Speakers

Robert E. Loredo

Panelist on the Fireside Chat on the Quantum Computing: Unveiling the Future of Computation Panel Robert Loredo is the IBM Quantum Ambassador worldwide lead, a Qiskit Advocate, and IBM Master Inventor with over 20 years of experience in the technical industry. He holds over 230 patents and has presented various workshops, lectures, and articles covering; [...]

Simay Akar

Panelist at the Welcome Celebration at Akamai Technologies’ Headquarters and 2024 IEEE Theodore W. Hissey Outstanding Young Professional Award Recipient Simay Akar has consistently demonstrated her dedication and willingness to contribute her time and skills to IEEE, holding various positions over the years. As the lead for 2013 and 2014 IEEE Day, she successfully coordinated [...]

William D. Oliver

Panelist on the Fireside Chat on the Quantum Computing: Unveiling the Future of Computation Panel Dr. William D. Oliver is appointed Henry Ellis Warren (1894) Professor of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, and Professor of Physics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He serves as the inaugural Director of the MIT Center for Quantum Engineering [...]

Deepak Divan

Panelist at the Welcome Celebration at Akamai Technologies’ Headquarters and 2024 IEEE Medal in Power Engineering Dr. Deepak Divan does research in the areas of power electronics, power systems, smart grids, and distributed control of power systems. He works closely with utilities and industry and is actively involved in research, teaching, and entrepreneurship. He has [...]

Janet Wu

Master of Ceremonies Janet Wu is a Boston-based journalist and moderator.  For the last 5 years, she has covered business and innovation for Bloomberg. Before that, she was an Anchor/Health Correspondent for 7NBC. Her Op-Eds and essays have been published in The New York Times, The Boston Globe, Boston Magazine, and the "Norton Sampler of [...]

Tsu-Jae King Liu

Panelist at the Welcome Celebration at Akamai Technologies’ Headquarters and 2024 IEEE Founders Medal Recipient A microelectronics visionary and innovator, Tsu-Jae King Liu’s FinFET contributions have drastically improved the speed and functionality of semiconductor circuits and have extended the life of Moore's Law since 2011. Today, FinFET forms the basis for all leading-edge semiconductor design [...]

Sophia “Sophie” Muirhead

Opening Remarks at the Welcome Reception at Akamai Technologies' Headquarters Sophia (“Sophie”) Muirhead became IEEE’s Executive Director and Chief Operating Officer (COO) in January 2023. She manages a US$500+ million business enterprise with a worldwide staff of over 1,100 employees. Prior to becoming the Executive Director and COO, Sophie was IEEE’s General Counsel and Chief [...]

Robert Blumofe

Moderator on the Panel at the Welcome Celebration at Akamai Technologies’ Headquarters Robert Blumofe is the Executive Vice President and Chief Technology Officer, Akamai Technologies

Caroline Hyde

Moderator for the Fireside Chat with the IEEE Medal of Honor Recipient Caroline Hyde hosts Bloomberg Television’s flagship daily technology show from New York. She has also served as anchor of “The Close” and the network’s chief European correspondent. Hyde joined Bloomberg in 2008 to cover the European debt markets for Bloomberg News as a [...]

Andrea J. Goldsmith

Panelist at the Welcome Celebration at Akamai Technologies’ Headquarters and the 2024 IEEE James H. Mulligan, Jr. Education Medal Recipient Andrea J. Goldsmith is the Dean of Engineering and Applied Science and the Arthur LeGrand Doty Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering at Princeton University. She was previously the Stephen Harris Professor of Engineering and [...]

Bala Prasanna

IEEE Region 1 Director, Co-Sponsor of the Dessert Reception Bala Prasanna is IEEE Region 1 Director.

Drew Lowery

IEEE Region 2 Director, Co-Sponsor of the Dessert Reception Drew Lowery is a Senior Systems Engineer, Volvo Group.

Karen Panetta

Moderator on the Innovation and Collaboration in Leading Technology Laboratories Panel Karen Panetta received a B.S. in Computer Engineering from Boston University and a M.S. and Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering from Northeastern University. As the first female electrical engineer to be given tenure in the Electrical and Computer Engineering department, Panetta continues to promote the [...]

Nim Cheung

Opening Remarks at the Welcome Celebration at Akamai Technologies’ Headquarters Dr. Nim Cheung is Chairman and CEO of AIphotonics Limited, a technology company he founded at the Hong Kong Science Park specializing in 3D photography, LIDAR and artificial intelligence. He is also the Director of several listed and start-up companies in Hong Kong and has [...]

Maira Marques Samary

Chair of the IEEE Boston Section, Co-Sponsor of the Dessert Reception Maíra Marques Samary is an Associate Professor of the Practice, at Boston College.

John D. McDonald

Opening Remarks at the Welcome Celebration at Akamai Technologies' Headquarters John D. McDonald, P.E., is the Founder & CEO of JDM Associates, LLC. John has 49 years of experience in the electric utility transmission and distribution industry. John received his B.S.E.E. and M.S.E.E. (Power Engineering) degrees from Purdue University, and an M.B.A. (Finance) degree from [...]

Peter Vetter

Panelist on the Innovation and Collaboration in Leading Technology Laboratories Panel Peter Vetter is President of Bell Labs Core Research and Bell Labs Fellow. He leads an eminent global research organization with the mission to create game changing innovations that define the future of networks and insure portfolio leadership for Nokia’s core business. During an [...]

Eric Evans

Panelist on the Innovation and Collaboration in Leading Technology Laboratories Panel Dr. Eric D. Evans is the Director of MIT Lincoln Laboratory, a multidisciplinary Federally Funded Research and Development Center (FFRDC) run by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology for the Department of Defense. As Director, he is responsible for the Laboratory's strategic direction and overall [...]

Russell Harrison

Moderator for the CHIPS Act Panel As Managing Director of the IEEE-USA, Russell Harrison leads the Washington, DC office for the world’s largest technical professional society, the IEEE.   Prior to becoming Managing Director, Russ represented technology professionals to the US government as Director of Government Relations for IEEE-USA.   He focused on numerous policy issues including [...]

Charles Neal

Moderator for the Innovation and Collaboration in Leading Technology Laboratories Panel Charles Neal serves on the Board of Directors as President for the National Association for Multi-Ethnicity in Communications (NAMIC) Atlanta region. He sees his role within NAMIC as a platform for reaching and helping his corporate community. These endeavors are a direct connection to [...]

Carolyn Kirk

Panelist on the CHIPS Act Panel Carolyn A. Kirk was selected by the Executive Committee of the Massachusetts Technology Collaborative (MassTech) as the agency's chief executive in February 2019. MassTech is a state economic development agency whose mission is to strengthen the tech & innovation economy across a variety of industries including advanced manufacturing, cybersecurity, [...]

Anthony Vetro

Panelist on the Innovation and Collaboration in Leading Technology Laboratories Panel Anthony Vetro is the President & CEO of Mitsubishi Electric Research Labs (MERL), in Cambridge, Massachusetts. In his 25+ years with MERL, he has contributed to the strategic R&D directions of the company, led teams in a variety of emerging technology areas, and has [...]

Juraj Corba

Panelist for Panel on AI Juraj Čorba (born in Bratislava, 1978) is responsible for digital regulation and governance at the Ministry of Informatisation, Slovakia (expert position). Juraj is leading negotiations on behalf of Slovakia on the EU´s AI Act at the Council of the EU (i.e. the Council of Ministers) and on the first international [...]

Kathy Meier-Hellstern

Panelist for Panel on AI Kathy Meier-Hellstern is a Principal Engineer and Director in the Responsible AI and Human-Centered Technology organization in Google Research. Her current focus is on responsibility in Generative models, with a focus on model evaluation and mitigation techniques. Kathy was previously a Principal Site Reliability Engineer at Google, focused on improving [...]

Robert E. Kahn

2024 IEEE Medal of Honor Recipient and Featured Panelist on the Fireside Chat with the 2024 IEEE Medal of Honor recipient. Widely known as one of the “fathers of the Internet,” Robert Kahn has made extensive and unequaled contributions to the lifestyle, commerce, and culture of modern society.  Kahn began working in computer networking in [...]

Ming-Kai Tsai

2024 IEEE Robert N. Noyce Medal recipient and Panelist on the CHIPS Act Panel Ming-Kai (MK) Tsai initially planned to be a rocket scientist, but instead, his engineering degree and ambition led him to play a pivotal role in democratizing technology advancements for billions of people around the world. As Chairman of MediaTek, Ming-Kai Tsai [...]

Tom Leighton

Panelist on Evolution & Future of Network Technologies and Past Recipient of the 2023 IEEE John von Neumann Medal Dr. Tom Leighton co-founded Akamai Technologies in 1998 and served as Akamai’s Chief Scientist until he became CEO in 2013. Under Dr. Leighton’s leadership, Akamai has evolved from its origins as a content delivery network (CDN) [...]

Christopher Manning

2024 IEEE John von Neumann Medal Recipient and Panelist for Panel on AI Christopher Manning is the inaugural Thomas M. Siebel Professor in Machine Learning in the Departments of Linguistics and Computer Science at Stanford University, Director of the Stanford Artificial Intelligence Laboratory (SAIL), and an Associate Director of the Stanford Institute for Human-Centered Artificial [...]

Armen Pischdotchian

Moderator for Panel on AI Armen Pischdotchian is currently a Data Scientist at IBM Corporation. In this role, he drives adoption of IBM technologies with faculty and students worldwide with the IBM SkillsBuild for Academy to grow skills in artificial intelligence and data science. He is also lead course developer and instructor for both of [...]

Vincent W. S. Chan

2024 IEEE Edison Medal recipient and Panelist on Evolution & Future of Network Technologies Vincent Chan is the Joan and Irwin Jacobs Professor of EECS and a faculty of the Artificial Intelligence & Decision Making Sector of the Stephen A. Schwarzman College of Computing, MIT, received his BS(71), MS(71), EE(72), and Ph.D.(74) degrees in EE from [...]

Samuel Naffziger

Panelist on the CHIPS Act Panel (AMD is the 2024 IEEE Corporate Innovation Award recipient) Samuel Naffziger is SVP and Corporate Fellow at AMD responsible for technical strategy and product architecture.   He has been the lead innovator behind many of AMD’s chiplet architecture products and low power features.   He has over 35 years of industry [...]

Jennifer Rexford

2024 IEEE Alexander Graham Bell Medal recipient and Panelist on Evolution & Future of Network Technologies Jennifer Rexford is the Provost, Gordon Y.S. Wu Professor of Engineering, and Professor of Computer Science at Princeton University. She served as the chair of the Computer Science department at Princeton from 2015 to 2022.  Before joining the Princeton [...]

Claire Tomlin

2024 IEEE Mildred Dresselhaus Medal recipient and Panelist on AI Discussion Claire Tomlin is the James and Katherine Lau Professor in Engineering, and Professor and Chair of the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences at the University of California at Berkeley. She received her BASc in EE from the University of Waterloo in 1992, [...]

Kathleen A. Kramer

2024 IEEE President-Elect  Kathleen A. Kramer is a Professor of Electrical Engineering at the University of San Diego in California. She worked to develop new engineering programs as a founding member of the faculty and eventually became the chair of electrical engineering, and then serving as Director of Engineering (2004-2013), providing academic leadership for all [...]

Tom Coughlin

2024 IEEE President Welcome Remarks at the 2024 IEEE VIC Summit on 3 May at the Encore Boston Harbor Hotel, Welcome Reception on 2 May at Akamai Technologies' Headquarters, and Host of the IEEE Honors Ceremony Tom Coughlin, President, Coughlin Associates is a digital storage analyst and business and technology consultant. He has more than [...]

Alberto Moreira

Panelist at the Welcome Celebration at the Georgia Aquarium and Recipient of the 2023 IEEE Dennis J. Picard Medal for Radar Technologies and Applications Alberto Moreira is a pioneer in the field of microwave systems, techniques, and technologies, with particular emphasis on spaceborne synthetic aperture radar (SAR) for Earth monitoring. The concepts and technologies he [...]

Luc Van den hove

Panelist on the Innovation Panel and 2023 IEEE Robert N. Noyce Medal Recipient Luc Van den hove has been with imec, a world-leading research and innovation hub in nanoelectronics and digital technologies since its founding in 1984 and has been president and CEO since 2009. In his time with imec, Van den hove has been [...]

Katie Hafner

Moderator for the Fireside Chat with the 2023 IEEE Medal of Honor Recipient, Vinton G. Cerf Katie Hafner is an author and long-time tech journalist who was on staff at The New York Times for more than a decade. She is the author of six non-fiction books, including Where Wizards Stay Up Late: The Origins of the Internet (with [...]

Melba Crawford

Panelist on the Innovation Panel and the 2023 IEEE Mildred Dresselhaus Medal Recipient Melba Crawford’s pioneering work in the development and application of algorithms to analyze remote sensing data has resulted in vital new capabilities to address urgent problems in agriculture, geotechnical engineering, and environmental mapping and monitoring. For example, her contributions are helping to [...]

Tim Gitau

Moderator on the Artificial Intelligence and ChatGPT Tim Gitau is a technologist and has been an IEEE member since 2011, volunteering in numerous roles within the United States and Africa, making him an IEEE senior member. He currently serves as the Treasurer of the IEEE Humanitarian Technologies Board and supports the Power and Energy Society [...]

Alessio Medda

Dessert Speaker Dr Alessio Medda is a Principal Research Engineer at the Aerospace, Transportation, and Advanced System Laboratory at the Georgia Tech Research Institute and he is Chief of the Biosensing and Signal Analytics Branch. Dr. Medda Alessio received his M.S. in Electronic Engineering in 1993 from the University of Cagliari, Italy, and his Ph.D. [...]

Theresa Brunasso

Dessert Speaker Theresa Brunasso, Founder of D&S Microwave, is a 30-year veteran in the field of Electrical Engineering. Prior to starting D&S Microwave, she spent more than 20 years at EMS Technologies. At EMS, Theresa served as Microwave Engineering Manager, Director of Technology Development, and provided innovative design and development expertise for numerous programs, including [...]

Lydia E. Kavraki

Panelist on the Artificial Intelligence and ChatGPT and 2023 IEEE Frances E. Allen Medal Recipient Lydia E. Kavraki revolutionized the field of algorithmic robotics and searching in continuous domains. Her contributions have had a broad impact in both robotic motion planning and computational biology. Twenty-five years ago, Lydia introduced the world to the simple yet [...]

Carlotta Berry

Panelist on the Artificial Intelligence and ChatGPT and 2023 IEEE Undergraduate Teaching Award Recipient Carlotta Berry has a passion for increasing diversity in engineering. She is utilizing robotics and engineering education, as well as human-robot interaction research to bring STEM to diverse populations. She has built several organizations that reach out to women and marginalized [...]

James J. Truchard

Panelist on the Innovation Panel and the 2023 IEEE James H. Mulligan Jr. Education Medal As an engineer, business owner, and global technical leader, James Truchard has always been driven by a vision to empower engineers to be more innovative and efficient—and his work to make that vision a reality has had enormous worldwide impact. [...]

Frank Thomson “Tom” Leighton

Panelist on the Innovation Panel 2023 IEEE John von Neumann Medal Recipient "for fundamental contributions to algorithm design and their application to content delivery networks". Tom Leighton is a computer scientist, entrepreneur, and technology leader—and extraordinarily successful in all those endeavors. Early in his career, as a computer scientist and algorithm designer at MIT, he [...]

Hope Merritt III

Moderator for Innovator's Panel Hope Merritt III serves as the Vice President and General Manager of Data Center Platform Application Engineering (DCPAE) within DCAI's Data Platforms Engineering and Architecture (DPEA) organization. Hope is a 26-year Intel veteran with extensive leadership and management experience ranging from traditional launch support to technology enabling across multiple business units and [...]

Nim Cheung

Opening Remarks at the Welcome Celebration at the Georgia Aquarium Dr. Nim Cheung is Chairman and CEO of AIphotonics Limited, a technology company he founded at the Hong Kong Science Park specializing in 3D photography, LIDAR and artificial intelligence. He is also the Director of several listed and start-up companies in Hong Kong and has [...]
Nirmala Ramanujam headshot.

Nirmala “Nimmi” Ramanujam

Panelist and 2023 IEEE Biomedical Engineering Award Recipient recognized for more globally accessible technology for women's health related to cancer screening, diagnosis, and treatment. Nimmi Ramanujam has made pioneering contributions to the development of innovative, patient-centered health technologies that have far-reaching impacts in the fight against cancer, particularly cervical cancer. She uses her knowledge of [...]

Sophia “Sophie” Muirhead

Opening Remarks at the Welcome Celebration at the Georgia Aquarium Sophia (“Sophie”) Muirhead became IEEE’s Executive Director and Chief Operating Officer (COO) in January 2023. She manages a US$500+ million business enterprise with a worldwide staff of over 1,100 employees. Prior to becoming the Executive Director and COO, Sophie was IEEE’s General Counsel and Chief [...]

Chris Coco

Panelist at the Welcome Celebration at the Georgia Aquarium Chris Coco is Senior Director for Aquatic Sustainability at Georgia Aquarium, Inc. (GAI).  He joined GAI in 2004 as a member of its pre-opening team.  During that phase, Coco helped to assemble one of the largest living collections at any aquarium, most notable was his role [...]

Rodney Brooks

Speaker and 2023 IEEE Founders Medal Recipient Rodney Brooks is a robotics visionary. Early on, he saw the future of robotics, then found ways to create that future and bring robots to everyday life. The impact of his work is found everywhere, from the research lab to the consumer market, from the living room to [...]

Alaa J. Mousa

Individual Speaker, "Building a Future-Ready Digital Ecosystem" Dr. Alaa J. Mousa, Deputy CEO at Earthlink Telecoms, has more than 23 years of experience in the ICT sector since he graduated as a Telecom Engineer in 1999 and holds MSC and Ph.D. in Telecommunications in 2002 and 2007 respectively. He was the chief technical officer (CTO) of many telecom operators. In [...]

Vinton G. Cerf

Fireside Chat with the 2023 IEEE Medal of Honor Recipient, Vinton G. Cerf Widely known as one of the “Fathers of the Internet,” Vinton (Vint) G. Cerf is the co-designer with Robert E. Kahn of the TCP/IP protocols and the architecture of the Internet. Cerf’s tireless commitment to the Internet’s evolution, improvement, oversight, and evangelism throughout [...]

Scott Frank

Featured Speaker, “Making the World a Better Place with Intellectual Property" The Global Intellectual Property Alliance (GLIPA) was launched in October 2022 with the World Intellectual Property Organization (created by the United Nations) which is a non-profit. GLIPA seeks to raise IP awareness/education, improve IP ecosystem collaboration, and increase IP diversity and inclusion for the [...]

Erwin Hochmair

Panelist and 2023 IEEE Alexander Graham Bell Co-Recipient, recognized for the research, development, and realization of multi-channel microelectronic cochlear implants. Biography Ingeborg and Erwin Hochmair The Cochlear Implant (CI) is the first replacement of a sensory organ, enabling deaf persons to hear via a (partially) implanted device. CI-users are able to communicate orally, and many [...]

Ingeborg J. Hochmair-Desoyer

Panelist and 2023 IEEE Alexander Graham Bell Co-Recipient, recognized for the research, development, and realization of multi-channel microelectronic cochlear implants. Ingeborg J. Hochmair holds Dipl.-Ing. and Dr.tech degrees in Electrical Engineering and a venia legendi in Biomedical Engineering from the Technical University of Vienna, where she, together with Erwin Hochmair, developed the very first microelectronic [...]

Anna Zakrzewska

Panelist and 2023 IEEE Theodore W. Hissey Outstanding Young Professional Award Recipient recognized for contributions in telecommunications research and innovation, leading to commercialization while inspiring tomorrow's young technology leaders through STEM volunteering work. Anna Zakrzewska is a senior principal engineer at the Telecom Co-Innovation Expert Centre at Dell Technologies in Dublin, Ireland. She leads company [...]

Tracy Daniels

Serving as Moderator - Women in Tech Panel Tracy Daniels is the Chief Data Officer for Truist Financial Corporation. She leads the team responsible for Truist’s enterprise data capabilities, including strategy, governance, data platform delivery, client, master & reference data, and the centers of excellence for business intelligence visualization and artificial intelligence & machine learning. [...]

Tom Coughlin

IEEE President-Elect Tom Coughlin, President, Coughlin Associates is a digital storage analyst and business and technology consultant. He has more than 40 years in the data storage industry with engineering and senior management positions at several companies. Dr. Coughlin has many publications and six patents. He is also the author of Digital Storage in Consumer [...]

John D. McDonald

Opening Remarks at the Welcome Celebration at the Georgia Aquarium John D. McDonald, P.E., is Smart Grid Business Development Leader for GE’s Grid Solutions business. John has 49 years of experience in the electric utility transmission and distribution industry. John received his B.S.E.E. and M.S.E.E. (Power Engineering) degrees from Purdue University, and an M.B.A. (Finance) [...]

Arijit Raychowdhury

Lunch Speaker Arijit Raychowdhury is the Steve W. Chaddick School Chair in the School of Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE) at Georgia Tech. He previously held the Motorola Solutions Foundation Professorship. He joined the ECE faculty as anassociate professor in January 2013 and held the ON Semiconductor Junior Professorship from 2015 to 2019. As the [...]

Jairo Garcia

Panelist at the Welcome Celebration at the Georgia Aquarium Dr. Jairo Garcia is an expert in urban sustainability and climate change. Dr. Garcia is the CEO of Urban Climate Nexus, the North America Curator for United Nations Habitat, a Sustainable Development Goals Educator Fellow, and long-term collaborator and lecturer at Johns Hopkins University and The [...]

Charles Neal

Moderator for the Evolution and Future of Networking Technologies Panel Charles Neal serves on the Board of Directors as President for the National Association for Multi-Ethnicity in Communications (NAMIC) Atlanta region. He sees his role within NAMIC as a platform for reaching and helping his corporate community. These endeavors are a direct connection to his [...]

Rahul Saxena

Lunch Speaker Rahul Saxena is the Interim Director for CREATE-X and the Associate Director for LAUNCH. Leading up to this role, Saxena had a career as a Venture Capitalist, startup CEO, entrepreneur, mechatronic design engineer, and published academic researcher. Saxena is a mechanical engineering Georgia Tech alumnus, earned his European Master’s degree in Fluid Mechanics [...]

Saifur Rahman

2023 IEEE President & CEO Moderator at the Welcome Celebration at the Georgia Aquarium; Opener at 2023 IEEE VIC Summit Saifur Rahman Professor Saifur Rahman is the founding director of the Advanced Research Institute at Virginia Tech, USA, where he is the Joseph R. Loring Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering. He also directs the [...]