered 400+ keynote/invited talks/tutorials/lectures, co-authored 2 books, 100+ publications/patents, served on 40+ IEEE conferences committees.

He has been involved in developing industry-academia partnerships in Canada, US, UK, Europe and India for future technology innovations especially in the areas of 5G, Edge compute, AI, and early 6G research, working with NSF (USA), NSERC (Canada), EPSRC (UK) and European Commission. He serves on several advisory boards including Global Semiconductor Alliance, Gartner/Evanta CIO Council, Digital India Initiative, London Digital Twin Research Center, Chair for the Industry Advisory Board for Garwood Center for Corporate Innovation and, Advisor to Center for Growth Markets at UC Berkeley and Council of Advisors for Jacobs School of Engineering at UC San Diego.

Eric Hardouin leads the “Ambient Connectivity” research domain of Orange, which investigates future access and transport networks and technologies, as well as related business models. Eric received his Ph.D. degree in signal processing and telecommunications from Telecom Bretagne and the University of Rennes 1, France, in 2004. Since 2004, he has been with Orange, where he has conducted research on interference mitigation for mobile networks. Between 2008 and 2013 he represented Orange in the physical layer standardization group of 3GPP (RAN WG1) for HSPA, LTE and LTE-Advanced. From 2012 to 2015, Eric led the research on wireless networks in Orange. Eric had a leading role in the NGMN 5G White Paper, as co-lead of the work on 5G requirements. Eric is the author of the book “LTE et les réseaux 4G” (in French).

Marja Matinmikko-Blue is Research Director of the Infotech Oulu Institute and Director of Sustainability & Regulation at 6G Flagship at the University of Oulu, Finland, where she also holds an Adjunct Professor position in spectrum management.

Marja completed her Doctor of Science degree in communications engineering in 2012, and Doctor of Philosophy degree in industrial engineering and management in 2018 at the University of Oulu. She has been conducting multi-disciplinary research into the technical, business, and regulatory aspects of future mobile communication systems in close collaboration with industry, academia, and regulators for over two decades. Marja has coordinated several national research project consortia that have successfully demonstrated new technology including the world’s first licensed shared access (LSA) spectrum sharing trials and the introduction of a new local 5G operator concept, which has become a reality in many countries. She has actively contributed to, and participated in, regulatory bodies at the national, European, and international levels. She also coordinated the preparation of twelve 6G White Papers at the 6G Flagship (the first White Papers on 6G in the world) and led the development of the White Paper on 6G Drivers and the UN Sustainable Development Goals. She has published 170+ scientific papers and prepared 150+ contributions to regulatory bodies.

Ruth Pritchard-Kelly is an expert on satellite regulatory policy with over 30 years of experience. She is currently the Senior Advisor for Regulatory & Space Policy at OneWeb where she advises a global team of legal & technical policy analysts. Pritchard-Kelly has also worked at O3b (now SES Networks) and American Mobile Satellite Corporation. She has a Master’s Degree in space and telecommunications policy from George Washington University and a J.D. from the University of Maryland. Ms. Pritchard-Kelly is on the board of the US Telecommunications Training Institute and is a member of the Advisory Committee for the Secure World Foundation.

Bio will appear here shortly.

Dr Lysko is an engineer, researcher and innovator with an interest in wireless communications and networking. He holds a PhD from the Norwegian University of Science and Technology.

He has worked in both industry and academia in Europe and Africa. While at the CSIR, his leading experimental research in television white spaces (TVWS) enabled the provision of the Internet to over 20 000 users in two African countries and the setting up of the South African National TVWS Regulation,  and he also contributed to TVWS regulations in Ghana and the USA.

He has authored three patents, a book, two book chapters, over 100 research papers, popular science and news articles, and led production of several technology demonstrators.

Dr Lysko’s professional achievements have been recognised through multiple awards, including international IEEE awards, invitations to deliver plenary, keynote and other talks as an invited guest, as well as in serving in the General Chair and Technical Chair roles in several international IEEE conferences.

Professor and Jarislowsky Chair in Water and Global Health, and Canada Research Professor. Development of innovative technologies for wastewater and biosolids treatment and optimization; fate and removal of pathogens, emerging contaminants and nanoparticles; real-time monitoring; bioenergy from wastewater and sludge; disinfection; public health engineering; water and sanitation in indigenous communities and developing countries.

Mohammad is responsible for the strategic coordination of cross-government and international activities for the UK’s 5G Testbeds and Trials Programme. This includes working with stakeholders to facilitate and develop links to maximise the benefits for the UK from 5G research and development.

Prior to joining DCMS, Mohammad was with the Canadian federal public service for 6 years, where he held various roles driving strategic R&D&I policies in key growth sectors from 2013 to 2019.

As President and CEO of CENGN, Jean-Charles (JC) Fahmy provides leadership and strategic direction to the company and drives the delivery of CENGN’s mission by working with the ICT ecosystem on the goal of the commercialization, growth, and global competitiveness of Canada’s innovation economy.

JC has over 25 years of global leadership experience in tech, creating value and accelerating business performance with large public companies as well as both Private Equity and Venture Capital backed businesses.  Prior to CENGN, JC held several senior leadership roles including Vice President of Product Management & Business Development at Coriant, and Operating Executive in the Telecom practice at Marlin Equity Partners, a leading Private Equity Firm.

JC holds an MBA from McGill University, and a BASc in Electrical Engineering from the University of Ottawa.

Mr. Onoe has worked for NTT and NTT DOCOMO since 1982, acquiring more than 30 years of experience. Prior to his current position, he was President of DOCOMO Technology, Inc. from June 2015 to June 2021. From June 2012 to June 2017, he was Chief Technology Officer and Executive Vice President and a Member of the Board of Directors of NTT DOCOMO. He took various positions of Managing Director of R&D organizations within NTT DOCOMO as Senior Vice President and Vice President from July 2002 to June 2012.

He has been responsible for leading initiatives in the research and development of the analog cellular system (1G), the digital cellular system (2G), W-CDMA/HSPA (3G), LTE/LTE-Advanced (4G), 5G and beyond.

Mr. Onoe has a master’s degree in electronics from the Kyoto University Graduate School of Engineering. He is a candidate for the next Director of the ITU Telecommunication Standardization Bureau in the election at the Plenipotentiary Conference of the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) to be held in September 2022.

Bio will appear here shortly.

Dr. Peiying Zhu, Senior Vice President of Wireless Research, is a Huawei Fellow and IEEE Fellow. She is currently leading 5G and beyond wireless research in Huawei. The focus of her research is advanced wireless access technologies with more than 200 granted patents. She has been regularly giving talks and panel discussions on 5G vision, enabling technologies and standards. She served as the guest editor for IEEE Signal processing magazine special issue on the 5G revolution and IEEE JSAC on Deployment Issues and Performance Challenges for 5G. She co-chaired various 5G workshops in IEEE GLOBECOM. She is actively involved in 3GPP and IEEE 802 standards development. She is currently a WiFi Alliance Board member.

Prior to joining Huawei in 2009, Peiying was a Nortel Fellow and Director of Advanced Wireless Access Technology in the Nortel Wireless Technology Lab. She led the team and pioneered research and prototyping on MIMO-OFDM and Multi-hop relay. Many of these technologies developed by the team have been adopted into LTE standards and 4G products.

Mérouane Debbah is Chief Researcher at the Technology Innovation Institute in Abu Dhabi. He is an Adjunct Professor with the Department of Machine Learning at the Mohamed Bin Zayed University of Artificial Intelligence. He received the M.Sc. and Ph.D. degrees from the Ecole Normale Supérieure Paris-Saclay, France. He was with Motorola Labs, Saclay, France, from 1999 to 2002, and also with the Vienna Research Center for Telecommunications, Vienna, Austria, until 2003. From 2003 to 2007, he was an Assistant Professor with the Mobile Communications Department, Institut Eurecom, Sophia Antipolis, France. In 2007, he was appointed Full Professor at CentraleSupelec, Gif-sur-Yvette, France. From 2007 to 2014, he was the Director of the Alcatel-Lucent Chair on Flexible Radio. From 2014 to 2021, he was Vice-President of the Huawei France Research Center. Since 2021, he is leading the AI & Telecom Systems center at the Technology Innovation Institute. He is an IEEE Fellow, a WWRF Fellow, a Eurasip Fellow, an AAIA Fellow, an Institut Louis Bachelier Fellow and a Membre émérite SEE.

Prof. Ari Pouttu has scientific and engineering experience as a researcher, project manager and research manager in various domains of ICT development. The projects under his command have resulted in waveforms and system designs for military radio communication, radar systems, embedded device networks, future wireless radio communications including cellular systems, cognitive networks and navigation applications.
He has published more than 70 conference or journal papers in the field of wireless communications and he holds two patents. He is the principal investigator of 5G test network (5GTN) experimental research, and vice-director of the national 6G Flagship Programme targeting 6G solutions including wireless solutions for business verticals such as energy, industry, health and automotive.

Mr. Mario Maniewicz was elected Director of the ITU Radiocommunication Bureau at the ITU Plenipotentiary Conference 2018 in Dubai, United Arab Emirates. He took office on 1 January 2019.

Mario Maniewicz is an electronic engineer specialized in telecommunications. He has been with the ITU for over 30 years, where he has served in high-level management positions in the Radiocommunication and Development Sectors as well as in ITU Regional Offices.

As Director, Mr. Maniewicz is responsible for the management of the Radiocommunication Bureau, which organizes and co-ordinates the work of the Radiocommunication Sector whose aim is to ensure the rational, equitable, efficient and economical use of the radio-frequency spectrum and satellite orbits.

Venkatesh Sampath joined Ericsson Canada in January 2008, and is currently working as the Director of Regulatory Affairs and Standards Policy. In this role, Mr. Sampath has the dual responsibility of coordinating Government and Industry Relations (GIR) and carrying out technology and standardization activities related to present and future mobile wireless networks.
Mr. Sampath works closely with Industry Canada and the International Telecommunications Union (ITU) on spectrum and technology matters. He is the Chair of the Canadian Evaluation Group and is a Canadian delegate to the ITU.
Prior to Ericsson, Mr. Sampath worked as a private consultant from 2003-2007 for various companies both in the United States (Nexius, Nextel, Flarion Technologies) and Canada (Oz Communications, Trio Capital) in a mainly technology capacity such as the testing of base-station and user equipment to get the CE mark, laboratory and field testing of Flash-OFDM networks.
Between 1996 and 2002, Mr. Sampath was with Microcell Telecommunications, where he was Director of the R&D/Standardization group.
Mr. Sampath holds an M.Sc. and a Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering – both from Université Laval (Québec city). He is a Senior Member of the IEEE.

Angeliki Alexiou is a professor at the department of Digital Systems, ICT School, University of Piraeus. She received the Diploma in Electrical and Computer Engineering from the National Technical University of Athens in 1994 and the PhD in Electrical Engineering from Imperial College of Science, Technology and Medicine, University of London in 2000. Since May 2009 she has been a faculty member at the
Department of Digital Systems, where she conducts research and teaches undergraduate and postgraduate courses in the area of Broadband Communications and Advanced Wireless Technologies.
Prior to this appointment she was with Bell Laboratories, Wireless Research, Lucent Technologies, (later Alcatel-Lucent, now NOKIA), in Swindon, UK, first as a member of technical staff (January 1999-February 2006) and later as a Technical Manager (March 2006-April 2009). Professor Alexiou is a corecipient of Bell Labs President’s Gold Award in 2002 for contributions to Bell Labs Layered Space-Time (BLAST) project and the Central Bell Labs Teamwork Award in 2004 for role model teamwork and technical achievements in the IST FITNESS project. Professor Alexiou is the Chair of the Working Group on Radio Communication Technologies and of the Working Group on High Frequencies Radio Technologies of the Wireless World Research Forum. She is a member of the IEEE and the Technical Chamber of Greece. Her current research interests include radio interface for 5G systems and beyond,
MIMO and high frequencies (mmWave and THz wireless) technologies, cooperation, coordination and efficient resource management for Ultra Dense wireless networks and machine-to-machine communications, ‘cell-less’ architectures based on virtualization and extreme resources sharing and machine learning for wireless systems. She is the project coordinator of the H2020 TERRANOVA project
(ict-terranova.eu) and the technical manager of H2020 ARIADNE project (ict-ariadne.eu).

Dr. Almazrouei has the distinction of being the first Emirati to hold a PhD in artificial intelligence for wireless communication engineering and computer science. Dr. Ebtesam joins TII with a track record of innovation in advanced technologies and a proven ability to realize the adaptation of artificial intelligence (AI) solutions, big data, the Internet of Things (IoT), and wireless emerging technologies for multiple industrial applications. An award-winning public speaker, she is a patent inventor and a scientific author at top-ranking conferences and leading journals.

Dr. Almazrouei delivers big data and AI training courses for various entities across the UAE. Recently, she led a Deep Learning and Artificial Intelligence for Robust Radio Signal Intelligence project. As part of the project, the team developed intelligent spectrum monitoring using AI schemes to identify various radio access technologies and provide robust summary radio access statistics. She has led multiple projects in partnership with British Telecommunications (BT) in the UK, as well as Etisalat, and Khalifa University in the UAE.

Dr. Almazrouei said: “I was always interested in future-focused technologies and kept an eye on what was happening around the world. I saw that AI and the Internet of Things (IoT) were the next breakthrough technologies that will drive the digital economy and decided to steer my career along this path. The UAE government’s initiative of launching its national AI strategy in 2017 reiterated the importance of technological advancements through AI.”

Dr. Ebtesam Almazrouei obtained her PhD and MSc in Electrical and Computer Engineering from Khalifa University of Science and Technology and earned a BSc in Communication and Electrical Engineering from the United Arab Emirates University.

Dr. Emilio Calvanese Strinati obtained his Engineering Master degree in 2001 from the University of Rome ‘La Sapienza’ and his PhD in Engineering Science in 2005. He then started working at Motorola Labs in Paris in 2002. Then in 2006, he joined CEA/LETI as a research engineer. From 2007, he becomes a Ph.D. supervisor. From 2010 to 2012, Dr. Calvanese Strinati has been the co-chair of the wireless working group in GreenTouch Initiative which deals with design of future energy-efficient communication networks. From2011 to 2016 he wasthe Smart Devices & Telecommunications European collaborative strategic programs Director between December 2016 and January, 2020 is was the Smart Devices & Telecommunications Scientific and Innovation Director. Since February 2020 he is the Nanotechnologies and Wireless for 6G (New-6G)Program Director focusing on future 6G technologies. December 2013 he has been elected as one of the five representatives of academia and research center in the Net!Works 5G PPP ETP.From 2017 to 2018 he was one of the three moderators of the 5G future network expert group.Between2016 and 2018 he wasthe coordinator of the H2020 joint Europe and South Korea 5GCHAMPIONprojectthat showcased at the 2018 winter Olympic Games, 5G technologies in realistic operational environments. Since July 2018 he is the coordinator of the H2020 joint Europe and South Korea 5G-AllStar project. Since 2018 he holds the French Research Director Habilitation (HDR).In 2021 he started the coordination of the H2020 European project RISE-6G, focusing on the design and operation of Reconfigurable Intelligent Surfaces in future high frequency 6G networks. Since February 2021 he is also the director of the New-6G (Nano Electronics & Wireless for 6G) initiative, dedicated to the required convergence between microelectronic & telecom, hardware & software, network & equipment for upcoming 6G technologies.

E. Calvanese Strinati has published around 140 papers in international conferences, journals and books chapters, given more than 200international invited talks, keynotes and tutorials. He is the main inventor or co-inventor of more than 65patents. He has organized more than 100international conferences, workshops, panels and special sessions on green communications, heterogeneous networks and cloud computing hosted in international conferences as IEEE GLOBCOM, IEEE PIMRC, IEEE WCNC, IEEE ICC, IEEE VTC, EuCnC, IFIP, EUCnC and European Wireless.

Bio will appear here shortly.

Shiro Fukumoto is the Director of Standardization Department at SoftBank Corp., responsible for spectrum-related international standardization activities in ITU-R, APT and 3GPP for both companies.

He has around 15 years experience in the telecommunications sector addressing regulatory and technology standardization aspects. He played a leading role in key discussions on HAPS at WRC-19, ITU-R and APT, making major contributions to the establishment of WRC-23 agenda item 1.4 (additional identifications of HAPS frequency bands) as an APT rapporteur, chairing the HAPS drafting group in ITU-R Working Party 5D to develop a new ITU-R document (the group was later incorporated into the newly established group responsible for WRC-23 agenda item 1.4) and developing a new APT report on technical and operation analysis for HAPS.

He is also working for the vice-Chair of Telecommunications Working Group in HPAS Alliance.

Eric Hardouin leads the “Ambient Connectivity” research domain of Orange, which investigates future access and transport networks and technologies, as well as related business models. Eric received his Ph.D. degree in signal processing and telecommunications from Telecom Bretagne and the University of Rennes 1, France, in 2004. Since 2004, he has been with Orange, where he has conducted research on interference mitigation for mobile networks. Between 2008 and 2013 he represented Orange in the physical layer standardization group of 3GPP (RAN WG1) for HSPA, LTE and LTE-Advanced. From 2012 to 2015, Eric led the research on wireless networks in Orange. Eric had a leading role in the NGMN 5G White Paper, as co-lead of the work on 5G requirements. Eric is the author of the book “LTE et les réseaux 4G” (in French).

Dr. Edward G. Tiedemann, Jr. is an IEEE Fellow, a Qualcomm Fellow, and a Senior Vice President of Engineering of Qualcomm Technologies, Inc. He leads Qualcomm’s worldwide standardization and industry organization activities. Dr. Tiedemann was instrumental in the design and development of the TIA/EIA/IS-95 CDMA system, also called cdmaOne™. He has been active in every G since then. Dr. Tiedemann has almost 300 granted US patents and has participated in many papers, conference lectures, and industry panels. He is interested in multiple topics in communications including 5G and beyond, IoT, and V2x.
Dr. Tiedemann holds the Ph.D. degree from MIT where he worked in the areas of queueing theory and communications networks. He holds the Master of Science degree from Purdue University and the Bachelor of Science degree from Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University (Va Tech).
Dr. Tiedemann is past chairman of the Advisory Board of the College of Engineering at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University (Va Tech). He currently sits on the Advisory Board of the Purdue University School of Electrical and Computer Engineering, the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (HKUST) School of Engineering Advisory Committee, and the International Advisory Panel of the Singapore Future Communications Research & Development Programme. Dr. Tiedemann currently serves as the IEEE Communications Society as Director, Standards Development. He was General Chair of IEEE GLOBECOM 2015. He is also a member of the Board of Advisors of the Peabody Essex Museum and a member of the Board of Trustees of the Concord Museum. He has received numerous recognitions, including the Robert M. Walp Industry Humanitarian Award from the IEEE Communications Society.

Bernard Barani joined the European Commission in 1994 after 11 years as a Communication engineer in the industry working on military optical systems and in the European Space Agency on advanced Satcom programmes. He is currently Deputy head of unit for “Future Connectivity systems” in the European Commission. In this position, he has been leading the definition and implementation of the 5G Public-Private Partnership launched in 2013 to support 5G European R&D. Main field of activities covers strategic R&D planning and implementation including future beyond 5G systems, standardisation, international cooperation, demonstration and pilot programmes. He is also vice-chairman of the Steering committee of the EUCNC conference showcasing telecom research sponsored by the EU programmes. He has an engineering degree from the “Ecole National Supérieure des Télécommunications de Bretagne”.

Mr. Bharat Bhatia has over 45 years of experience in Telecom and ICT policy, regulations and spectrum management.

Mr. Bhatia is the President of ITU-APT Foundation of India. Mr. Bhatia also chairs the PPDR working groups under ITU and APT. Earlier he was also the President of TEMA – India’s Telecom Equipment Manufacturers Association and Vice President of ATIS -Association of Telecom Industries of Singapore. Earlier he was also head of international spectrum team of Motorola Solutions Inc. where he worked for over 23 years in India and Singapore. Mr. Bhatia is also a governing council member of WWRF.
Mr. Bhatia actively participates in various ITU and APT meetings and has attended all World Radio Conferences during the last 20 years. Mr. Bhatia has lived in India and Singapore and frequently travels all over the world to speak at various conferences and events.
Bhatia was the key originator of ITU World Radio Conference Resolution (WRC) 646 on PPDR approved at WRC-2003 and 2015.
He was a senior regulator with the Indian Government for 22 years as a spectrum regulator and Telecom policy specialist and was actively involved in opening of the Indian telecom to the private sector, including the first ever GSM metro licensing in India through a beauty contest in 1992 designed by him. He was also a key architect of India’s first ever National Frequency Allocation Plan (NFAP) in 1981 and the first ever published NFAP in 2000.
Mr. Bharat Bhatia holds a B. E. degree from University of Delhi in Electronics and Telecommunications and is a fellow member of IETE, the Institution of Electronics & Telecommunications Engineers. He did his Foundational Course from Lal Bahadur Shastri National Academy of Administration in 1976. Mr. Bhatia has completed a number of management courses from various institutes and universities including National University of Singapore and George Washington University.

Bio will appear here shortly.

Alexander Kuhn is a Senior Government Official at the German Federal Network Agency (BNetzA).

He is Deputy Head of Section “International Frequency affairs, frequency utilization concepts and the frequency usage plan” and the preparation for World Radiocommunication Conferences is under his responsibility. He lead the European countries (CEPT) at WRC 2015 and 2019.

Charley Lewis (PhD, MComm) has extensive experience across the field of ICT sector policy and regulation, ranging from telecommunications and broadcasting to broadband and the Internet. His knowledge and expertise cover a wide array of key areas. These range from universal access and service, through the digital divide, consumer protection, quality of service, statistics, and indicators, to spectrum management and the 4th industrial revolution.

Dr Lewis’ varied career includes teaching Mathematics and English at high school level; Information Systems Analyst; Head of IT at COSATU (Congress of SA Trade Unions); Senior Lecturer at the University of the Witwatersrand; and Independent Analyst and Researcher. He has managed and taught professional development and academic courses on ICT policy and regulation to policy-makers, regulators, and industry practitioners.

Dr Lewis holds a BA Hons in English, a Higher Education Diploma, an M Comm in Management of Information Systems, and the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. He is a published author, with his book, Regulating Telecommunications in South Africa: Universal Access and Service (Palgrave Press, 2020) following on from the research for his award-winning PhD thesis.

Dr Lewis served on the Ministerial Task Team on Post-Covid-19 Economic Response Strategy, having previously been appointed to serve on South Africa’s national ICT Policy Review Panel (2012-2015).

In August 2020 Dr Lewis was appointed by the Minister of Communications and Digital Technologies to serve a four-year term as Councillor at the Independent Communications Authority of South Africa. He was further recently appointed as an Adjunct Professor at the University of the Western Cape.

Bio will appear here shortly.

Gary Clemo is currently Data Innovation Director at Ofcom, where he is responsible for the creation, operation and evolution of a new function intended to transform the way the organisation obtains, analyses and extracts insights from data. Prior to this he spent eight years delivering a range of technical strategy projects at Ofcom, before becoming project director for Ofcom’s work on mapping the coverage and performance of the UK’s communications networks. Before joining Ofcom, Gary managed a team of wireless and mobile researchers at Toshiba’s Telecommunications Research Laboratory in Bristol. He holds a PhD from the University of Bristol.

RK Saxena in an IRRS officer with more than 30 years of experience of Administrative, managerial and Technical Experience in the field of Radio Spectrum management at national and international level. He also served as the Wireless & Planning & Coordination wing/ Wireless Monitoring organization (WPC Wing/WMO). RK Saxena is currently responsible for the 28 Wireless Monitoring Systems (WMS) spread all over the country which include 5 international Monitoring systems (IMS) and 1 International Satellite Monitoring Earth Stations (ISMES).