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Annie Turner has researched and written about telecoms since the late 1980s in a number of roles — as editor of business titles including for International Thomson and The Economist Group, contributor to national newspapers such as The Times and FT, and as an analyst for Market Mettle and Current Analysis.
Patrik Rokyta is the VP of Systems Architecture at NetNumber, that delivers interGENerational signaling, security, routing and global data solutions to the telecommunication industry.
Patrik has been with NetNumber since 2013. His focus is on the use of the cloud-native technologies in the public/private cloud, and in virtual infrastructure environments. Over his seven years with NetNumber, Patrik has been instrumental in helping communication service providers build economic and effective telecommunication networks including the 5G core. In addition, Patrik and his team are responsible for architectural issues in the areas of telecommunication system security, delivery and deployment automation, OSS integration, network service management, and orchestration.
Prior to joining NetNumber, Patrik was with Nokia Siemens as a Product Manager with a focus on customer projects and deployments in the LTE data, VoLTE, VoIP and Unified Communications space.
Patrik holds a PhD in electrical engineering from the Technical University of Ilmenau, Germany and is based in Munich, Germany.
Israel Katz has over 20 years of experience in satellite communication. In the past year, Israel rejoined Gilat Satellite Networks as Global Sales Engineering Manager working with sales and product teams on strategic accounts around the world.
Previously, Israel served for 3 years as a product manager at Amos-Spacecom, and before that he served for 17 years invarious technical positions at Gilat which included, among others, designing cellular backhauling solutions for MNOs.
Israel holds a bachelor’s degree in Electronics and Science in Education from Holon Institute of Technology.
Kim Larsen, CTIO, T-Mobile Netherlands
Since the beginning of 2019 and with the acquisition of Tele2 Netherlands by T-Mobile Netherlands, Kim has led the technology transformation journey of integrating and migrating Tele2 Netherlands to the ever-growing TMobile Netherlands company. Kim’s previous roles include working as the CTIO of Magyar Telecom, Hungary, as well as Ooredoo Myanmar respectively. Kim has also held prominent roles at Deutsche Telekom in Bonn Germany, including as their Senior Vice President of Technology Economics & Transformation, as well as their Senior Vice President of Technology Architecture & Innovation, Group Technology. Together, Kim has amassed more than 20 years’ worth of experience in the telecommunication industry, holding various national and international leadership and senior management roles. He holds a Ph.D. degree in Physics and a master’s degree in Physics & Mathematics. Kim is known as a techno-economical strategist and blogger (techneconomyblog.com, aistrategyblog.com) with a keen interest in value-based technology transformations, innovation, and the anatomy of great customer experience. Among many things, Kim has been developing a blueprint for Deutsche Telekom’s network-centric big data architecture to support all network needs including the diverse use cases and requirements of a modern telecommunications network. In this work, Kim identified early on the importance of anomaly detection as an integrated path of an innovative modern Telco stack. He is driving various applied machine learning initiatives, aggressive network automation, and how to get more data science competences into the telecom industry. Kim is passionate about technology transformation, innovation, and the strategic and economic impact of new technologies such as 5G SA, Telco cloud, Telco automation, autonomous networks, and ML/AI.
Joann currently leads the Digital Ecosystem and Labs initiatives at TM Forum. She is a transformative technology leader who recognizes the importance of APIs, 5G, IoT and automation in achieving a true digital strategy. Joann has led the TM Forum’s Open API initiative from concept to global success as an enabler to the zero-integration economy and has significant experience leading complex large-scale transformation programs for a number of global organizations. The Digital Ecosystem program is currently exploring the role and impact of emerging technologies on different industry verticals including healthcare, manufacturing, media/entertainment and smart cities. She has a mixture of technical and management background, enjoying both equally. Joann has a BS in Information Technology majoring in Telecommunications from Dublin City University and MBA from Open University.
Dr. Terje Jensen is Senior Vice President at Telenor heading up both the Global Network Architect team and the 5G Readiness strategic program. The first role spans all network domains (RAN, transport, cloud platform, core) and setting directions for future technical solutions by defining targets, detailing guidelines, outlining solutions and executing pilots. This is a global team implying there are persons from all Telenor units and markets engaged. The 5G Readiness program addresses technical, commercial, strategic and business environment topics for all Telenor markets, which ensures that insights are readily available for main decisions and implementation. Collaboration with operators, vendors, industry fora and others are also part of the tasks across the different domains. Terje has more than 3 decades experience in the telecom area from a number of positions within areas like operations, planning, strategy and research. This includes engagements in several countries and international projects. He authored more than 200 publications.
Dr. Richard Benjamins is Chief AI & Data Strategist at Telefonica. He was named one of the 100 most influential people in data-driven business (DataIQ 100, 2018). He is also co-founder and Vice President of the Spanish Observatory for Ethical and Social Impacts of AI (OdiseIA). He was Group Chief Data Officer at AXA, and before that spent a decade in big data and analytics executive positions at Telefónica. He is an expert to the European Parliament’s AI Observatory (EPAIO), a frequent speaker at AI events, and strategic advisor to several start-ups. He also was a member of the European Commission’s B2G data-sharing Expert Group and founder of Telefonica’s Big Data for Social Good department. He holds a PhD in Cognitive Science, published over 100 scientific articles, and is author of the books “The myth of the algorithm: tales and truths of artificial intelligence” (Spanish) and “A Data-Driven Company”.
Paul Beastall is strategy director at Cambridge Consultants, a global product development and technology consultancy firm providing outsourced R&D and technology strategy services for clients around the world. He is also a member of UK5G’s Advisory Board and member of its Testbeds and Trials working group. Throughout his career, Paul has been focused on the use of innovative technology to solve business and societal problems. This has included time working with clients in operators, equipment developers and users of 5G services to help them develop solutions that take advantage of developments in communications technology to deliver new use-cases, business models or approaches. Paul worked for the UK Government on the early technical solutions for the Emergency Services Network, which will deliver mission critical services for first responders over a public access network. Most recently he has been working with a global consumer packaged goods company, leading a team developing a connected solution, using AI to generate insights for user and provide a route for direct relationships between our client and their customers. Previously, Paul was BT’s Chief Wireless Broadband Architect and led global presales engineering for a mm-wave mesh wireless broadband start-up.
Kurt started his career in the Telco industry in 1999, at Alcatel-Lucent, where he soon started an international career, serving in various positions for entities in Asia, Middle East and Europe. He was then joining Nokia for 5 years and Ericsson for 6 years, where he took over several management positions in various countries. He was responsible for heading Network Services for Central and Eastern Europe, overseeing Ericsson’s business and heading an international unit, spanning 7 countries. In 2018, Kurt joined A1 Telekom Austria Group where he started as 5G Program Manager, being responsible for the orchestration of the 5G program and driving the 5G strategy for A1 Telekom Austria Group across all markets, promoting the implementation of E2E use cases and prototypes on technical and organizational level. He also aligned industry cooperation with vendors and partners. In 2019, Kurt was appointed head of Network Evolution within the Group Technology & Future Services area, where is in in charge of driving the evolution of networks from a strategic and architectural point of view within the domains of access, transport and core of A1 Group’s fixed and mobile operations. He is responsible for the 5G, Automation and Service Orchestration Programs of A1 Telekom Austria Group from end-to-end perspective, including related IT, BSS and OSS System evolutions. Kurt is also a member of the Supervisory Board of Freeeway, an IoT start-up based in Vienna, and a member of the Board of the NGMN Alliance. Kurt held various leadership positions in Alcatel-Lucent and Nokia, as well as Supervisory Board positions of related affiliates. His background is in the domain of radio engineering and planning.
David has been with SS8 since 2015 and has significant experience in critical network architecture technology and advanced data analytics. He is responsible for working with both intelligence agencies and Communication Service Providers (CSPs) around the world and is instrumental in helping them transition to 5G, defining system requirements to meet regulatory compliance. As a member of ETSI, he represents SS8 to ensure the adoption of cloud native infrastructure is met with industry best practice and to guarantee that compliance of lawful interception is maintained. Prior to joining SS8, David worked at Allot Communications in both Europe and Asia, where he specialised in Deep Packet Inspection and Video Optimisation. Over his 22 years in the telecommunications industry, he also held various management positions at companies including Vodafone, 3UK and Ericsson, where he was responsible for all UK Core Network Systems.
Sultan is the newly appointed Director of Healthcare for BT’s Enterprise unit. He is an experienced executive with a passion for digital innovation and has had a distinguished career in the NHS spanning two decades. Prior to this role Sultan was Chief of Innovation, Integration and Research at The Royal Wolverhampton NHS Trust (RWT). He led pioneering work in integration across the care spectrum in primary, community and acute care and developed some of the most impactful live clinical datasets at a placed based level. Sultan is enthusiastic about care providers working collaboratively and using digitally enabled methods to manage patient care in an anticipatory way. To this end, he has worked closely to develop partnerships with the commercial sector, patient groups and clinical teams to enable evidence-based innovation.
Dr. Massimo Valla is Innovation Area Manager, Digital Environment Ecosystems within the Chief Technology Office at TIM (Milano, Italy). In his role he coordinates a team of R&D engineers and Project Managers working on innovation projects related to Digital Services in different domains: Smart Cities, Industry 4.0 and Smart Mobility with a focus on 5G and Edge Computing. He has been involved for 18+ years in several Innovation activities both within TIM and at European level, as Innovation Project Manager on “smart spaces” services, mobile applications, IoT and digital services architectures. From 2013 to 2020 he launched and coordinated for TIM the “Digital Life IoT Lab” in Milano, an Open Innovation lab in collaboration with universities, R&D centres and start-ups, with technical responsibility for more than 2,8M€ of industrial research funding. He is co-author of papers in several international conferences and co-inventor of three patents on advanced service platforms. He received his “Laurea” in Computer Engineering, a Master of Science (UCLA, Los Angeles U.S.A.) and a Ph.D. in Computer Engineering (University of Genova). He spent two years as a research assistant at the UCLA Network Research Lab in Los Angeles (2000-2).
Juan Carlos is SVP Technology and Ecosystem at Telefonica global CTIO unit, leading technical projects like edge computing, private networks or network slicing. He is in charge of Telefonica’s participation in standardization bodies and industry fora (O-RAN, ETSI, 3GPP, etc). He represents Telefonica at the GSMA Technology Group and is chairman of the GSMA Telco Edge Cloud taskforce. He has taken other VP positions at Telefonica GCTIO unit over the years: Technology and Architecture (2017-19), Radio Access (2016-17), Transport Optimization (2015-16), Operations and Plans (2010-11), Transport, Architecture and Plans (2008-9), Fixed Access (2006-7). He has worked in different Telefonica companies along his career: VP Engineering Access & Transport Telefónica Germany (2011-14), directorTechnical & Business Development Telefonica Data Europe (Italy 2000-2, Germany 2003-5), Manager Operations & Resources Telefonica Latam (1998-2000), Senior R&D Engineer Telefonica R&D (1990-97). During 1997 he worked at BellCore Labs (NJ, USA) in TINA-C, an international research project. He has a Telecom Engineering degree from the Politechnical University of Madrid and worked as associate professor of Computer Science at Carlos III University in Madrid, from 1990 till 1997.
Bela is the global lead for the enterprise segment in TIME (telecoms, IT, media & electronics) industries. His focus is on service differentiation, mission critical ICT, managed services, go to market strategies, operations, audit, production models, and platform and process design. Bela has over 20 years’ experience in telecoms, both as a consultant and within the industry.
Karim has extensive consulting and operational / management experience in Europe, Middle East, and South East Asia in the Telecoms sector in the areas of strategy, organization, and transformation in the Telecom and Media sectors. He has more than 20 years of consulting experience. Prior to joining Arthur D. Little, he spent 4 years with a leading European telecommunication supplier. Karim is the chair of multiple conferences worldwide on hot telecommunications topics. He has an MSc from the ESEM, Orléans, France, incl. a master thesis at the University of California, a Ph.D. from the Vienna University of Technology, and an MBA Intern. Bus. Webster University St Louis, MI
Franco has the prime responsibility of defining strategic product direction, working in tight collaboration with the regional Presidents, the CTO organization and all other relevant stakeholders. Franco joined Infovista from Empirix where he was Chief Strategy Officer. Prior to Empirix, Franco led Mutina Technologies, providing quality assurance technologies for mobile, next-gen IPTV, and IP core networks. Prior to Mutina, Franco founded Pro.tel Srl, one of the first companies to offer VoIP monitoring solutions. It was acquired by Sunrise Telecom in 2000 and Franco served as CEO of the Sunrise Telecom Pro.tel Division for six years. Before his entrepreneurial work, Franco served as managing director of Ascom Italia from 1991-1996 and became Chief Technology Officer of Tele Communication Systems (TCS) in 1981. Prior to that, he served Telecom Italia former SIP in the Data Transmission Department.
Alcino is General Manager of Altice Labs, formerly PT Inovação and today the Innovation and Technological Development Center of the Altice Group. He has a degree in Electrotechnical Engineering from the Faculty of Science and Technology, University of Coimbra in 1985. He began his career that year at PT Inovação, as a development engineer for Network Protocols and later for Intelligent Network Services. He held several management positions in the company and led important projects in Africa and Brazil, supporting the internationalization of Portugal Telecom and PT Inovação, and was appointed CEO of the Brazilian subsidiary in January 2003. In August 2006, he was appointed Executive Director of PT Inovação until March 2008, when he became CEO. He is a member of the General Council of University of Coimbra, leading the Innovation Committee. He holds positions in several Portuguese entities related to innovation and ICT and is Vice-Chairman of the ICT and Electronics Competitiveness Hub – TICE, the ICT cluster in Portugal.
Recognized by Light Reading as one of the industry’s best Female Tech Pioneers in 2018, by capacity Media as the “Best Women in Network Orchestration” in 2019 and with multiple patents to her name, Alla Goldner is the Chair of ONAP Requirements Subcommittee and Orchestration stream lead of TIP’s OCN project. She also leads 5G and ONAP activities and internal decision-making at Amdocs where her responsibilities include defining and implementing Amdocs’ ONAP strategy, working directly with ONAP members from service providers, vendors and partners, and leading Amdocs’ internal Technical Steering Committee. Her current focus is 5G, Zero-Touch operations, NFV and SDN network evolution, and in particular, the technology, strategy, standardization and open-source domains.
With over 25 years of experience in developing technology strategy and system architecture at global companies including Alcatel, Motorola, and Intel, Alla also has extensive experience in leading standardization efforts in 3GPP, IETF, ETSI NFV, BBF, ETSI MEC, ETSI NFV and ETSI ZSM – examples of standards she has created include TDF (Traffic Detection Function) into 3GPP Packet Core Architecture, Network Congestion handling into 3GPP architecture, and also traffic-steering into 3GPP architecture.
A key member of the group-defined service-functional chaining in IETF, she is also a leading contributor of multiple work items in the areas of 5G, Policy Control and Charging, NFV, SDN, control-user plane split and congestion management. She has also served on the numerous program committees of several conferences including IEEE ICC and IEEE CSCN, ONS NA, ONS EU.
Recently Alla was awarded as one of the top 20 SDN market leaders and Member of Power 100 list by Capacity Media (2020).
Alla holds an MSc in Technology Management from NYU and a BSc in Mathematics and Computer Science from Tel Aviv University.
Ron Porter is head of product marketing for Amdocs 5G, network and OSS solutions. He is part of Amdocs’ technology team covering the industry shift into the digital era of 5G, cloud and IoT and the wide opportunities that come with it. As a Communication Systems Engineer with an MBA in marketing and finance, and with over 15 years of experience in the telecom industry, Ron has a passion for bridging technological advancements with business opportunities that are driving the industry’s revolution.
Dr. Petrit Nahi is Head of Data Science and Chief Data Officer at Rakuten Mobile Inc. responsible for driving the adoption and use of artificial intelligence to derive insights on the network performance throughout its life cycle as well as enable automation of engineering and operation to ultimately achieve network autonomy.
Dr. Nahi has over 20 years of experience in the mobile communications industry and has held various product leadership and technology expert roles.
Dr. Nahi joined Rakuten Mobile in 2019 having previously worked as a Chief Scientist, RAN with NetScout Systems Inc. and has worked on development of various network planning and optimization solutions, network performance analytics, service assurance and other applications throughout his career.
Dr. Nahi holds a PhD in Electronic Engineering from Queen Mary University of London. His research explored the use of artificial intelligence to implement agent-based control and optimization of network coverage in combination with use of novel advanced antenna techniques.
Dimitris is a Fellow in Innovations and Senior Director of Technology Evolutions in TEOCO. He leads the evolution of the RAN capabilities, focusing on addressing the emerging challenges of 5G.
He brings more than 25 years of experience creating and delivering solutions for operators to design and optimise mobile communications networks and has held a variety of roles within TEOCO and with AIRCOM International in Consulting Services.
He has a strong interest in identifying and maturing innovative solutions internally and externally to support the evolving needs of operators, working with Tier 1 operators, as well as academic and industrial partners, to create stronger solutions and capabilities for TEOCO. He has been a proponent of 5G and its benefits serving as a member of the Strategic Board of the 5GIC and the 5GUK Hub.
Dimitris holds a PHD and MSc in Telecommunications from the University of Bradford and MBA from Henley University.
Dr. Massimo Valla is Innovation Area Manager, Digital Environment Ecosystems within the Chief Technology Office at TIM (Milano, Italy). In his role he coordinates a team of R&D engineers and Project Managers working on innovation projects related to Digital Services in different domains: Smart Cities, Industry 4.0 and Smart Mobility with a focus on 5G and Edge Computing. He has been involved for 18+ years in several Innovation activities both within TIM and at European level, as Innovation Project Manager on “smart spaces” services, mobile applications, IoT and digital services architectures. From 2013 to 2020 he launched and coordinated for TIM the “Digital Life IoT Lab” in Milano, an Open Innovation lab in collaboration with universities, R&D centres and start-ups, with technical responsibility for more than 2,8M€ of industrial research funding. He is co-author of papers in several international conferences and co-inventor of three patents on advanced service platforms. He received his “Laurea” in Computer Engineering, a Master of Science (UCLA, Los Angeles U.S.A.) and a Ph.D. in Computer Engineering (University of Genova). He spent two years as a research assistant at the UCLA Network Research Lab in Los Angeles (2000-2).
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