Featured Speakers
As head of Research & Development for Amadeus in the North America and Latin America regions, Rashesh Jethi leads the teams responsible for developing and maintaining distribution software and airline passenger support systems. In his role, he oversees the creation, development and delivery of software platforms and products across all of Amadeus' business lines and travel industry customers. Rashesh joined Amadeus in 2015 from Cisco Systems, where he held the position of Portfolio Management and Marketing Leader for Cisco Services. As a technology industry veteran, Rashesh previously held the role of CTO and CIO of Visage Mobile in San Francisco, as well as several technology management and consulting roles in the finance, telecom and travel industries. Rashesh holds a Master's degree in Industrial Engineering from the University of Alabama. He has also completed the Executive Education Program in Marketing from the London Business School. Rashesh has served as a visiting faculty for technology and operations classes and he holds a patent in the Web services area for multi-tenant mobile platforms.
Dr. Eyal Felstaine is responsible for shaping Amdocs’ product vision, strategy, and long-term roadmap for Network Cloud Service Orchestration and NG OSS. An innovator and entrepreneur by nature, Eyal has co-founded and held CXO positions in several successful start ups in the communications and Evolved Packet Core space. These include Traffix Systems, acquired by F5 [NASDAQ: FFIV], Allot Communications [NASDAQ:ALLT] and SANRAD, acquired by OCZ Technology [NASDAQ: OCZ]. Prior to joining Amdocs, Eyal served as Vice President of Cyber Security Division at Radware [NASDAQ: RDWR]. An experienced speaker at industry conferences, Eyal has authored numerous articles, referred journal papers, patents and internet standardization documents (RFC). He serves as a senior staff faculty member in the Information Systems Engineering department of Ben Gurion University, where he heads a research team focused on wireless communications and network security, and has won prestigious awards for research excellence. Eyal holds a Ph.D. and an M.A.in Computer Science, as well as a B.Sc. in Electrical Engineering – all from the Technion, Israel Institute of Technology. He also holds an MBA from Columbia University, NY and an MBA from the London Business School.
Lakshmi Sharma is the VP of Cloud and Computing at Target Corporation.
Sam is authoring a book on Human Assisted Deep Learning. Sam is a consultant to technology companies to define strategies and offers technology services beyond the company's business strategy. He will focus on the strategic requirements of clients' businesses by working with them to determine long-term technology-related decisions and create the appropriate operating model. Mr. Greenblatt is a Technologist in Residence at several technology companies. He uses his background as a technologist and his history of successfully helping companies bring technology to market. Helping the management team of these companies source and evaluate potential technology, particularly in areas where he applies his background. Sam served as CTO and General Manager of Engineering Solutions at Dell providing solutions, to have strong alliances, develop cross-line of business offerings. He offered a cohesive architecture that made customers’ offerings run better with the workloads that meet these needs. He is a recognized expert in Object Technology, IaaS, PaaS, and HPC (Red Hat OpenStack, Azure, HyperV, VMware). He built solutions based on Cloud, Analytics, Big Data, and Enterprise Applications (SAP and Oracle). He was the chief architect, in and technologist at the Enterprise Solution Group involved in the architecture, communication and technical promotion of Dell's Enterprise family of products. Sam has served on USDL (Linux Foundation) 4 years, Object Management Group (11 years), Eclipse Board (1 Year), and the DMTF Board 2 Years. He is the primary inventor on 4 US Patents in Object Technology. He was a CTO at Hewlett-Packard, Candle Corporation and Chief Innovation Officer at Computer Associates. Sam also was an adjunct professor of Computer Science at both Temple University and LaSalle University.
Amin Vahdat is a Google Fellow and Technical Lead for networking at Google. He has contributed to Google's data center, wide area, edge/CDN, and cloud networking infrastructure, with a particular focus on driving vertical integration across large-scale compute, networking, and storage. Vahdat has published more than 150 papers in computer systems, with fundamental contributions to cloud computing, data consistency, energy-efficient computing, data center architecture, and optical networking. In the past, he served as the SAIC Professor of Computer Science and Engineering at UC San Diego and the Director of UCSD's Center for Networked Systems. Vahdat received his PhD from UC Berkeley in Computer Science, is an ACM Fellow and a past recipient of the NSF CAREER award, the Alfred P. Sloan Fellowship, and the Duke University David and Janet Vaughn Teaching Award."
Sandra L. Rivera is vice president in the Data Center Group and general manager of the Network Platforms Group at Intel Corporation. She is responsible for the Intel business group charged with providing innovative technology and solutions to the networking industry. Rivera joined Intel in 2000 as marketing director for the new Intel division that resulted from the company’s acquisition of Dialogic Corporation. During her Intel career, she has held various marketing and business development roles focused on network infrastructure, including product marketing, segment marketing, and channel and ecosystem marketing. Prior to her current position in 2015, Rivera led the global market development team responsible for communications and storage infrastructure segments. In 2015, Intel recognized Rivera with its highest honor, the Intel Achievement Award, for helping to transform the telecommunications industry with Intel® architecture technologies and network functions virtualization (NFV). Before joining Intel, Rivera co-founded and served as president of The CTI Authority, a computer telephony distributor; and served as president of the computer telephony division at Catalyst Telecom. She also spent seven years at Dialogic, culminating in her role as director of Dialogic’s sales organization in the eastern United States and Canada. She started her career as an engineer at Westinghouse Electric Corporation. Rivera holds a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering from Pennsylvania State University. She sits on the board of the Open Platform for NFV Project (OPNFV) and serves as OPNFV’s marketing chair, on the board of the Telecommunications Industry Association (TIA), and the Alliance for Telecommunications Industry Solutions (ATIS). Rivera is also a member of the Intel Hispanic Leadership Council.
John, Chief Strategy Officer and Group President - AT&T Technology and Operations (ATO), is responsible for the corporate strategy function, technology development, network deployment and operations, and AT&T's transition to a software-defined network. John is driving AT&T's global leadership position in the technological transition to separate hardware and software and virtualizing network elements to the cloud. His responsibilities also include oversight of the company's global information, software development, network technology and big data strategy; AT&T Intellectual Property, Labs and Foundry innovation; IT and digital planning, engineering, implementation and operations; network planning, construction and operations including security, field operations, installation and maintenance; global supply chain; and corporate fleet operations. John previously served as Chief Technology Officer for AT&T, overseeing the company's global technology direction and innovation road map, including product development, network and engineering operations, AT&T Labs and the security and intellectual property organizations. Under John's leadership, AT&T has turbo-charged its innovation programs and now is recognized as an industry leader in working with application developers and others to make AT&T's network open to collaboration and innovation. John previously was an executive vice president of product, sales, marketing and operations at VeriSign Inc., a technology company that provides Internet infrastructure services. At VeriSign, John was responsible for leading its global sales organization, driving the expansion of broad solutions offerings, and integrating a global professional services capability. Before that, he was chairman and CEO of inCode Telecom Group Inc., where he helped shape strategic direction and positioning for wireless network operators around the globe. Previously, John was a partner with Deloitte Consulting, where he was the Americas Industry Practice director for telecom. John serves on the Board of Directors for Palo Alto Networks. He has authored two books, The Value of Enterprise, published in January 1998, and Value Creating Growth, published in 1999. John received a B.S.E.E. from the University of Notre Dame and earned an M.B.A. in finance from the University of Minnesota.
John Healy is vice president in the Data Center Group and General Manager of the Datacenter Network Solutions Group at Intel Corporation. He is responsible for executing a global Intel strategy to transform all networks through Software Defined Networking (SDN) and Network Functions Virtualization (NFV) within Communication Service Provider, Enterprise and Cloud Service Provider networks. Healy joined Intel in 2001, and his leadership in the communications industry consists of 26 years of experience in planning, engineering, deploying and maintaining next generation communication networks. Previously, Healy held senior positions in Finance, Information Systems and business and technical consultancy. Healy is a regular industry speaker analyzing the transformation of all networks in their adoption of SDN and NFV. Healy is an electronic engineering graduate from the University of Limerick in Ireland.
As Chief Technology Officer, Ihab Tarazi is responsible for Equinix International Business Exchange™ (IBX®) network operations, platform strategy, leading the next generation technology and innovation function and contributing to the company's cloud initiatives. He joined Equinix in 2013 from Verizon, where he was Vice President of Enterprise Network Services. There, he was responsible for product management, strategy, technology and development for Verizon network products. During his tenure at Verizon, Mr. Tarazi led planning and technology development for Verizon’s global IP network connecting customers in over 150 countries. He also led the design and development of next-generation optical and submarine cable systems driving many industry innovations in 100G optical technology globally.
Margaret is currently VP of Open Ecosystems in the US with Huawei, focused on the realization of open source and standards into the network product line. She has helped shape the SDN industry by being a founding member of the ETSI, ISG, NFV, and Linux Foundation OPNFV including being president of OPNFV. Her previous experience includes 30+ years working for a Tier 1 US Carrier leading teams focused on concept through delivery of network products, data services (e.g. FR, ATM, IP, Ethernet, and Optical) as well as helping shape the SDN/NFV strategy and realization. She has also been on the board of directors of MEF.
Drew Schulke is Vice President at Dell EMC responsible for Converged Networking within the Infrastructure Solutions Group. This encompasses the definition and development of the networking component of future converged infrastructure solutions for the enterprise data center and high-performance computing environments. Drew joined Dell in 1999, with previous roles in product operations, enterprise services, and most recently seven years in Dell’s Data Center Solutions group where he was responsible for product management and product marketing. Prior to joining Dell, Drew was a Senior Consultant in Accenture’s SAP practice focused on customers in the manufacturing segment.
Srinivasa (Srini) Kalapala is the Vice President of Technology and Supplier Strategy at Verizon. Srini is responsible for developing next-generation network technology strategies, identifying strategic suppliers to enable Verizon's technology strategy and driving architecture efforts across Verizon's Technology organization.
Prior to his current role, Srini was managing technology strategy, architecture and user experience functions in the wireline business unit. In that role, he led transformation efforts delivering world-class platforms such as Fiber to the Premises networks and well recognized Technician Tablet and Mobile Coach. Srini drove the technology transformation efforts in the areas of work force mobility, Wireline network transformation and platform rationalization. InfoWorld-Forrester recognized Srini’s team as one of the top five leading architecture organizations in the world for these efforts.
Prior to this role, Srini drove the technology architecture for Verizon’s Fiber to the Premises (FiOS) business. Srini has played notable roles in the delivery of long distance, voice unbundling and development of broadband strategies at Verizon. Prior to joining Verizon, Srini worked at British Telecom, IBM and MCI in various technology roles.
Srini holds an MBA from Georgetown University’s McDonough School of Business, a Master’s degree in Information Systems from George Washington University, and a Bachelor of Engineering degree in Electronics and Instrumentation from Birla Institute of Science (BITS) in Pilani, India.
Martin Casado is a general partner at the venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz. He was previously the cofounder and chief technology officer at Nicira, which was acquired by VMware in 2012. While at VMware, Martin served as senior vice president and general manager of the Networking and Security Business Unit. Martin started his career at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory where he worked on large-scale simulations for the Department of Defense before moving over to work with the intelligence community on networking and cybersecurity. These experiences inspired his work at Stanford where he created the software-defined networking (SDN)movement, leading to a new paradigm of network virtualization. While at Stanford he also cofounded Illuminics Systems, an IP analytics company, which was acquired by Quova Inc. in 2006. For his work, Martin was awarded both the ACM Grace Murray Hopper award and the NEC C&C award, and he's an inductee of the Lawrence Livermore Lab's Entrepreneur's Hall of Fame. He holds both a PhD and Masters degree in Computer Science from Stanford University.
Martin Bäckström is VP Datacom in the Ericsson CTO office, and has more than 20 years of strong experience in Wireless Data and track record in managing technology, products, and solutions designed to support business requirements. He is responsible for bringing IT technologies into the telecom space and fostering close cooperation between industries in areas such as Cloud, Virtualization, SDN and Analytics.
Mrs. Zhiqiang Yang is the Deputy General Manager of China Mobile Research Institute. She is a professor level senior engineer and a China Central Government Special Allowance expert. Mrs. Yang earned her MBA degree from China-Europe International Business School (CEIBS) in 2003. She has over 30 years of experience on communication network design, development and management. In recent years, she leads fields including Core Network Research and Planning, Big Data and Information Security. She has led and accomplished key network strategic projects for China Mobile such as China Mobile 4G core network trials, TD-LTE based VOLTE network, and SDN/NFV oriented evolution of core network (Novonet). She and her team have also developed and deployed a series of products on big data and information security.
Dr. Alex Jinsung Choi is serving as CTO, Executive Vice President and Head of Corporate R&D Center. Dr. Choi joined SK Telecom in 2012 as Executive Vice President and Head of Technology Strategy Office. He is responsible for building the company’s technology roadmaps and strategies aimed at securing technology leadership in the rapidly-evolving mobile marketplace. In line with the company’s efforts to open a new 5G era, his focus is currently on developing next generation network and future ICT technologies including 5G, NFV/SDN, SDDC, Hadoop, Cloud & Big Data, Quantum Communication, Video Cloud, Media and IoT. Choi has over 20 years of experience in the mobile telecommunications industry. Before joining SK Telecom, he held various key positions at LG Electronics including EVP & Head of Mobile Communications Business Unit, EVP & Head of Mobile Core Technology Lab and SVP & Head of Next-Generation Telecommunications Lab. Choi is credited with developing the world’s first LTE handset modem chip and launching LG’s first Android smartphone. He has also actively participated in global standardization activities through 3GPP/3GPP2, NGMN, OMA and ITU. He received his Bachelor's degree in Control and Instrumentation Engineering from Seoul National University; and Master's Degree in Computer Engineering and Doctor’s degree in Electrical Engineering from University of Southern California.
Andre oversees the global technology direction for AT&T. This includes network planning, the company's innovation road map, AT&T Labs, AT&T Foundry, and the intellectual property organization. His responsibilities include spearheading the design of the company's next generation 5G wireless infrastructure and software-defined networking (SDN) initiative. He's also heavily involved in AT&T's push into open source software and other open standards, and engagement and collaboration with the broader developer community. Since joining AT&T in 1995, Andre has supported and led several organizations responsible for software, systems and network architecture, planning and engineering, where he holds six patents in the field of network traffic optimization and database design. He earned his bachelor's degree in Industrial Engineering and Operations Research at U.C. Berkeley and completed his graduate coursework in Computer Science at Stanford University.
Dr. Jan Uddenfeldt, a principal innovator and creator of the wireless industry including GSM technology and mobile broadband 3G and 4G LTE technology. He is the former global Chief Technology Officer of Ericsson and Sony Mobile Communications.
He is currently advisor/board director to several start-up companies in Silicon Valley (e.g. Guavus, Glo, Sentons, Agnity, Jolata, Artifical Solutions, Tarana) as well as to large corporations such as Ericsson and Sony.
He was the global CTO and Senior VP at Sony Mobile Communications (previous Sony Ericsson) from 2010 to 2013 based in Silicon Valley with major reporting units in Sweden and Tokyo.
Dr. Uddenfeldt is the former global CTO and Senior VP at Ericsson in Stockholm, Sweden. He worked at Ericsson from 1978 to 2010 of which as Chief Technology Officer and SVP from 1989 to 2010.
He received his Ph.D. from the Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm in 1978 and an honorary Doctor’s degree from the University of Lund in 1996. He has been awarded with many prestigious prizes in Europe, US and Japan and is a member of the Wireless Hall of Fame.
Zaid began his career in Silicon Valley in 1998 at WebEx as the company's first network engineer, where he designed the first SaaS network called MediaTone. After building his own software company, Zaid eventually returned to his passion of infrastructure engineering. At LinkedIn he leads the infrastructure architecture team which works on next generation technologies for network, compute and datacenters. Zaid is passionate about Internet development which lead him to co-found the San Francisco Chapter of the Internet Society, a non- profit organization that promotes open development and ensures that the Internet is for everyone. Zaid has been an invited speaker to many Internet Peering forums and currently is an advisory board member for DE-CIX, the world’s largest Internet Exchange.
Justin Dustzadeh is Vice President and Head of Global Infrastructure Network Services at Visa. He drives the vision & strategy for the modernization and transformation of Visa’s global infrastructure toward open, software-defined networking & cloud technologies, and leads a team responsible for the architecture, planning, engineering, and 24x7 operations & security of the global datacenter and wide-area networks that enable 129 billion Visa transactions with a total volume of US$8.2 trillion annually.
Prior to Visa, Justin served as the CTO & VP of Technology Strategy for Huawei’s $9B Networks business while helping to drive the development and adoption of open SDN & NFV in the industry as a visible and active member of the open networking community. Justin has held various leadership, advisory and board roles within industry organizations, including most recently at the Open Networking Foundation where he served as an executive council member and the chair of the migration working group. Other previous positions include VP of Technology & Head of Network Architecture at Ericsson, CTO & Co-Founder of a Silicon Valley software technology startup, senior technology and management roles at AT&T Labs (CTO support including driving the transformation of AT&T’s networks & systems), as well as senior technology roles with French service providers Cegetel/SFR and Orange. Justin holds a Ph.D. and master's degree in Computer Science from Telecom ParisTech and a bachelor's degree in Theoretical Physics from Ecole Normale Supérieure (ENS Paris).
Albert, CVP for Microsoft Azure Networking, is leading software and hardware development and engineering for all Microsoft Azure, including all Microsoft first and third parties and encompassing physical data center, regional and wide area networking, host networking datapath, virtual networking, virtual appliances, hybrid networking, network security, network services, network distributed systems, optical networking, network reconfigurable hardware and device firmware, network analytics, edge/CDN networks and services. Azure is built on SDN principles, which the team pioneered as the inevitable and right way to scale the cloud. Major offices for Azure networking are in Redmond, Beijing, Dublin and Hyderabad, all working to transform all elements of networking for the cloud: controlled by software, low cost, high performance, super reliable, secure and automated. With Azure, founded and led the network virtualization, datapath and physical data center network teams in Azure, as well as other teams in networking and monitoring. He worked in Microsoft Research to invent and prototype the data center networking technologies now widely deployed in Microsoft services and products, such as Virtual Layer-2 (VL2), Virtual Networks (VNets), Load Balancing (Ananta), Data Center TCP (DCTCP). Albert joined Microsoft from Bell Labs and AT&T Labs Research, where he was an AT&T Fellow and Executive Director. He helped build the systems and tools for engineering and managing AT&T's networks. Albert is an IEEE Kobayashi Award Winner, ACM Fellow, ACM Sigcomm Award Winner, ACM Test of Time Paper Award Winner, and a member of the National Academy of Engineering.
Chris Rice is senior vice president of AT&T Labs. He is responsible for delivering the architecture and design of Domain 2.0, the software-centric AT&T network. This transformation uses software-defined networking and network function virtualization to make AT&T’s network faster, simpler, and more scalable.
Prior to this role, Chris was the vice president of AT&T Labs, leading the research and advanced development for the software-centric network. He and his team made advancements in networking and IP network management, network virtualization, big data, speech and multimedia technologies, information systems and visualization, algorithms and optimization and scalable, reliable software systems.
Chris has been with AT&T for over 20 years. He has contributed expertise and focus on wireless and broadband communication systems. He worked on satellite and broadband data communication systems. He also led development efforts for a digital radio-based, pico-cellular base-station, which provided in-building, mobile voice communication on standard cellular phones.
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