2021 Speakers

Anand Nandakumar is the founder & CEO of Halo.car, an all-electric driverless car service that is launching a fleet of driverless cars on public roads later this year.

Before founding Halo, Anand led the perception team at Uber’s self-driving division where he oversaw the deep learning imaging research teams. Prior to that he led trailblazing technology divisions at Sony, Disney, Vodafone, and others.

Asha R. Keddy is Corporate Vice President at Intel Corporation, where she also serves as the General Manager of Next Generation and Standards (NGS) Group. A recognized industry leader, Keddy’s passion is in understanding how advancements in technology can improve the lives of people, and the environment in which we live—creating a safer, healthier, smarter society for all.

Keddy’s organization enables new business verticals and applications – participating in industry consortia; contributing to global standards; developing and testing prototypes in trials, and driving product innovation. Her team facilitates trials with other ecosystem partners, key learnings from which have been influential in setting government and industry policy, and in furthering the convergence of communications and computing with end-to-end technology solutions. This work will open up new market opportunities in multiple verticals, including games, sports, connected cars, and smart cities, while bringing forward the advanced capabilities of artificial intelligence, visual data, mixed reality and connectivity-based technologies to address residential, enterprise and industrial business needs.

Keddy’s vision of innovation is based on iterative development, insights about people, and a commitment to partnerships with industry and governments alike. Keddy leads 5G partner strategy and development efforts for Intel. This multi-year investment, her team’s work, and dozens of trials with industry-leading manufacturing, operator, and vertical partners have resulted in several world “firsts.” These accomplishments will accelerate 5G commercial deployment across industrial, automotive, fixed wireless and enterprise use cases in all major geographies. The learnings and Intellectual Property (IP) from these engagements will also serve to evolve the development of system architectures and incubation of technologies and IP for wireless at Intel. Ms. Keddy lives in the Portland, Oregon, and in her personal time enjoys reading, painting, hiking, biking and kayaking with her husband and dog. 

Bejoy is the Chief Strategy Officer at Mavenir. In this role, Bejoy leads and orchestrates cross-functional strategic alignment of the complete product portfolio, advises on business-critical imperatives, and engages external business and industry experts on product and technology strategies that accelerate innovation across Mavenir. He is an accomplished product and technology leader with a record of defining business vision and driving investments and acquisitions to realize long range growth.

Previously he led the Product Line Management and Solution Architecture teams at Mitel Mobile (now Mavenir) and has held multiple leadership roles with Sprint (now part of T-Mobile) and MetroPCS (now part of T-Mobile), and technical roles at BPL-US West (now part of Vodafone Idea).

Bejoy’s extensive mobile and telecommunications experience includes leadership positions in Product & Technology Development, Strategic Planning, M&A transactions, Competitive Analysis, Network Engineering and Design.

Having led multiple industry-first innovations and led launches of world’s first technologies both from the Operator & vendor side, Bejoy is backed by solid credentials including MS, MBA, CCIE and over 25 granted patents covering next generation technologies.

Biju Nair is president of Assurant’s Global Connected Living business unit, which delivers comprehensive services, support and protection for the connected consumer. He is responsible for the financial performance and growth of the business across the markets we serve, as well as development of our people, products and capabilities.

Nair’s entrepreneurial and innovation leadership spans more than 25 years in the wireless industry. Previously, Nair served as the EVP and president of Assurant’s Global Trade-in and Upgrade business. He joined Assurant in 2020 as part of Assurant’s acquisition of HYLA Mobile where he served as president and CEO. HYLA Mobile focused on developing technologies to re-purpose pre-owned mobile devices, creating economic opportunities for wireless companies, providing a better experience for device owners its clients and promoting environmentally sustainable practices. Under his leadership, HYLA was named a most valuable startup in the nation by PitchBook and won the SME Award at The Circulars, the world’s premier Circular Economy award program hosted by the World Economic Forum.

Ernst & Young named Nair as a finalist for Entrepreneur of the Year in 2019 and 2020. He also is the recipient of the prestigious Chairman’s Award for Communications Quality and Reliability from IEEE, the world’s largest technical professional organization dedicated to advancing technology for humanity, for his work in providing basic technology services for those who are less fortunate so they can improve their everyday lives.

Nair serves on the board of College of Computing at Illinois Institute of Technology (Illinois Tech) and as a commissioner on the Global Information Infrastructure Commission. He owns several patents in the field of wireless technology and is a frequent speaker at major wireless conferences, such as Mobile World Congress and Mobile Future Forward.

Nair has a B.S and M.S in Electronics and Computer Engineering from Warsaw University of Technology and a M.S. in Computer Science from Illinois Institute of Technology in Chicago.

Bikash is currently the Vice President of Google Global Networking (GGN). Bikash’s team is responsible for design, development, build and operation of Google’s massive global network that every Google service and the Google Cloud Platform relies upon. The GGN team develops the cutting edge intent driven networking technologies that allow Google’s global WAN to be zero touch, builds out some of the largest scale SDN infrastructure ever deployed (B4, Espresso), scales Google’s global CDN that fuels Youtube and all other Google services and expands the reach of Google’s network by building the highest capacity submarine cables and the most programmable terrestrial optical networks. This infra is also the core network that underpins of all Google cloud services. Prior to this, Bikash was the Executive Vice President and Chief Technology Officer of Juniper Networks. In this role, Bikash charted Juniper’s technology strategy and led the execution of the company’s critical technology innovations. Specifically, Bikash was responsible for Juniper’s telco cloud and virtualization, multicloud enterprise datacenter and software defined enterprise networking products and technologies. Prior to Juniper, Bikash spent close to ten years at Google, where he was a Distinguished Engineer and the Head of Network Architecture, Engineering and Planning. Bikash received a BTech from IIT, India; and MS and PhD degrees from the University of Maryland at College Park, all in Electrical Engineering.

Bill is the Senior Director of System Architecture at Medtronic’s Surgical Robotics Operating Unit developing the Hugo Robotic System for teleoperated minimally invasive surgery. Before joining the company in 2013, Bill was at T2 BioSystems working as a technical lead to develop the T2Dx, a fluid diagnostic system incorporating nuclear magnetic resonance for detecting molecular targets. He has also been involved with several medical device startups, including Cambridge Endoscopic Devices developing handheld articulating laparoscopic instruments and EndoVia Medical developing a low-cost teleoperated surgical robot. In addition to his industrial experience, Bill was a tenure track Professor of Mechanical Engineering at Purdue University researching novel surgical robotic technology and algorithms for image-guided surgery. He was also a founder of Pressure Profile Systems producing high sensitivity tactile sensors and systems for industrial and academic applications. Bill earned his Ph.D. in Engineering Sciences from Harvard University and B.S. in Electrical Engineering from Purdue University and is the author of over 80 patents and peer reviewed publications.

Caroline Chan is General Manager of 5G Infrastructure Division within Intel’s Network Platform Group. Caroline has overall responsibility for Intel’s global network infrastructure strategy and solution development related to 5th-generation wireless technology. Chan and her team identify and develop use cases that incorporate the Internet of Things, innovation in wireless technologies and deployment models.   

Chan was previously VP and GM of Intel 5G Infrastructure Division and had overall responsibility for Intel’s global network infrastructure strategy and solution development related to 5th-generation wireless technology. Chan and her team identified and developed use cases that incorporate the Internet of Things, innovation in wireless technologies and deployment models, such as mobile edge computing and alternative spectrums that will enable new service providers and enterprise networks.

Since joining Intel in 2009, Chan has worked closely with telecommunications vendors, operators and application developers to advance strategy and marketing in virtual RAN, mini Cloud-RAN and mobile edge computing technologies. Before leading the 5G infrastructure division, she spent six years as director of wireless technology and strategy. In that position, Chan oversaw server CPU extension into Intel’s wireless infrastructure business, a role that encompassed investment strategy, CPU adoption and modification, marketing, and business development.

Before joining Intel, Chan had a 15-year career at Nortel Networks Corp., culminating in her role as director of 4G wireless product management.

She serves as an independent director on EnerSys Inc. (NYSE: ENS) board. In addition, Chan serves on the board of the Telecom Infrastructure Project (TIP) and CBRS Alliance. She is also an advisory board member for Advisory Council for Rural Edge Solutions (ACRES) and 5G Open Innovation (5GOI) Lab. Her contributions in the area of virtualized wireless radio access networks earned Chan an Intel Achievement Award in 2016. Chan was elected to be among the top 25 movers and shakers in the telecom industry 2018 by Fierce Telecom and among the top 5G 100 most influential individuals charting the course for the next generation of global communications in 2020 by Light Reading.

Chan holds bachelor’s and master’s degrees in electrical engineering from the University of Texas at Austin and the University of Massachusetts Amherst, respectively.

Chetan Sharma is CEO and founder of Chetan Sharma Consulting and is one of the leading strategists in the mobile industry. Executives from wireless companies around the world seek his accurate predictions, independent insights, and actionable recommendations. He has served as an advisor to senior executives of several Fortune 100 companies in the wireless space and is probably the only industry strategist who has advised each of the top 9 global mobile data operators. Chetan is the author or co-author or editor of 15 best-selling books on mobile and over 200 articles related to mobile. He has been served on the advisory boards of Telefonica, Ericsson, Kymeta and other stealth startups.

Chrissy Meyer has spent the past decade taking hardware products from early concept through high-volume production.  After getting her MS in Electrical Engineering from Stanford, she led several projects at Apple and Square.  She was also a founding team member at Pearl Automation, a vehicle technology startup. She has developed products that have shipped tens of millions of units, and she has spent over a year on the ground in Asia working closely with manufacturers and suppliers.  Chrissy is currently a partner at Root Ventures, a seed-stage hard tech venture capital firm.  At Root, she invests in deeply technical teams that are solving problems in robotics, hardware, IoT, industrial automation, AI, and machine learning.

Cristin Flynn Goodwin is the Assistant General Counsel for Cybersecurity and Digital Trust at Microsoft. She has been Microsoft’s Lead Counsel for the Microsoft Security Response Center (MSRC), and since 2015 has specialized in adversary incidents, helping protect over a billion customers around the world. She also provides counsel to the Microsoft Threat Intelligence Center (MSTIC) on operational issues. Goodwin advises on a range of cybersecurity and cybercrime policy issues, and provides legal counsel to Microsoft’s Government Security Program (GSP) which provides governments with a structured, legal means to access source code and affirm there are no back doors in Microsoft products or services, as well as to share information about threats and vulnerabilities.

Don McGuire is senior vice president and chief marketing officer of Qualcomm Technologies, Inc. He is leading global marketing to support Qualcomm’s advancement in new and existing markets and expansion into growth areas. In this role, Don oversees communications; product and technology marketing; channel marketing; digital and social marketing; advertising, creative, media and brand management; strategic marketing and planning; and measurement and analytics.

Don is a seasoned marketing leader with 25 years of experience working across service provider, device OEM, content/applications, and semiconductor industries.

Don joined Qualcomm in 2016 to lead the Global Product Marketing organization. In this role as senior vice president, he redefined Qualcomm’s strategic approach to product marketing. His oversight and strong marketing expertise have led to innovative marketing campaigns and collaborative partnerships that have brought the most cutting-edge products to market, including the latest in 5G technologies.

Prior to joining Qualcomm, Don was a senior leader at Intel, where he led global marketing strategy, campaigns, and messaging for their Client Computing Business.

Previously, he was a founding member of a marketing strategy consulting firm with a client roster that included Intel, NBC Universal, Dell, Motorola, and Cricket. Don led the firm’s technology engagement practice. Before that, Don was the chief marketing officer of Amp’d Mobile, the vice president of global marketing for Kyocera, the vice president of sales and marketing for Leap Wireless and the vice president and general manager for Sprint PCS. Don began his career as a sales and marketing executive at McCaw Cellular Communications.

Don has a Bachelor of Science degree from California State University Chico in business administration and has attended an executive master’s program at Stanford University’s Schwab School of Business.

Don Stroberg is the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) at Onclave Networks, Inc. Joining the organization in 2020, he brings more than 25 years of experience in telecommunications and technology industries to his current role.  Prior to joining the Onclave team, Stroberg served as the Senior Vice President of Corporate Development for Ligado Networks. There he shaped the organization’s growth strategy, leading an international team as the entire industry pivoted to include 5G technologies and networks.  Stroberg’s career has taken him from startups like Radius Networks, where he served as COO, to more established organizations like Clearwire Corporation, Sprint and Nextel Communications, and Deloitte Consulting. He also has prior experience in the aerospace industry, where he worked in the New Aircraft Products Division of McDonnell Douglas.  Stroberg has a Master of Business Administration from the University of Chicago and a bachelor’s degree in Aeronautical and Astronautical Engineering from the University of Illinois.

As the CEO and President of C360, Howard Wright is responsible for leading the company into its next level of growth. His 20-year career in telecommunications, media and sports technology is driving his unwavering dedication to changing the way sports fans experience their favorite athletes and teams in this new immersive media economy.

Prior to joining C360, Wright was responsible for strengthening Intel’s presence as a sports technology company, and for developing new business opportunities related to the immersive experiences enabled by the Intel Sports Group. Wright also led the digitizing and personalizing of sports and entertainment in inventive ways to stimulate growth while collaborating with major sports leagues and organizations, broadcasters, telecom companies and other digital media business partners. Wright spent 14 years at Qualcomm Inc., culminating in his role as Senior Vice President of global business development. Wright holds a bachelor’s degree in Qualitative Economics from Stanford University, where he also played collegiate basketball. After earning his degree, Wright continued his athletic career by becoming a professional basketball player in the NBA, playing with the Dallas Mavericks, Orlando Magic and Atlanta Hawks. Wright was inducted into the Stanford Athletic Hall of Fame in 2001. Wright is active on several national charitable boards, including serving as chairman of the Pro Kids Golf Academy and Learning Center.

Igal Elbaz is senior vice president of Engineering and Operations. Igal’s responsibilities include engineering and operations for AT&T’s mobility and voice core networks, common IP backbone network, transport and cloud engineering as well as global monitoring and surveillance of AT&T’s network, tier 3 advanced technical support, business continuity planning and AT&T’s Global Technology Operations Center which provides centralized command operations.

Igal’s past leadership roles at AT&T included senior vice president of Wireless and Access Technology; where he was responsible for wireless and wireline access network architecture, design and technology roadmap, including radio access network, subscriber product engineering, Network AI, 5G and LTE mobility, voice core network functions and driving industry standards and the device specification, testing and implementation program. Igal also led ecosystem and innovation through AT&T’s Foundry and his focus on understanding and leveraging the startup community. Through his many assignments, Igal brings strong leadership and key experiences to deliver advanced access technologies and innovative products and services with speed and agility.

Igal serves as the Chairman of the 5G Americas Board of Governors, an industry trade organization’s whose mission is to advocate for and foster the advancement and full capabilities of LTE wireless technologies and their evolution to 5G, throughout the ecosystem’s networks, services, applications and wirelessly connected devices in the Americas. Igal has an MBA from the College of Management Academic Studies and his Bachelor of Arts in Economics and Business Management from Bar Ilan University, Ramat Gan, Israel. He lives in Dallas, Texas with his wife and two sons.

Ina Fried is a Chief Technology Correspondent, where she covers a wide range of technology issues. Before helping launch Recode, Ina covered mobile at All Things Digital where she also co-produced the D: Dive Into Mobile conference. She spent a decade at CNET where she covered, among other things, Microsoft and Apple. Prior to joining CNET in May 2000, she covered chips for Bridge News and was a writer at the Orange County Business Journal and Orange County Register. She graduated from Miami University in Ohio.

Juho Sarvikas is the VP and President of North America and Australia overseeing the sales, account management, product marketing and business development for the entire Qualcomm business in the region. Juho is leading Qualcomm’s efforts in 5G to accelerate the digital transformation of key industries including Mobile, Infrastructure, Compute, Industrial IoT, Automotive, XR and Networking segments. In this role, he collaborates with the key ecosystem leaders in the region on the to pave the way for a future that leverages the endless potential of 5G.

In a career spanning over two decades, Juho has held senior-level executive roles in Product Management, Marketing, Sales and Business Development at HMD, Microsoft, and Nokia. For the past five years he has been the Chief Product Officer for HMD Global – Home of Nokia Phones. In addition to his Chief Product Officer responsibilities, Juho was also the CMO and President for North America region responsible for restructuring the region and resetting channel and marketing strategy.

Juho has a proven track record in both global enterprise and start-up environments. In addition to his Product Management, Sales and Marketing experience, Juho has deep understanding of the supply chain, the ODM and carrier landscape.

Juho holds a a Master of Science in Industrial Engineering from Lappeenranta University of Technology in Finland.

Kaitki Agarwal is the co-founder, President, and CTO at A5G Networks. Before A5G Networks, Kaitki was the Chief product officer at Parallel Wireless and led product and operations. Kaitki co-founded Parallel Wireless in 2012. She led the disruption of the traditional RAN market with Open RAN movement. She Established global operations in the US, India, UK, and Israel and grew the team to 500+. She created a culture of innovation and has 50+ patents pending and granted.

Before founding Parallel Wireless, Kaitki was at Starent Networks. She led the multimedia team and architecture for various packet gateways and VoLTE products and led customer engagements with several customers wins. Kaitki has a strong track record of innovation and leading disruptions. She led CS voice to VoIP disruption at CedarPoint communications and Excel Switching that went IPO, followed by acquisition by Lucent.

Kaitki holds MBA from Babson College and BS in computer science from IIT Roorkee.

Karen Weise is a writer for New York Times. She covers Seattle Technology Players. Previously, Weise was with Bloomberg. Her work has been recognized by the Society of American Business Editors and Writers, the Investigative Reporters and Editors, and was named Longform’s Best Business story of 2015. Weise has a master’s degree in journalism from the University of California, Berkeley and came to journalism from a business background after graduating from Yale University.

Ken Denman is a venture partner at Sway Ventures and a voting member of the Investment Committee. He also leads Sway Studios, a new platform that will have the firm building and launching venture-scale businesses. Ken brings nearly two decades of CEO experience to Sway Ventures’ consumer and enterprise investments, garnered through successful transformations at several companies.

Ken is a former Silicon Valley technology CEO and now stays equally busy as a public and private board member and venture capitalist. Previously he was co-founder, President and Chief Executive Officer of Emotient, Inc., a developer of software technology to analyze facial expressions, until the company was acquired by Apple in January 2016. He was the Chief Executive Officer of Openwave Systems, Inc., subsequent to his role as the Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of iPass, Inc., for which he led a successful IPO. Ken was also a Senior Vice President for MediaOne. As an expat, he was Chief Operating Officer of MediaOne International based in London.

Len joined Madrona in January 2010. He is interested in software/hardware/analytics systems that transform work and economics for big industries, and consumer products that change the way we see, hear, feel and sense life. He most enjoys working with entrepreneurs on building their teams to last and scale. “I have 16 years of experience working at companies and have made some great decisions and meaningful mistakes. It’s worth learning from both.”

Len has served on the boards of 17 early-stage companies and has been a director or executive at three companies that have completed initial public offerings. Prior to joining Madrona, Len was a partner at Frazier Technology Ventures and was involved in investments including Control4 and Docusign. Prior to his career in venture, Len spent 16 years in the software industry, including as senior vice president at RealNetworks from 1996-2001 (RNWK-Nasdaq). Len’s team released four major versions of the RealSystem software platform and generated the majority of the company’s 100%+ annual revenue growth during the period. Before joining Realnetworks Len was President of Creative Multimedia, Inc., (acquired by IHS- NYSE INFO) and started his software career in product management for Central Point Software before it was acquired by Symantec (SYMC- Nasdaq).

Matt Grob, chief technology officer of XCOM, is responsible for XCOM Labs, which develops innovative wireless technologies.  Matt previously spent over 26 years at Qualcomm in technology and engineering leadership roles. He served as Qualcomm’s EVP and CTO from 2011 to 2017, overseeing R&D and managing a global team of 2,200 employees across various divisions worldwide, and later as EVP/Technology.

Mr. Grob holds a B.S. in electrical engineering from Bradley University and a M.S. in electrical engineering from Stanford University. He is a trustee of the Fleet Science Center in San Diego, and a volunteer for over a decade at FIRST, the robotics and education organization inspiring future leaders in science and technology.

Michael has several decades of experience in key roles within technology, financial services, payments, and authentication providers. He has a deep security background, having led Authentication Strategy at Bank of America, worked in strategy, fraud, and authentication leadership roles at American Express, and was the Head of Authentication for Wells Fargo.

Michael was the CSO/CMO at InAuth, a device intelligence company, acquired by American Express, and was the CSO/CPO at DeepLabs, an artificial intelligence and machine learning company. Leading PR for these emerging companies, he has been published in many media outlets in articles, webinars, podcasts, and has been a speaker at many events such as Money 2020.

At Prove, Michael acts as CSO, working on innovation solutions for identity, authentication, enabling commerce, international strategy, and new vertical strategy.

He is a graduate of Boston College and resides in Saint Augustine, FL

Mike Sievert is president and chief executive officer of T-Mobile and is a member of T-Mobile’s Board of Directors. Mike leads a customer-crazed team of disruptors and innovators, working tirelessly over the last eight years to change the rules of wireless, resulting in T-Mobile becoming the fastest-growing company in the industry. He most recently served as president and chief operating officer of T-Mobile.

Mike has been actively involved in all of T-Mobile’s significant corporate decisions since he joined T-Mobile in 2012 as chief marketing officer and since he became COO in 2015. In 2018, he joined the board of directors and was appointed president of the company. Prior to being CMO at T-Mobile, Mike joined Clearwire Corporation, now part of T-Mobile, in 2009, serving as EVP and chief commercial officer. Mike was instrumental in building T-Mobile’s “Un-carrier” strategy to solve customer pain points, an approach that has been the foundation for T-Mobile’s unprecedented growth over the past seven years. He worked alongside prior CEO John Legere since 2012, transforming T-Mobile into the enormously successful Un-carrier, all while pursuing the Sprint merger, to cement T-Mobile’s ability to continue to be a disrupter well into the future.

Mike believes that great customer experiences can only come from a great company culture. Over the years, Mike has been extensively involved in leading and shaping T-Mobile’s customer-obsessed “Un-carrier” culture—one that encourages communication, diversity, opportunity, collaboration, and transparency—all of which are vital to T-Mobile becoming a bigger and more disruptive force for consumers and businesses in the wireless industry.

Mike also serves on the board of directors of Shaw Communications in Canada. Prior to joining the Un-carrier, Mike had a nearly 25-year career in marketing, technology, and entrepreneurship. Over the years, he has served in various roles, including EVP and chief sales and marketing officer at E*TRADE, EVP and chief marketing officer at AT&T Wireless, and corporate vice president of the Windows Business Group at Microsoft. He started his career in marketing at Proctor & Gamble and IBM.

He’s an avid aviator and mariner, and an enthusiastic supporter of conservation and the environment—especially in his adopted home of the Pacific Northwest. He’s a proud husband and father to two boys in their 20s. Mike owes his success to daily doses of a perfectly crafted dark roast French press, the source of all his earthly power.

Nicola (Nicki) Palmer is senior vice president of technology & product development for Verizon. Nicki oversees the growth and expansion of the 5G ecosystem, convening partners and developing products and services to advance 5G growth and device technology. Previously she was responsible for planning, operations & engineering of the nation’s largest and most reliable 4G LTE wireless network, the company’s 5G residential broadband and 5G mobile network deployments.

Palmer began her career at Bell Atlantic in 1990 and has held a number of leadership positions in engineering, operations, and technology supporting advanced data, I and wireless products. Among many highlights throughout her career at Verizon, she was responsible for the planning, design and operation of global voice, data and IP networks, and also led the engineering and operations of the nation’s premier fiber-to-the-premises (FTTP) network, which powers Verizon’s FiOS data and TV services.

She is active in a number of organizations including the National Academy Foundation, and is a passionate advocate for promoting education and careers in Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM), especially for young women. She has been recognized by Fierce Wireless as one of the industry Women to Watch, a Top 100 CIO/CTO Leaders in STEM by STEMCONNECTOR, and as one of the Most Influential Women in Wireless. Nicki has also been honored by Working Mother magazine and Girl Scouts of
Greater New York.

Palmer earned a bachelor’s degree in industrial engineering from Penn State University and an MBA from the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School. She resides in New Jersey with her husband and three children.

Niklas Heuveldop leads the Market Area North America, a organization of approximately 11,500 employees in serving Ericsson’s customers in the United States and Canada with industry-leading technology and services.

Prior to this position Heuveldop was Chief Strategy Officer, Head of Technology & Emerging Business, which combines the Corporate Strategy and Technology functions, Ericsson Research, Business Innovation, Mergers & Acquisitions and Emerging Business, focused on the Internet of Things, as well as Information Technology and Ericsson’s Digital Transformation.

Heuveldop has also had the position as Chief Customer Officer and Head of Group Function Sales. He first started at Ericsson in 1993 and has served in various international assignments across the Americas and Europe, including as Head of Global Customer Unit AT&T and Head of Market Unit Central America & Caribbean.

From 2001 to 2005, Heuveldop led venture capital-backed technology start-ups, first as COO at WaterCove Networks, which was acquired by Alcatel in 2003, and then as CEO at ServiceFactory, a management buyout from Swedish operator Telia.

Heuveldop holds a Master of Science in Industrial Engineering & Management from the Institute of Technology, Linköping University, Sweden.

Philip Neufeld is Executive Officer, Technology Services, Fresno Unified School District.  He has served in technology and board leadership roles in healthcare, agriculture, and economic development.  Philip left private industry to work for Fresno State with 25,000+ students; and then Fresno Unified School District, with 72,000 students.  Leadership roles in education include core infrastructure, enterprise services, co-leading a personalized learning initiative with 1,000+ teachers, and co-leading a global learning analytics collaborative facilitated by Microsoft.  To support modern learning in and beyond the classroom, Philip rolled out dark fiber rings for the WAN and private LTE to support learning from home. Philip shapes educational ecosystems to better prepare and empower students with knowledge, skills, dispositions and agency to choose their #AsYetImagined futures.  Philip received an M.B.A. and Ed. D. from California State University, Fresno.  Philip’s publications and presentations can be found at https://criticaltechnopedagogy.com/about-2

Ragu Masilamany is the Vice President and Head of Amdocs Technology Solutions Engineering. Ragu is responsible for developing business solutions consisting of Digital BSS/OSS, 5G Core functions, Cloud, and Orchestrations technologies for service providers.  Ragu is a passionate technology and business leader; he and his team helps global service providers transform their Network and IT infrastructure through digital and cloud transformation.  Previously, Ragu lead the ONAP development program – NFV Orchestration & Automation initiative with AT&T, Bell Canada, Orange, and several other global service providers. Ragu is a Fulbright Scholar, holds master’s degree in computer engineering from Kansas University. 

Rasesh Patel is the Chief Product and Strategy Officer for AT&T Business. Prior to this role he had responsibility for AT&T Business’ portfolio-wide P&L with $36 Billion of annual revenue, including Mobility, 5G, Edge Compute, Internet of Things, SD-WAN, Cybersecurity, Voice, Collaboration, and Cloud Connectivity. He also oversaw pricing and the group’s digital platforms and portals. Rasesh has a wealth of experience at AT&T, including sales, distribution, customer operations, customer experience, digital, and product management. He previously led the distribution and care organization for AT&T Communications, where he and his team of 50K employees delivered best-in-class products and services and cared for customers. Prior to joining AT&T, during his tenure at DIRECTV, Rasesh served as SVP of Customer Experience. Rasesh received an MBA from UCLA’s Anderson School of Management and a bachelor’s degree in Electrical Engineering from the University of California, Irvine. He enjoys travel, golf, and has a passion for climbing mountains. He, his wife, and their daughters reside in Dallas, TX.

Rob is a co-founder of Shasta Ventures and a 24-year veteran of the venture capital industry. He focuses on investing in emerging platforms – Robotics, Space, Connected Hardware, and Transportation. His current Shasta investments include Doctor on Demand, Fetch Robotics, LawVu, Spire Global, Starship Technologies, Survios, Tonal, and Turo. Rob earned a Master of Science in mechanical engineering from the Georgia Institute of Technology and a Bachelor of Science in mechanical engineering from the University of Virginia. He also holds an MBA from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania, where he was named a Palmer Scholar.

As Vice President of Advanced Technologies & Innovation for T-Mobile, Dr. Marquardt is responsible for the exploration of new and enabling technologies, partnerships with business leaders in new categories of products and services, and the related industry relationships and investments enabling T-Mobile’s innovation and ecosystem development goals.  He also represents T-Mobile at speaking engagements, in press and analyst interviews, and as needed with regulatory bodies and other industry stakeholders.  Previously, he held a similar role at Sprint before the companies merged.

Prior to Sprint, Dr. Marquardt was VP of Technology Development at Clearwire Corporation, responsible for that company’s technology strategy as well as the architecture, design, testing, and implementation of its mobile broadband 4G network, devices, and services.  He also was CTO at Covad Communications where he led teams responsible for the engineering and network planning of VoIP, wireless, and broadband services across the United States. Prior to that role, he was in various positions at network equipment manufacturers.

Dr. Marquardt has an S.B. in Physics from MIT, an M.S. and Ph.D. in Applied Physics from Caltech, and is an alumnus of the Stanford Graduate School of Business.

Sanjay Uppal is SVP and General Manager of the Service Provider & Edge Business Unit at VMware, focused on accelerating opportunities with and through Service Providers by driving value for both Service Providers and Enterprise Customers globally, and delivering a multitude of services at the Edge. Sanjay came to VMware following the acquisition of VeloCloud by VMware in December 2017. Prior to VMware, Sanjay was the CEO and co-founder of VeloCloud Networks and grew VeloCloud to be the leader in the fast-growing SD-WAN (Software-Defined Wide Area Networking) space. Earlier, Sanjay ran publicly traded OnMobile Global, serving as its President and COO. Sanjay was at Citrix as VP of the Application Networking business through the acquisition of Caymas Systems where he was President and CEO. In the past, Sanjay has served in executive roles at Webvan (Vice President of Engineering and Business Development) and at Hewlett-Packard where he ran the Internet Infrastructure Division as VP & GM prior to his departure in 1999. He holds an MS in the Management of Technology from Stanford University, an MS in Electrical and Computer Engineering from the University of Wisconsin, Madison, and a BS in Electrical Engineering from The Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay.

Sridhar Solur is Senior Vice President and General Manager at Berkshire Grey.

Sri is a serial entrepreneur, technologist, and a business leader with extensive experience in Robotics, AI, and IOT. He has a track record of incubating, building, growing, and managing new ventures and portfolios of business in a worldwide capacity. Sri’s significant international experience comes from having lived and worked in Asia, Europe, and the US. He has deep understanding of growth hacking having scaled businesses to deliver products and services to Fortune 50 companies in a B2B capacity and to millions of customers in B2C consumer products companies.

Before joining Berkshire Grey, Sri was the EVP/GM of Shark Robotics and Chief Product Officer at SharkNinja. Prior to that he was the SVP of Product and Engineering at Comcast for their Internet and IOT businesses leading security and automation. Before Comcast, he held various leadership roles in HP building and scaling multiple businesses from the ground up including their Mobile Printing and wearables business. Sri has a Bachelor’s degree in Electronics and Computer Engineering from NIT in India and an MBA from Boston University. In 2017, Inc Magazine recognized him as one of the Top 20 IOT influencers.