Software Defined Radio (SDR) is one of the most important emerging disruptive technologies that will shape the future of the wireless communication and mobile computing industries. It is the result of a long process of technology evolution. This evolutionary process is still underway.

The “ideal” software radio, consists of a wideband antenna, wideband ADC and DAC, and a programmable processor. The key difference between digital radios and software radios is the ability to upgrade the hardware or software of the radio device. The software upgrade can be performed directly over the wireless medium.

The full value of software-defined radios will be achieved when they can fully meet the goals and objectives of all vendors in the wireless value chain. In order to achieve this, it is necessary to have a language that provides an interface to each of these groups on one side and to the radio systems (hardware and software) on the other side. This language, called a Metalanguage contains information about hardware / software functionality / configuration, Air Interface Standards, the information being exchanged, and end users.

Mark Cummings is currently organizing enVia II. He was the CEO and founder of enVia I, a venture catalyst spun out of Stanford Research Institute which launched three SDR companies. Mark is the principal inventor on the earliest patent granted on the use of reconfigurable logic for SDR. He chaired the Organizing Committee of the SDR Forum and was its first Technical Committee Chair, served as Chairman of the Board of Directors and is currently Chair of the Commercial Working Group. Earlier in his career, Mark helped found and sat on the Board of Directors of PCMCIA, Smart Card Industry Association and IrDA (Infrared Data Association). He was an early member of IEEE 802, a contributor to the X.25 standard and designed the first international X.25 network. Mark holds a Ph.D. from the Graduate School of Information Science at Tohoku University (Japan), and an MBA from the Wharton School of Business in Conjunction with the Moore School of Engineering and the Annenberg School of Communications at the University of Pennsylvania. He has published over 150 papers and articles on communications and computing and two book chapters on SDR technology currently used as college texts.

Todor Cooklev is with San Francisco State University. He also serves as an industry consultant. His interests are in the areas of wireless communication systems, software radio, and signal processing. Previously he had positions with 3Com Corp. and Aware, Inc. He has been involved with the development of the Bluetooth and the IEEE 802 standards for wireless communication. He was one of the founders and the first Vice-Chair of IEEE 802.15.3, as well as the most recent Study Group on Video Transport Stream over 802.11. Currently he chairs the IEEE Standards in Education Committee, a committee sponsored by the IEEE Standards Association and IEEE Education Activities Board. He is the author of the book Wireless Communication Standards: A Study of IEEE 802.11, 802.15, and 802.16, published by IEEE Press in 2004.

The purpose of this talk is to familiarize participants with all aspects of substation automation, including the different levels of substation integration and automation, the use of Intelligent Electronic Devices (IED), and the reasons a utility would need substation automation. The components of the integration and automation architecture with communication protocols are discussed. Relevant industry standards and their impact on substation automation are described.

John D. McDonald, P.E., Vice President, Automation for Power Systems Automation for KEMA, Inc. assists electrical utilities in substation automation, feeder automation SCADA/DMS/EMS systems, and communications protocols. He received his B.S.E.E. and M.S.E.E. (Power Engineering) degrees from Purdue University and an M.B.A. (Finance) from the University of California-Berkeley. He is a Fellow of the IEEE, President of the IEEE Power Engineering Society (PES), and Past Chair of the IEEE PES Substations Committee. He has published 31 papers and co-authored three books, including being Editor-in-Chief, and Substation Integration and Automation Chapter author, for the book Electric Power Substations Engineering, Second Edition published by Taylor and Francis/CRC Press in 2007.

This talk is an overview of the present environment of voice, data and multimedia communications industry. Everyone is aware that the communications industry, which includes traffic that is voice, data and other media, grew by leaps and bounds in the 1990’s, providing wonderful opportunities for many business people and entrepreneurs. Then the bottom fell out of the market.

Many companies failed, merged or formed joint ventures. Even amongst these there has been more churn than analysts can follow. Additional uncertainty was, and still i s, caused by the evolution of emerging competitive technologies, such as Voice over IP, allowing people to use internet for voice calls, and adding further to the woes of the traditional telephone companies, since the models used for internet rates did not generate the same level of revenue for such calls. It remains to be seen which technologies and which companies will survive. There is also growth in many internet applications.

Engineers and other creative designers are introducing new services almost daily, and many of these are also becoming very popular. However this growth alone cannot sustain the industry, because the revenues produced by these services are low. The internet culture was one of offering free service, with generally low quality, which is diametrically opposed to the telecom culture. Users are showing that they are willing to pay for these services, but this change is slow in coming. Services such as voice over IP and electronic commerce do appear to have a solid future, and these services, along with mobile communications, will help the industry to recover.

The nature of the telecom industry has changed, and will continue to evolve. There are numerous opportunities for people who understand the new types of services, but they must come with the right skills. This talk illustrates the need for strong management skills to accompany the technical skills engineering typically bring to the industry.

Celia Desmond is President of World Class-Telecommunications, which provides training in management skills in business and telecommunications engineering environments. She was instrumental in creating a Masters Program and a Certificate Program at University of Toronto. She has lectured internationally on programs for success in today’s changing environment. At Stentor Resource Centre Inc. she was instrumental in establishing the Stentor culture and processes, and in obtaining buy-in from the employees to adopt and grow the new organization. She developed and implemented processes for service/product development and for project governance. As Director - Industry Liaison, she was the external technical linkage to the Stentor owner companies, their customers, and the international technical community In various positions at Bell Canada, Celia provided strategic direction to corporate planners, ran technology and service trials, standardized equipment, and issued guidelines for the member companies. In Celia's previous line positions, her groups provided technical and project management support to large business clients. She is author of Project Management for Telecommunications Managers , published by Kluwer Academic Publishers (now Springer).

Celia is the 2007 Director and Secretary of IEEE, and she was 2006 IEEE Vice President - Technical Activities. She is also Vice President Membership for IEEE Engineering Management Society. She was 2002-2003 President of IEEE Communications Society. In 2000-2001 Celia was President of IEEE Canada, and she served her second term on the Board of Directors of IEEE as Region 7 Director. She was 1997-1998 Division III Director. She has twice served in the IEEE Audit Committee, including serving as Chair, and actively participated in numerous other TAB, RAB, IEEE and Society committees. She was 2004 Chair of the IEEE Transnational Committee. She is a member of the Board of Directors of the IEEE Canada Foundation where she is the Donations Chair. Celia was awarded the Donald J. McLellan Award for meritorious service to IEEE Communications Society, the Engineering Institute of Canada John B. Sterling Medal in May 2000, and the IEEE Millennium award. She is a Senior Member of IEEE.

She is co-editor of Journal of Communication and Information Systems in Brazil , and on the Advisory Board for New Jersey Institute of Technology Engineering Department.

Celia holds a Masters in Electrical Engineering from Carleton University, a B.Sc. in Mathematics and Psychology from Queens University, an Ontario Teaching Certificate and a Project Management Professional (PMP) certification. Celia has taught kindergarten, high school, and at three universities, Ryerson School of Business, Stevens Institute of Technology, and University of Toronto.

Telecom Engineers and Managers often find themselves in the position of a program or project manager without the tools to efficiently manage the process, or the know-how to develop supercharged, high performing, project teams.

This presentation provides an overview of the project management process and the theory and techniques for developing a project team culture of trust and collaboration.

The presentation includes:

• An overall introduction to the project management process
• A chance to work with selected project management tools
• An introduction to the approaches and theories of teambuilding
• Interactive "teamwork challenge" activity

Doug Bedinger is a former engineer, project manager and now teambuilding and organization development consultant. Doug helps project teams work better together. With over 16 years of both internal and independent consulting experience, Doug consistently helps guide and lead project teams to higher levels of performance. Doug works with clients to customize each engagement to meet the needs of the team, with deliverables that include everything from face-to-face teambuilding, strategic planning, project management workshops, online learning and collaboration, to low-ground and high-ropes team challenges.

Doug’s industry experience includes clients from both large and small companies in the manufacturing, high-tech, gas and electric utilities, professional services, finance and banking industries including Lucent Technologies, PG&E, Salesforce.com, and Irwin Home Equity. When not consulting with clients, facilitating a company offsites or developing a new workshop, you will likely find Doug at home with kids, playing racquetball, or out backpacking in the high Sierras.

This presentation will cover the medium-access control (MAC) and the physical layer (PHY) of the IEEE 802.16 wireless standard. This meeting is the continuation and conclusion of the Oakland-East Bay IEEE Communications Society Seminar on the IEEE 802 wireless standards seminar held on March 24.

See below for biography of Subbu Ponnuswamy

The IEEE 802 wireless standards have become a mass market industry, which has led to further standards development. In this seminar we will discuss wireless data communication standards developed by the IEEE: the 802.11 standard for wireless local area networks (including a, b, g, and n) and the 802.16 standard for broadband wireless access systems. The seminar will present the medium-access control (MAC) and the physical layers (PHY) of these standards. A key enabler of the 802.11n and 802.16 is OFDM (orthogonal frequency division multiplexing) which will be discussed. The latest developments within 802.11 and 802.16 will be summarized.

Subbu Ponnuswamy was one of the early participants in the IEEE 802.16 Working Group and a contributor to the IEEE 802.16 and IEEE 802.11 standards. He is a coauthor of the book WirelessMAN: Inside the IEEE 802.16 Standard for Wireless Metropolitan Area Networks, published by the IEEE Press. He is also a coauthor of a WiMAX course for development engineers, offered by Doceotech. He has many years of industry experience in the design and development of wireless LAN and MAN products, including those based on the IEEE 802.16 and IEEE 802.11 standards. As the director of engineering at Kiwi Networks, Ponnuswamy led the design and development of interference-resilient IEEE 802.16 and IEEE 802.11 systems in the license-exempt bands for indoor and outdoor applications. He also led IEEE 802.11 medium access control (MAC) application-specific integrated circuit (ASIC) and software development at Vivato for smart antenna systems. During his tenure at Malibu Networks, he designed and developed a quality-of-service-centric broadband wireless MAC. He has also held various technical positions with Honeywell, Sequent Computer Systems, and Lincom Wireless. He is currently with Aruba Networks. Ponnuswamy is the author of many publications and patents in the areas of wireless communication, real-time systems, and multiprocessor communication networks. He graduated with an M.S. in computer engineering from Wayne State University and a B.E. in electronics and communication engineering from the University of Madras, India. He is a member of the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) and the IEEE Communications Society.

By turning any mobile device user into an on-location broadcaster, location platforms facilitate the user friendly collection, sharing and delivery of information. Uses for such devices include companies tracking assets out in the field, parents trying to ensure the safety of their children, and a couple searching for a restaurant review on the spot. In this presentation, Dr. Hotes will provide an update on the technology behind location platforms and dynamic mobile applications.

WaveMarket's CTO, Dr. Scott Hotes, brings to WaveMarket a 10-year track record of leading software development. His specialty is launching industrial-grade software implementing advanced algorithms - ranging from UNIX kernel to cryptography. Prior to WaveMarket, Dr. Hotes was at the United States Department of Defense, where he oversaw software development teams at Ft. Meade, MD and at the Army Research Lab at Austin, TX. The systems developed supported large military customers, employing the use of advanced data mining and machine learning algorithms in Internet security and traffic modeling applications.