Are we ready for Edge & 5G?

Since the inception of NFV, the industry has made admirable progress virtualizing the network to build scale and flexibility. But how close are we really to the agile, cloud-based networks of the future that will fuel the 5G and edge inflection? And how soon will the use cases of the future demand that transformation? We’ll dive into several critical attributes of next-generation networks and examine the most pressing work ahead of us to deliver the infrastructure of tomorrow.

Jennifer Panhorst
VP of Data Center Group; GM of Strategy & Programs Network Platforms Group, Intel Corporation

Jennifer (Jeni) D. Panhorst is a vice president in the Data Center Group and general manager of Network Strategy and Programs at Intel Corporation. She is responsible for leading a team of business and technical strategists, market intelligence analysts, product and technology planners, and program and business operations managers driving the definition and execution of the portfolio of investments for one of Intel’s fastest growing businesses.

Upon graduating college, Panhorst joined Intel in 1999 as part of the Rotation Engineers Program. Since then, she has held a variety of technical and leadership positions. As platform applications engineer, she drove the creation of the first low-power Intel® Xeon® processors and served as technical account owner for one of Intel’s largest customers. She was a platform applications engineering manager in the Embedded Intel Architecture Division where she was responsible for leading a worldwide customer enabling organization. In her role as platform solutions architect, she helped establish the foundation for Intel’s network media processing business. Panhorst also served as the product line director for the Communications Infrastructure Division responsible for defining and marketing Intel products for network infrastructure equipment. More recently, she was chief of staff for the Network Platforms Group managing the executive office and the group’s strategic initiatives.

Panhorst graduated summa cum laude with a bachelor’s degree in computer engineering and a minor in artificial intelligence from Case Western Reserve University. A strong advocate for causes in education and women in technology, she serves in leadership roles for the Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing, Experience Matters, Arizona Academic Decathlon Association, National Charity League, and numerous Intel diversity and inclusion initiatives and Arizona community organizations.

5G Evolution & Status in India
India is at the cusp of a digital revolution powered by increasing broadband and internet penetration, exponential data uptake, the Government’s focus on digitalisation and increasing trend of technology adoption across industries. This revolution is likely to generate new growth avenues, boost industrial productivity and has the potential to transform the socio-economic fabric of the country.

The speech shall  be categorized as:

1. 5G Spectrum availability and challenges.
2. 5G trials and readiness towards commercial launch.
3. 5G evolution for Reliance JIO in particular

Pankaj Sharma
Vice President & Technology CTO, Reliance Jio Infocom Ltd, India

28+ years of Experience in Telecommunications.
Responsible for overall State of the Art Technology vision, Deployment, Innovation, Product Development,& Customer Delivery for 23 Million customers. Handling large number of Service Providers, Equipment Manufacturers and Content makers. Lead all aspects of architecture, software and product development, investment rationalization, and delivery schedule for high transaction applications.

• Maintained and enhanced large Network KPI’s, Created & Implemented all IP-4G Network, World Largest VoLTE Network deployment & successful operation, and a host of other applications.
• Created development, quality assurance, and implementation methodologies, processes and teams to support demanding customer base and highly aggressive business goals.
• Developed processes for estimating, staffing, training, implementation, and post-implementation support.
• Review all development projects to ensure reliability, effectiveness and ROI.
• Managed department of 300 employees with 6 direct reports: 1 Director each of Development, Backhaul/IP, Wireless/RF, Platform and Operations.

Jim Cathey

SVP and President of Global Business, Qualcomm

James Cathey is senior vice president and president of Global Business for Qualcomm Technologies, Inc. In this role, Cathey has an overall responsibility for all regional activities, including business development, operations, distribution channels and sales, as well as assisting Qualcomm with in-country relationships.

Previously, Cathey was president of Qualcomm’s businesses in Asia Pacific and India and he led all business and operations functions for Qualcomm in these regions. Cathey’s prior roles were president of Qualcomm’s operations in Japan, and country manager in Taiwan where he was responsible for leading the global business development of Qualcomm MEMS Technologies (QMT) stationed in Taiwan, including product management, operations, applications engineering, management of the fab construction, technical product marketing and marketing communications.

Prior to joining Qualcomm Technologies, Inc., Cathey served as an executive at Micron Technology and MicroDisplay, as well as the head of Investor Relations for PixTech. He also has provided strategic business consulting services to companies such as DuPont Display, DuPont PhotoMask and Applied Materials.

Cathey holds seventeen patents and is a member of the Society for Information Display (SID) Cathey earned a Bachelor of Business Administration in marketing from Boise State University.

Open Telco Transformation

The network of the future is open-sourced, future-proofed, highly secure, and flexible enough to scale up to meet any demand. Telco customers are working to transform their businesses and expand their relevance in the digital economy. Operators must change how they operate due to global competition, disruption, and end customer demands. Hear about how Red Hat enables telcos to save money, make money and go faster.

Kenny Chin
Head of Strategic Business Development & Telco, Red Hat GEM
Kenny Chin is the Head of Strategic Business Development & Telco for Red Hat Asian GEMs (Growth and Emerging Markets), which consist of ASEAN, Hong Kong, Taiwan and Korea. He leads a team of Sales Specialist, focused around Cloud Infrastructure and Application Development across the region, responsible for driving and increasing the adoption of Red Hat’s emerging technologies portfolio through strategic engagements with our customers. In the past 5 years, he has also been actively involved in driving NFV engagements and leads the telco practice across the region.

Kenny has 19 years of experience in IT sales and consulting where he has worked with customers across industries in various capacities ranging from sales, business development to management consultancy

Steve Cheng

Vice President, Quanta Computer Inc.

With 20+ years working experience in Quanta, Steve has always been a pioneer of innovation, bringing Quanta’s product diversification from notebook, to new value-added consumer electronic market such as tablet, cellular connected wearables, routers all the way to 5G development. Steve’s team has successfully deliver millions of ODM solutions for world leading customers including Blackberry, Amazon, Verizon, etc, and is working closely with Taiwan leading research institute on more future technology development.

5G Device Development Status
2019 is the year to demystify 5G. 5G will no longer be just a lab demo. 5G services will be available at selected cities and its device will also be available for purchase. In this talk, MTK will provide the development status of 5G devices and its corresponding ecosystems. The pros and cons between sub-6GHz and mm-Wave will be discussed.  Due to the usage of higher frequency bands in 5G deployments, how do we solve the up-link link budget limitation? Power consumption and thermal issues are also very important for 5G devices, and hence, system level solution will be introduced.

Paul Liang
Director of Advanced System and Technology, MediaTek

Dr. Paul Liang received the M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in electrical engineering from the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, in 1998 and 2001, respectively with a focus on communication system design. From 2000 to 2006, Dr. Liang joined a start-up, Tropian, in Cupertino, California, working on high speed digital system design for energy-efficient transmitters. In 2006, he joined Panasonic Wireless Research Laboratory, Cupertino, California, through acquisition and continued to develop the high-efficiency digital transmitters and all-digital phase-lock loop (ADPLL). In 2010, he joined MediaTek in Taiwan. Dr. Liang holds the director position and supervised advanced system and technology team on mix-signal architectural design for 2/3/4/5G MODEMs and RF, 5G prototype, and automotive radar system design. Dr. Liang also served at the ISSCC technical program committee from 2015 to 2017. His research areas include efficient digital baseband designs and digital RF system designs. He holds 45+ US patents and has authored/co-authored tens of technical articles in these areas.

5G SA Test Challenges

Cellular communications services are ubiquitous. We rely on them and expect them to work anytime and anywhere. 5G will push those requirements further than ever before in terms of connected devices, data rates, coverage and reliability. Coupled with this, the pressure on Service Providers and Infrastructure Vendors to deploy these new 5G services is immense.

VIAVI have provided the world’s leading test solutions to the cellular industry for over 20 years. In this presentation we look at how the challenges continue into the latest 5G SA networks and the testing that will support their successful deployment.

5G Development in Europe
What is the status of 5G development in Europe and in particular in the UK? What are the EU priorities for 5G spectrum harmonisation? How is Ofcom, the UK telecoms regulator, supporting this. What are the priorities for Ofcom and how can innovation become a bridge between Universality and Fairness? 5G has been conceived as a flexible, programmable framework with a high degree of automation, capable of integrating multiple access technologies. Many 5G business cases also require 5G to be ultra-reliable. What are the key challenges and opportunities? What changes will full virtualisation bring to reliability and performance? How are governments and regulators cooperating across Europe to ensure that 5G networks are secure and resilient? Is a new approach to standards required to support ultra-reliability?

Mansoor Hanif
CTO of Ofcom
Mansoor has 25 years’ experience of planning, building, optimising and operating mobile networks around the world. From 2011 Mansoor was Director of RAN at EE and a board member of MBNL (the joint venture of EE with H3G) until 2016. At BT Mansoor was Director of the Converged Networks Research Lab from 2016 to 2018, and led collaboration with UK Universities, innovators, and government bodies. From September 2018 Mansoor is the CTO of Ofcom, the UK telecoms and media regulator. As CTO he is head of the technology profession across the organisation, ensuring that the technology aspects of all Ofcom’s policy work are informed and robust, and is a member of the Policy and Management Board (the decision-making body at executive level). He also leads Ofcom’s activities in network security & resilience as well as engagement with CTOs at our stakeholders, industry bodies and with Government. Outside of Ofcom, Mansoor is also a member of the Advisory Boards of the UK5G Innovation Network, the Satellite Applications Catapult and UCL Electrical and Electronic Engineering Dept and is Patron of the Institute of Telecoms Professionals.

Thomas Haustein

Head, Wireless Communications and Networks Department, Fraunhofer HHI

Thomas Haustein received the Dr.-Ing. (Ph.D.) degree in mobile communications from the University of Technology Berlin, Germany, in 2006. In 1997, he was with the Fraunhofer Institute for Telecommunications, Heinrich Hertz Institute (HHI), Berlin, where he worked on wireless infrared systems and radio communications with multiple antennas and OFDM. He focused on real-time algorithms for baseband processing and advanced multiuser resource allocation. From 2006 till 2008, he was with Nokia Siemens Networks, where he conducted research for 4G. Since 2009 he is heading the Wireless Communications Department at Fraunhofer HHI focussing on 5G and Industrial Wireless. Since 2015 he is actively participating in 3GPP standardization advocating technology contributions for Millimeter wave communication and new use cases like Vehicular Communications and Industry 4.0.