Adrian Scrase is CTO within ETSI with operational responsibility for all of ETSI’s standards production activities. He has more than 30 years of experience in the telecommunications field, which includes 25 years of experience in standardization.

He played a central role in the creation of the “3rd Generation Partnership Project” (3GPP) and is responsible for the operations of the 3GPP Project Co-ordination Group. He heads 3GPPs’ Mobile Competence Centre (MCC) which is an International team of 20 experts who provide comprehensive support to the Project.

He was also principally involved in the formation of the “oneM2M” Partnership Project and oversees ETSI’s support to that initiative.

Bharat Bhatia

President, ITU-APT Foundation of India

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.

Pamela Kumar

Director General, TSDSI (Telecom Standards Development Society of India)

Since February 2017, Ms. Pamela Kumar has been appointed as the Director General of TSDSI. An alumnus of PEC Chandigarh, Rutgers University and IIM Bangalore, Pamela brings with her an experience of 30+ years in the communications, computers and semiconductor industry. She is also the Founding Chair and current President of Cloud Computing Innovation Council of India (CCICI) and the Bharti Chair Visiting Professor at UIET, Panjab University. She has been on the Governing Board of Indian Financial Technologies and Allied Services (IFTAS) and Punjab Engineering College.

She spent the first 10 years of her career at AT&T, Bell Labs in USA and at C-DOT in
Bangalore. Later, she held leadership positions in Texas Instruments, IBM, Hewlett
Packard Enterprise, R&D labs in India. She set up the R&D centers of Network
Programs and Alliance Semiconductors in India and continues to mentor several
start-ups . She holds 3 US Patents and 5 pending patents in Networking
Accelerators. She has been a Keynote/ invited speaker in 70+ Local and Global
forums.

Samant Khajuria

Senior Specialist Cybersecurity, Terma A/S

Dr. Samant Khajuria is Senior cyber security specialist at TERMA A/S with the responsibility of product security and strategy. His role deploys information security information security expert knowledge across the organization to provide agile, responsive information security support to meet those customer needs. Additionally, the role is an anchor point of bringing knowledge across a wide area of projects, in various stages of the project lifecycle from proposal to maintenance, e.g. security engineering, security architecting, vulnerability assessments, penetration testing, incident response, authorization and accreditation, embedded cybersecurity. His current research focuses on applied cryptography, system integrity, Cyber-resilience - Supply Chain, IoT and wireless communication in defense sector.

Samant received his Ph.D degree in Cryptology and Wireless Communication from Aalborg University in 2013. Between 2013 - 2018, he worked first as assistant and afterwards associate professor at the Center for Communication, Media, and Information Technologies, Aalborg University Copenhagen Denmark. During his academic career, he was involved in various EU research projects, and published books and papers in International Journals and Conferences in the field of Cryptography, Access Control and Privacy.

Yi Shen Chan

Director, Plum Consulting

Yi Shen Chan is a Director at Plum Consulting and is a specialist in policy and regulatory issues in the telecoms, media and online sectors. His experience covers radio spectrum policy and management, digital broadcasting, economic regulation of telecommunications networks and infrastructure, and competition issues in the communications and audio-visual sectors.
Yi Shen is an expert in spectrum management issues and has led a range of projects on the valuation and pricing of spectrum for mobile and other uses. His expertise covers both theoretical and practical implementation of spectrum pricing approaches such as administered incentive pricing (AIP), cost recovery, benchmarking analysis and market valuation. More recently, he has been involved in various projects on the technology, policy and regulatory aspects of 5G, with a specific focus on supply- and demand-side issues and measures to facilitate 5G deployment. As a key member of Plum’s spectrum advisory team, he has provided advice to governments, regulators and industry players around the world, including Australia, Hong Kong, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, Taiwan, Thailand and the UK.
His previous experience also includes roles within regulatory authorities in Singapore and the UK. Yi Shen has an MSc in Media and Communication Governance (Distinction) from the London School of Economics, and a BA in Economics and Philosophy from the National University of Singapore. He is fluent in English and Mandarin Chinese.

Nigel Jefferies

Chairman, WWRF

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.

Kiran Kuchi

Founder and CEO, WiSig Networks

Prof Kiran Kuchi is a member of faculty at the Department of Electrical Engineering, IIT Hyderabad (IITH). He is also the founder and CEO of WiSig Networks, a 5G wireless start-up based out of Hyderabad.

Prof. Kuchi has been leading Indian 5G research and standards development efforts through his leadership role in TSDSI (Telecom Standards Development Society, India) and participation in 3GPP (Third Generation Partnership Program), a body that develops 5G standards and specifications. Prof. Kuchi’s team introduced a number of key 5G/IoT technologies in 3GPP, including a new waveform that doubles the transmission power of handsets and IoT devices, a key feature that increases the communication range of 5G networks.

Prof. Kuchi spearheads the Government of India funded “Indigenous 5G Testbed” program, a 40 Million USD research grant given to several IITs to develop “An End-to-End 5G system”.

Prof. Kiran Kuchi lived in the USA between 1995-2008 before he moved back to India to join the IIT system. He holds both M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in Electrical Engineering from The University of Texas at Arlington, Texas, USA in 1998 and 2006, respectively.

Prof. Kuchi is the author of more than 100 international patents, many of them related to 5G technologies.

Sudhir Dixit

Vice Chair Americas, WWRF and Co-Founder, Basic Internet Foundation Oslo

Sudhir Dixit is a Co-Founder, Senior Fellow and Evangelist at the Basic Internet Foundation in Oslo, Norway, and heads its US operations. He is also associated with the Academy of Finland Flagship Programme, 6Genesis, led by the Centre for Wireless Communications, University of Oulu, Finland. From 2015 to 2017 he was the CEO and Co-Founder of a start-up, Skydoot, Inc. From 2009 to 2015, he was a Distinguished Chief Technologist and CTO of the Communications and Media Services for the Americas Region of Hewlett-Packard Enterprise Services in Palo Alto, CA, and the Director of Hewlett-Packard Labs India in Palo Alto and Bangalore. Before joining HP, he held various leadership positions at BlackBerry, Nokia, NSN and Verizon Communications.

He has been a technical editor of IEEE Communications Magazine, and is presently a Board Member & Working Group Chair at the Wireless World Research Forum (WWRF). He is also the Vice Chair for Americas at the WWRF. He is on the editorial boards of IEEE Spectrum Magazine and Springer’s Wireless Personal Communications Journal. He is a Co-Chair of the Industry Engagement Committee of the IEEE Future Network Initiative and is on its Industry Outreach Board (IOB). In 2018, he was appointed a Distinguished Lecturer by the IEEE Communications Society. From 2010 to 2012, he was an Adjunct Professor of Computer Science at the University of California, Davis, and, since 2010, he has been a Docent at the University of Oulu, Finland. He has published 8 books by Wiley, Artech House and Springer. A Life Fellow of the IEEE, Fellow of IET and IETE, Dixit holds a Ph.D. from the University of Strathclyde, Glasgow, U.K. and an M.B.A. from the Florida Institute of Technology, Melbourne, Florida.

Sameer Sharma

Regional Director a.i. ITU Regional Office Asia-Pacific, Bangkok , ITU

With the focus of achieving the United Nations Agenda for Sustainable Development, Mr. Sharma is responsible to the ITU Member States, Sector Members and Academia in the Asia-Pacific region to develop the digital economy through Digital Transformation using ICTs.

Mr. Sharma is the ITU’s Asia Pacific region focal point for Cybersecurity and his role includes developing National Cybersecurity Strategies, establishment of CIRT and Child Online Protection (COP) framework. He has also assisted several countries to establish Emergency Communications framework as well as network restoration.

Mr. Sharma’s technical experience includes migration of legacy networks to Next Generation Networks, Conformance and Interoperability, Type Approval, Interactive Terrestrial Transmission Map, National Broadband Policy frameworks and Wireless Broadband Master Plans, IoT, IMT/5G and bridging the standardization gap.

Mr. Sharma is also passionate in promoting digital inclusion through developing policy frameworks on ICT for persons with disability (accessibility) and ICT for empowerment of women and development of digital skills and innovation.

His work related to the digital economy includes cross sectoral work on e-health, e-agriculture by working closely with members from the private sectors and the academia, alongside the UN/ International agencies including UNESCAP, UNODC, INTERPOL, UNICEF, UNESCO, WHO, FAO, APT, APNIC as well as other academia’s such as Oxford University, in order to promote cross sectoral collaboration

Prior to ITU, Mr. Sharma has worked as an Advisor for the Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission (MCMC), General Manager for Celcom, Malaysia and Director for Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI). He also has an extensive experience working in the Television and Radio broadcasting industry. Mr. Sharma holds an MBA in Telecom Management and Bachelor of Engineering in Electronics and Communications (Honors).

Hendrik Berndt

Vice President for Europe, Middle East, Africa, WWRF

Dr. Hendrik Berndt is Vice-president of the Wireless World Research Forum for Europe, Middle East and Africa. He dedicates himself to positions as Senior Advisor to partners in Asia, the Americas and Europe to contribute to solutions for the bigger global societal ICT challenges. Berndt is advisor to the Association of Radio Industries and Businesses (ARIB) Japan. He has been continuously appointed to support the European Commission for establishing next generation mobile communication system research directions, currently with focus on Beyond 5G. Since 2015 Berndt serves as board member of the IEEE ComSoc Industry Communities Board, vice chairing its Special Interest group for 5thG. Additional he holds the position as Senior Consultant for the chair of Communications Technology (ComTec) at the University Kassel. Berndt is founder of the 2015 established International Institute for Innovation Aysén–Patagonia. From 2001 until 2014 Berndt held the position as CTO and CSO of DOCOMO’s Communications Laboratories Europe, in Munich, Germany. From 2000 to 2010 he has been teaching con-currently as Visiting Professor at the Global Information and Telecommunication Institute, Waseda University, Tokyo, Japan. Berndt was stationed in the US from 1993 until 2000. During these years he worked within Bellcore, Red Bank, NJ; as Executive Director of Advanced Technology for Global One in Reston, Virginia; as invited member of Sprint's Office of Network and Architecture Planning in Kansas and held the position as Chief Technology Officer of the TINA-C headquarters in New Jersey, USA. His recent publications are directed towards 6G.

Tonnie de Koster

Adviser for Digital Single Market International Outreach, European Commission, DG CNECT

Tonnie De Koster works in the European Commission since the early 1990ies and now holds the position of Advisor on the international aspects of the EU's digital single market strategy in DG Connect (Directorate-general for digital policy). He has previously worked on developing the digital single market strategy. In previous positions he has worked notably on designing the Europe 2020 strategy for growth & jobs and on economic coordination and surveillance in the Secretariat-general of the Commission. He also held positions as Deputy Head of Unit in charge of Innovation policy in the DG for Research & Innovation. Previously he worked in the Cabinet of Commissioner E. Liikanen in charge of information society policy and as policy assistant to the Director-General in DG Information Society. Tonnie is a Belgian citizen and an economist by training.

Debabrata Nayak

CSO, Huawei Telecommunication India

Dr.Debabrata Nayak has completed his PhD in wireless security from IIT Bombay. And has been working on security domain in last 21 years. He has been working in Huawei Telecom as Chief Security Officer. Oobtained Masters degree from NIT Rourkela, specialized in Elliptic Curve Cryptography and Internet security. And rated as Topper. Covering wide areas such as Security system Performance evaluation, Design of secure cryptographic system, Wireless Security policy design and implementation. He designed Security solution for INFINET (Indian Financial Network for RBI).IPv6 migration of INFINET.IPv6 Security for Indian financial network with C-DoT ,Leading IPv6 migration and security strategies in Huawei platform development for various products, cloud security, Currently guiding Enterprise security, Consumer security and Mobile broadband security(MBB). Working on privacy of user content. Spoke more than 100 conferences in India and abroad on network security ,Information security ,Cyber security.
He has presented 62 papers in international conferences and technical journals. He was active member of STIG (DoD) . He has worked with Motorola as Senior Security Architect, Reserve Bank of India as Information Security officer, and with Tata Elxsi as Security expert. He has extensively worked on LTE Security and WiMax Security. He was consultant to various financial institutes for implementation of standards such as BS7799 and ISO 17799. He was also involved in Ministry of Communication and IT of India for Secure mCheque project in IDRBT.Recently presented 10 Cloud computing security Paper in ITU,CJK korea, China and various international conference India like ASSOCHAM Cyber security conference,wireless vitae,Nasscom DSCI.
He was the Head of Patent /innovation Huawei India, He is the member of CII Innovation group.He is a Chairman of Global ICT Forum of India SIG.He is Co-Chairman for Assocham Cyber Law and IT act 2012 and also Co-chair continuing, Chairman for Huawei Senior security Expert Management Committee, 2012 International Association for Cryptological Research member, Motorola information assurance forum for 3 year, WiMax Forum (GWRG Group), LTE Forum (BWA Group), 3GPP SA3 Security, Cloud Security Alliance, IEEE Security and privacy and Cryptology Research Society of India , and Key member in ITU SG17 Security (Cybex- deals country specific Security), He is a member of Security Working group of TEC (DOT) NWG 17, He is a member of Assocham National security Group. Currently founding member in TSDSI cyber security group. And a certified lead Auditor of ISO 27001 :2013 from British standard Indtitute (BSI)

P Balaji

Chief Regulatory and Corporate Affairs Officer, Vodafone Idea

P Balaji is the Chief Regulatory and Corporate Affairs Officer of Vodafone Idea Limited, India’s largest telecom service provider, effective 31 August 2018.
A member of the National Leadership Team, Balaji leads the company’s Regulatory, Public Policy and Government Relations activities along with Industry advocacy, Corporate Communications, Reputation Management and CSR.
Prior to his present role, Balaji was the Director –Regulatory, External Affairs and CSR at Vodafone India. He was responsible for leading the company’s Regulatory, Public Policy & Government Relations activities and also the External Affairs function overseeing Corporate Communications, Reputation Management and administering Corporate Social Responsibility and the Vodafone Foundation in India.
Prior to that, he was the Managing Director of Nokia India and Managing Director of Sony Mobile. He has spent over two and half decades in Telecom & IT handling diverse functions including sales, marketing, strategy, operations, and product management. Balaji has held senior leadership positions in start-up and turn-around ventures of TATA group, AT&T, Ericsson, Lucent and Sony, gaining rich experience and exposure to the emerging Digital landscape.
Balaji is also the Chairman of ASSOCHAM National Council on Telecommunications and Convergence, a member of National Council of apex industry chambers like CII, FICCI, ASSOCHAM, AIMA and Telecom Sector Skill Council. He was President of Telecom Equipment Manufacturers Association (TEMA), Northern Region Chairman of the Telecom Export promotion council and member of Task Force forum set up by government on policy matters.
An Electronics Engineer from IIT Roorkee, Balaji completed his MBA from IIM-Ahmedabad in Marketing, Finance and Strategy. He loves travelling, tennis, singing and watching sports and movies.

Narendra Nath

Joint Secretary, National Informatics Center, Government of India

Bio to be updated

Simon Fletcher

CTO, Real Wireless

Simon joined Real Wireless in January 2016 as Chief Technology Officer, taking responsibility for overall technical and innovation strategy. He has chaired various conference committees including the Cambridge Wireless Annual International Conference and is recognised as a thought leader regularly speaking at industry events. His long-standing association with the UK innovation eco-system through roles such as Director of mVCE and the Innovate-UK ICT-KTN brings a wealth of practical knowledge on the application of open innovation to accelerate product and services delivery. Simon spent the past 20 years working in telecoms infrastructure systems and product development. In NEC Corporation he played a key role in the formation of Joint Ventures for the development of 3G and 4G products and established a Core Team that developed the first-generation of technology for 4G systems, ultimately representing NEC in a Steering Board position in the LTE SAE Trials Initiative (LSTI) during the early commercial product launch. In recent times he has directed projects in the area of future cities, the application of 5G and IoT in industry verticals with an event horizon towards 2030. He directs the Real Wireless engagement in H2020 5G-NORMA (also serving at the project level as the Innovation Manager), 5G-MoNArch and UK5G AutoAir project establishing new techno-economic analysis tool capability. He led a study for the UKs National Infrastructure Commission on Future Communications infrastructure use cases and costs, and is now a member of the recently formed UK5G Advisory Board.

Satish Jamadagni

Vice President - Network Planning Engineering, Head of Standards., Reliance JIO

Mr Satish Jamadagni is working as a Vice President in the Network Planning and Engineering division of Reliance Jio. He has over 20 years of industry experience in the telecom domain covering Devices, Networks, Platforms and Services. He has led teams contributing towards product development and delivery, develop standards and delivered essential patents for key organizations.
He has been a member of the following industry bodies (past/present): Current Chair of Study Group ‐ Networks, TSDSI ; Co‐Chair of the Asia Regional Operators Group; Small Cell Forum (SCF) ; Active member of GTI (Global TDD Initiative) & 3GPP ‐Previously on the board of the International Multimedia Teleconferencing Consortium (IMTC) with responsibility towards VoLTE/RCS and WebRTC test standards.
Mr Jamadagni has over 120 granted/pending patents in the wireless devices/platform domain and over 25 publications in the Wireless/Telecom areas.

Shri Kishore Babu

Deputy Director General, Department of Telecommunications, Government of India

A telecommunications professional with over 30 years of dedicated experience in various leadership positions in Telecommunications Policy; Development programs and projects; International Relations; Stakeholder engagement with National and International entities; Public Sector Functions

Areas of Contribution
Indian National Digital Communications Policy (NDCP) 2018
Facilitating Startups / SMEs ecosystem, Standardization, R&D and Innovation in Digital Communication Technologies
Spectrum Policy for - 5G, Next Generation Services & National Frequency Allocation Plan 2018 (India)
International cooperation in Telecommunications/ICTs; Partnership Development
Synergetic coordination with Intergovernmental Ministries, Departments, Industry Associations and Civil Society
High-level Agenda and coordination for the visits of H.E. Ministers
Agenda development and participation in International conferences including PP, WTDC, GSMA MWC, WCIT-12, WSIS, ITSO etc., International Negotiations
Coordination with Technology Providers, Vendors, Standardization bodies, International and National Service Providers
Chair, Working Group on Policy, Legal – APT (Asia Pacific Telecommunity) Preparatory Process for ITU PP Conference 2018
Vice Chair, APT Preparatory process for WTDC-17
Chair, Drafting Group for Study Group Questions WTDC 2017

Parag Kar

Vice President, Government Affairs, India and South Asia, Qualcomm

Parag Kar is Vice President, Government Affairs of Qualcomm India and South Asia, and has been the company’s key regulatory and policy interface for the Indian subcontinent and the region since January 2005.
His role includes forging lasting relationships with regulators, industry and the Department of Telecommunications (DoT), apart from helping establish Qualcomm’s leadership position as a pioneer and innovator in mobile wireless technologies globally and in India by creating a sphere of influence among key government, industry, media and civil society champions.
Mr. Kar is a key member of Qualcomm India’s leadership team, and works closely with all stakeholders to realize the company’s vision to take the benefits of mobile broadband to a larger base of Indian consumers, in particular to a billion Indians and beyond with advanced mobile wireless technologies like 3G and LTE.
Mr. Kar has been working closely with the DoT, industry bodies and telecom operators to ensure that policies and regulation are aligned with international best practices and the benefits of global experiences can be realized in an Indian context.
Mr. Kar has over 22 years of experience in the telecommunications industry. Prior to his appointment at Qualcomm, he was responsible for business development of broadband convergence technologies (both wireless and wireline) at Lucent Technologies in India. Before that, he was with the Indian Railways and responsible for the successful completion of various telecom projects in the Railways.
He holds a Bachelors Degree in Electronics and Telecommunication Engineering from the Regional Engineering College Bhopal and a Masters Degree from the Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi. As an expert and thought leader in the industry, Mr. Kar is also quoted extensively by key media and has written extensively in several newspapers and magazines.

Rajan Mathews

Director General, Cellular Operators Association of India

Prior to joining COAI as DG in April 2010, Rajan served in many senior executive positions such as CEO, COO and CFO of such major companies as AT&T Wireless, Birla-AT&T (now IDEA), Telargo (a JV of NTT DoCoMo), Afghan Wireless, Call Sciences, , and as a senior financial executive at Beatrice International, Columbia-Tri Star Pictures, and Pricewaterhouse Coopers.
Rajan specializes in international operations and start-up ventures, turn-arounds, mergers & acquisitions and venture financing. He assisted in raising over $1.5 billion of financing for companies through public and private offerings of equity, debt and private placements. He has managed companies in such diverse palaces as the USA, Afghanistan, India, UK, France, Germany, Belgium Taiwan and Hong Kong.
Rajan has served and continues to serve on the boards of several for-profit and non-profit organizations. He earned both his Master of Business Administration (Finance & Accounting) and Master of Arts (Economics) degrees from Rutgers University (USA) and he is a CPA from the State of New Jersey, USA.

Knud Erik Skouby

Professor, Department of Electronic Systems, Aalborg University

Knud Erik Skouby is professor and founding director of center for Communication, Media and Information technologies, Aalborg University-Copenhagen - a center providing a focal point for multi-disciplinary research and training in applications of CMI. Has a career as a university teacher and within consultancy since 1972; focus on ICT since 1987. Working areas: Techno-economic Analyses; Development of mobile/ wireless applications and services: Regulation of telecommunications

Project manager and partner in a number of international, European and Danish research projects. Served on a number of public committees within telecom, IT and broadcasting; as a member of boards of professional societies; as a member of organizing boards, evaluation committees and as invited speaker on international conferences; published a number of Danish and international articles, books and conference proceedings. Editor in chief of Nordic and Baltic Journal of Information and Communication Technologies (NBICT); Chair of WGA in Wireless World Research Forum; Past dep. chair IEEE Denmark. Member of the Academic Council of the Technical Faculty of IT and Design, AAU.

MPS Alawa

Sr. Deputy Wireless Advisor to the Government of India, Department of Telecommunications

Currently, he is working as a Senior Deputy Wireless Advisor (International conference) in WPC Wing. He coordinates on various radio-frequency spectrum issues with stakeholders to frame our country views for International bodies, such as, ITU-R, APT etc. His has played important role in formulating National Frequency Allocation Plan-2018. He was involved in drafting Indian contributions to WRC-19 and has also participated in WRC-19.

He also worked in Wireless Monitoring Organization, DoT where he was involved in carrying out monitoring of radio-frequency spectrum.

Seshadri Mohan

Professor, UA Little Rock

Dr. Seshadri Mohan is currently a professor in Systems Engineering Department at University of Arkansas at Little Rock, where, from August 2004 to June 2013, he served as the Chair of the Department of Systems Engineering. Prior to the current position he served as the Chief Technology Officer (CTO) and Acting CEO of IP SerVoniX, where he consulted for several telecommunication firms and venture firms and served as the CTO of Telsima (formerly known as Kinera). Besides these positions, his industry experience spans a decade at New Jersey-based Telcordia (formerly Bellcore) and Bell Laboratories. Prior to joining Telcordia, he was an associate professor at Clarkson and Wayne State Universities.
Dr. Mohan has authored/coauthored over 125 publications in the form of books, patents, and papers in refereed journals and conference proceedings with citations to his publications in excess of 5570. He has co-authored the textbook Source and Channel Coding: An Algorithmic Approach. He has contributed to several books, including Mobile Communications Handbook and The Communications Handbook (both CRC Press). He holds fourteen patents in the area of wireless location management and authentication strategies as well as in the area of enhanced services for wireless. He is the recipient of the SAIC Publication Prize for Information and Communications Technology. He has served or is serving on the Editorial Boards of IEEE Personal Communications, IEEE Surveys, IEEE Communications Magazine, Journal of Mobility and Cyber Security and International Journal on Wireless Personal Communications (Springer) and has chaired sessions in many international conferences and workshops. He has also served as a Guest Editor for several Special issues of IEEE Network, IEEE Communications Magazine, and ACM MONET. He served as a co-guest editor of the Feature Topic “Human Bond Communications,” that appeared in the February 2019 issue of IEEE Communications Magazine. He served as a guest editor of 2015 October IEEE Communications Feature Topic titled “Social Networks Meet Next Generation Mobile Multimedia Internet,” March 2012 IEEE Communications Feature Topic titled “Convergence of Applications Services in Next Generation Networks” as well as the June 2012 Feature Topic titled “Social Networks Meet Wireless Networks.” In April 2011, he was awarded 2010 IEEE Region 5 Outstanding Engineering Educator Award. He received the best paper award for the paper “A Multi-Path Routing Scheme for GMPLS-Controlled WDM Networks,” presented at the 4th IEEE Advanced Networks and Telecommunications Systems conference.
Dr. Mohan is a co-founder of the startup IntelliNexus, LLC, the objective of which are the development of innovative adhoc vehicular networking to advance the notion of connected cars and the development of IoT and IoV applications to improve traffic safety and reduce accidents and congestion. Dr. Mohan holds a Ph.D. degree in electrical and computer engineering from McMaster University, Canada, the Masters degree in electrical engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur, India, and the Bachelors degree in Electronics and Telecommunications from the University of Madras, India.

Pranav Jha

Senior Research Scientist, IIT Bombay

Pranav Jha has 20+ years of research and development experience in communication and networking technologies with expertise in wireless network architectures, communication protocols and resource management algorithms. He is an active participant in the development of technical standards in the areas of fifth generation wireless communication networks and Software Defined Networking (SDN) and currently chairs two IEEE working groups, namely, SDN based Middleware for Control and Management of Networks - IEEE P1930.1 and Frugal 5G Networks - IEEE P2061.
He currently works with IIT Bombay, Mumbai, India as a Senior Research Scientist where he focusses on research programmes under the broad umbrella of wireless communication and networking, with emphasis on SDN based architectures for Wireless Networks, Public Safety Communication and Rural Broadband Communication. Pranav has multiple patents issued and pending, contribution to IEEE and 3GPP standards and research papers in these areas. He has also developed and delivered workshops/tutorials on wireless communication networks, communication network architectures, system design, resource management schemes in wireless networks and SDN.

Rajesh Mehrotra

Global Spectrum Policy, ESOA

Mr. Rajesh Mehrotra is the Founder and Principal Consultant,`Redbooks Consulting Pvt. Ltd.’ - a radiocommunication/satellite Advisory. He is providing regulatory and technical guidance to global satellite organizations such as ESOA and counseling on matters concerning use and management of radio spectrum & ITU’s Radio Regulations.
He retired in 2010 from the Radiocommunication Bureau (BR), Space Services Department (SSD), ITU Headquarters in Geneva, as Senior Radiocommunication Engineer & Counsellor. He worked in ITU from 1997 to 2010 and was `inter-alia’ responsible for regulatory and technical analysis of space filings for `Coordination and Notification’ of satellite networks. He was ITU/BR Counsellor for WRC-03 and WRC-07.
Master of Engineering (Electronics & Communication) from the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Roorkee, India, he was Joint Wireless Adviser to the Govt. of India and did two ITU/UNDP Missions in Nepal and Bhutan as ‘Senior ITU Expert’ in 1992 & 1995 respectively.
In 2011/2012 he undertook the preparation of `A Roadmap for ITU’s Wireless Broadband Masterplan’ for the four countries, Myanmar, Samoa, Viet Nam & Nepal and also for the Asia-Pacific region, in general, as a mission under the ITU Regional Office in Bangkok.

Benoit Sauveroche

First Counsellor, Delegation of the European Union to India and Bhutan

Benoît Sauveroche is First Counsellor in the European Union Delegation to India and Bhutan, based in New Delhi. He is responsible for cooperation between the EU and India in the area Communication Networks, Contents and Technology. He is involved in the policy dialogue between India and the EU in fields related to information and communication technologies (ICT). He is also supervising the EU-India ICT standardisation project, which is active in promoting closer alignment the production and use of upcoming ICT standards in areas such as Machine-to-Machine communication, 5G, intelligent transport systems and security.

Andreas Sommer

Team Leader and Senor Technical Advisor , Project “India-EU Cooperation on ICT-Related Standardisation, Policy and Legislation”

For more than 36 years Andreas Sommer is active in the global ICT sector as Senior Project Manager, Senior Consultant, Technical Advisor and Expert. Best practice experience he has gained in partially very sensitive and complex projects across different time zones with investment volumes up to several billion USD.

His strong technical, economic and commercial background supplemented by a comprehensive knowledge of international telecommunications regulations and ICT policies as well as excellent organisational, team leading, analytical, presentation and communications skills were key success factors for his proven track record. Governments, multilateral agencies and organisations, and companies from various sectors including leading ICT network operators and service providers are international clients. Contacts are operating departments, executive boards and ministers.

T.R. Dua

Chairman, ITU-APT Foundation of India

An engineering graduate with diploma in Business Management and export Marketing. Have an experience of over 35 years in the telecom sector. Experience includes all facets of telecom be it Product Development, Business Development, Telecom Licensing, Regulatory issues & Spectrum Management.

All these years I have held very prestigious positions as Director in leading telecom companies like Bharti Airtel Ltd., Shyam Telecom Ltd., Cellular Operators Association of India, Vice Chairman, Global ICT Standardisation Forum for India and Director General TAIPA.

Have many first to my credit like finalization of joint ventures, technical collaboration, introduction of new products, launch of new services in India and finalization of licence agreements / interconnect agreements.

Work very closely with institutions like ITU/APT/WWRF with regards to the spectrum/regulatory matters.

Very actively involved with various professional institutions / associations to promote the interest of telecom sector and published many papers in telecom.

Presently holding the following position in various Professional Institutions:

1. Chairman – ITU APT Foundation of India
2. Vice Chairman - GISFI
3. Fellow of Institution of Engineers (India)
4. Fellow of Institution of Electronics & Telecom Engineers
5. Advisory Board inner circle Tower Xchange
6. MEMBER AMITY TELECOM VISION BOARD
7. MEMBER CORE GROUP “MOBILITY FOR LIFE “ EU PROJECT
8. Member – Computer Society of India
9. Member – Indian Science Congress
10. Member –WWRF
11. Member –FICCI/ASSOCHAM/CII Telecom committee

IN 2010 he was awarded the ”EVANGELIST MOBILE INFRASTRUCTURE AWARD

Vikram Tiwathia

Deputy Director General, Cellular Operators Association of India

Vikram, is the Deputy Director General, of the COAI. This is India’s leading industry association for Telecom, Broadband and Digital services. He interacts extensively with the ICT industry leadership and senior officials at DoT, MeitY, TRAI and other government offices for regulatory and policy matters. He is a member of the Joint Working Group on Cyber Security chaired by Chief Cyber Security Coordinator. An active member of national industry associations - CII, FICCI, Assocham, TSDSI Committees. He participates in many International Workshops / conferences being conducted by ITU, APT etc. He serves on the Board of the Global Certification Forum (GCF).
He has earlier worked with:
TATA Teleservices Limited from 2008-10;
Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) as their CIO from 2005 – 2008,
Indian Army (Signals).Took voluntary retirement in the rank of Colonel in 2005

Zainul Charbiwala

Co-Founder and CTO, Tricog Health

Zainul Charbiwala is a co-founder and the CTO at Tricog Health. He's been building systems, creating and managing teams and developing software for over 18 years. He is interested in the overlap of connected devices and machine intelligence to revolutionise and reinvent healthcare. He holds a Master's degree from IIT Bombay and a PhD from University of California, Los Angeles. Before Tricog, Zainul was a Research Manager at IBM's India Research Lab. Zainul has 7 patents and over 30 refereed publications.

Shri Vipin Tyagi

Executive Director, C-DOT

Vipin Tyagi is currently the Executive Director and Chairman of the Board of Centre for Development of telematics (C-DOT) an autonomous Telecom R &D Centre of Govt. of India, engaged in development of various projects at the frontier of Telecom technology in the areas of Optical communications, Next Generation Networks and Wireless technologies. He is an innovation and Business Leader from Information Technology and Telecommunication Industry for over 35 years. Founded and led a company of New Delhi for 12 years as Board Member and Global CEO. Headed global businesses in India, Japan, Australia, USA and Europe. He has more than 50 conference and journal publications, and has filed more than twenty patents, in the optical and wireless domains.
Vipin Tyagi is a recipient of the prestigious IEEE Bangalore “Technologist of the Year 2018” for exemplary work in the area of Optical Fibre Networks and for contribution to India’s flagship program, BharatNet. He has received various accolades and awards like “Eminent Engineer Award Sep 2017” – IET-The Institution of Engineering and Technology (UK), “Wi Fi Leader of the Year” at My India Wi Fi India Summit & Awards 2018 among others. Vipin Tyagi is also a recipient of prestigious IETE-BV Baliga Memorial Award-2019 in recognition of his innovative and business leadership role in the field of innovation technology and telecom industry for over 35 years promoting “Make in India” initiatives and his contribution towards R&D of large telecom systems, organizational development and creation of high performance teams.
Vipin Tyagi obtained his Bachelor of Electronics & Communication Engineering, Masters of Technology (Computer Science & Engineering) from Indian Institute of Delhi and Post Graduate Diploma in Management (Two years) from All India Management Association.

Debashish Bhattacharya

Dy. Director General, BIF

Debashish Bhattacharya is involved in Advocacy & Consulting in the field of Technology, Public Policy, Regulation, Markets & Business Development in the field of Digital Communications (IT & Telecom), Satellite Communications & Broadcasting.
He is currently associated with Broadband India Forum as Deputy Director General. Prior to this, he was holding the position of Sr. Director-Technology & Policy in BIF. BIF is a think tank which is solely dedicated to enhance, adapt & promote Policies & regulations for the enhancement of Broadband and Digital India.
Debashish has been part of this think tank since 2015 and has been part of the team responsible for formulating inputs to the Union Govt as well as the regulator TRAI on various Policy & Regulatory Matters from creation of a New Digital Communications Policy, Digital transformation of the Telecom sector, New and cutting edge technologies viz,. 5G, IoT, M2M, AI, ML, etc , the Fourth Industrial Revolution (Industry 4.0), Data Protection, Data privacy and Security, etc.
Mr. Bhattacharya has corporate experience of over three decades wherein he has worked with reputed companies viz. Siemens, Nokia-Siemens , Alcatel CIT, Lucent Technologies, Nokia –Siemens Networks , ZTE, Alcatel-Lucent Technologies, ACME CleanTech Solutions, besides reputed Indian business houses viz. HCL & Escorts.
He is an Engineer by profession from IIT, Roorkee and holds a Masters in Business Management ( MBA ) from FMS, University of Delhi.

Preetham Uthaiah

EVP Marketing & Strategy, Saankhya Labs

Preetham is an ICT professional with more than 2 decades of global experience in Telecom and networking industry. He is the Executive Vice President of Strategy and Marketing at Saankhya Labs. Prior to Saankhya Labs he was Vice President at Tech Mahindra leading their Smart City international Business development and IoT Go-To-market initiatives. Prior to that He was Vice President and Head of Business Unit of a large strategic account for Tech Mahindra. At Tech Mahindra, he has served in many roles from Technical roles to Sales and Large account management roles in USA and India. Prior to that he was Director of Sales at L&T Technology services in USA. He has also been entrepreneur and founder of start-ups in the areas of IOT and industrial automation. Preetham started his career as software engineer and has worked in Telecom and networking products in Alcatel USA (Now part of Nokia).
Preetham is an Electronics and communications Engineering graduate from Karnataka University, India and has MBA in International Business management from Thunderbird School of Global management, University of Arizona USA.

Narang Kishor

Mentor & Principal Design Architect, Narnix Technolabs

Kishor is Technology Consultant, Mentor & Design Architect in Electrical, Electronics & ICT with over 40 years of professional experience in education, research, design and consulting. Over 30 years of hardcore Research and Design Development Experience in Solutions, Systems, Products, Hardware, Software & Firmware (Embedded Software) in
fields of Industrial, Power, IT, Telecom, Medical, Energy and Environment, and over 10 years of Consultancy Experience to different segments of business & industry. He has over 200 Research & Design Mentees in the Electronics, ICT & STI Ecosystems.
Professionally, he is an Electronics Design Engineer practicing design & development of a wide spectrum of Products, Systems & Solutions as an Independent Design House – NARNIX since 1981.
For last 10 years, deeply involved in Standardization in the Electrical, Electronics, Communication and Information Technology Domains with focus on Identifying Gaps in Standards to address Interoperable Systems & Solutions Deployments and bring Harmonization by defining standardized interfaces to ensure End-to-End Interoperability. Currently leading the Standardization activities as the Chairman of Smart Infrastructure Sectional Committee LITD 28 in BIS the Indian National Standards Body, Vice Chair – Strategy & Convenor – Reference Architecture WG in IEC Systems Committee on Smart Cities, Project Leader – IEC TS 63188 ED1 – Smart Cities Reference Architecture Methodology, Project Leader – IEC 63205 ED1 – Smart Cities Reference Architecture, Member Steering Committee – OCEANIS (The Open Community for Ethics in Autonomous and Intelligent Systems) & Co-Editor – ISO
30145 on Smart City ICT Reference Frameworks…
Currently, Kishor is developing a Comprehensive “5G Inclusive ICT Architecture for Critical Infrastructure” and leading the 5G Application Layer Standards development in India.

Vivek Singh

Deputy CEO & CTO, SkyMet Weather Services

Vivek comes from an engineering background with 15 years of experience in PDLC , SAAS elivery, Software Architecture and design, Programming, Design Reviews.
Vivek has been instrumental in establishing Indian’s largest weather network based on IoT. It is this system that he established pan-India which has helped Skymet in accurate forecasting. Vivek is also an expert in combining HPC on cloud. It is this technology when combined with latest Agri Tech has given AI ML based models to design solutions which are consumed by millions of farmers.
He also has interest in painting and is a self-taught talented painter.

Ashwani Kumar

Vice-President, Standards and Industry, Huawei

Ashwani has been actively involved in Telecom industry for over 28 years. He has rich and wide experience working with Indian Govt. (in DoT, TEC & BSNL), Tech Mahindra, British Telecom, and Ericsson previously. He is currently heading Standards and Industry development role for Huawei in India.
He has extensive experience in wireline & mobile wireless networking, service delivery, technology standardization and spectrum strategy. He is actively involved with 3GPP 5G NR standardization, ITU IMT-2020 program and with ITU-R on spectrum standardization and technical regulations.

Subodh Kumar Gupta

Member Technology, Department of Telecommunications

Sri. S. K. Gupta is an ITS officer of 1980 batch and joined DOT in the year 1982 as ADET. He has completed more than 37 years in the Telecom department.
He did his graduation from Delhi College of Engineering in 1980. He worked in DCM, Data Products before joining in DOT in 1982 at TTC, Jabalpur, as ADET (Probationer). After completion of his training he joined at Telecom Engineering Centre and worked in E10B software Centre for 10 years till 1993 as ADET and ADG.
He was Promoted as Director and posted in TTC, Jabalpur as Director (Network ) and subsequently at ALTTC as Director (IT & UNDP).
He was promoted to Senior Administative Grdae level at ALTTC itself and worked there another two and half years as GM(Network ).
He was transferred to Himachal Pradesh Telecom Circle and worked there as GM(Business Development ) from 2003 to 2005. Then he went to BSNL Corporate office New Delhi as Dy. Director General,(Long Term Planning) and subsequently worked as the first Dy. Director General Vigilance Telecom Monitoring, Delhi DOT for two years before becoming Advisor in TRAI and worked there for two and a half years in Broadcasting and Cable Services division.
Again, he was back to HP Telecom Circle as GM(Development ) and became Chief General Manager, HP circle. He worked about 3 years as CGM, H.P. Telecom Circle. He also worked for over one year as CGM, Panjab Telecom Circle before he joined as Advisor WB LSA for 6 months from Oct’18 to March’19.
AT present he is working as Member (Technology) in DOT, New Delhi.
During his service tenure, he has visited various places in abroad like France, Canada, Switzerland, Singapore, Hong Kong, Bali, Bhutan and Laos etc. as a member / leader of delegation and for various training programs.

Samiran Gupta

Head of India, ICANN

Samiran is the Head of India for ICANN and a veteran in business strategy and public affairs management.

Prior to joining ICANN, Samiran was a Senior Director with APCO Worldwide responsible for counseling clients in business and public affairs strategy. Earlier, Samiran was a founder and managing director of a leading management consulting and business advisory practice known for working on distinctive projects for a range of corporations from Fortune 500 clients to top Indian businesses and mid-sized entities. Samiran has worked extensively in sectors including telecom, entertainment, payment systems, e-commerce, social media, and energy and renewables.

Samiran has a Masters in Business Administration from St Joseph’s University in Philadelphia, United States of America, and a Bachelor of Commerce from University of Calcutta, India.

P.K. Sinha

Member (Finance), Department of Telecommunications

He has been holding the post of Member (Finance), Digital Communications Commission w.e.f. 29th July, 2019 along with his present assignment of Controller General of Communication Accounts. He is Financial Advisor of Digital Communications Commission and involved in Telecom Policy making & Regulation Finance, Telecom Licensing and Spectrum Policy, Project Finance, Revenue Collection and Assessment, Administration of Pension and Terminal Benefits, Foreign Direct Investment in Telecom Sector. He is also Cadre Controlling Authority of Accounts and Finance Officers of DOT & Deptt. of Posts. He has a career span of around 35 years and prior to his appointment as Member (Finance) and CGCA, he has held various posts in Department of Telecom, Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited, Department of Posts and Damodar Valley Corporation. He was also a regular faculty member of National Institute of Communication Finance and National Institute of Financial Management.

Rajat Mukarji

Director General, BIF

Rajat Mukarji is a recognised veteran of the industry, having joined the Mobile Telecommunications industry in 1995. A sales, marketing and operations background provided the understanding of how technology becomes the enabler in this social metamorphosis. After performing leadership roles in Sales & Marketing, Operations, Business Development and Customer Operations, he moved to the Strategy and Policy team. A team leader and team player, he has effectively represented his company's views to the Policy maker and Regulator. He has witnessed the ups and downs of the Regulatory environment but has remained an optimist, confidant that in the end the consumer will get the right products, in the right place, at the right time.

Rajeev Prakash

Deputy Director General, Department of Telecommunications

Shri Rajeev Prakash, DDG (WPF), Department of Telecommunications, is a Senior Administrative Grade Officer of the Indian Post & Telecommunication Accounts and Finance Service (1995 Batch). He has done BA (Hons) in English
from St. Stephen’s College, Delhi University and MA in Development Studies from the Institute of Social Studies, Erasmus University. He has vast experience in various posts in the Government including conducting spectrum auctions.

Sushil Kumar

DDG, TEC

Bio to be updated

Brejesh Lal

NCC co-ordinator, IIT Delhi

Bio to be updated

Ravi Gandhi

Former Chief Regulatory Officer, Airtel

Bio to be updated

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