Prior to joining WIK, Ilsa was a Director at the European Competitive Telecommunications Association (ECTA), where she developed and presented recommendations on public policy and telecoms regulation to the European institutions on behalf of more than 100 operators. A key research project she led during this time was the ECTA Regulatory scorecard, which benchmarked institutional and regulatory frameworks and market outcomes for telecoms across 22 European countries using 120 indicators.
From 1998-2002, Ilsa was senior policy advisor at the UK telecoms regulator Oftel. During that period, she was responsible for Oftel’s first analysis of the broadband market. Together with the UK Ministry for trade and industry, Ilsa also developed policy and negotiated on the 2000 EU Unbundling Regulation and 2002 EU Telecoms Framework.
Ilsa has an MA in classics from Oxford University and studied postgraduate economics at London University.
He joined the Alcatel Research Center in Belgium in 1989. In 1992 he started research on ADSL and became a central figure in the team that developed the first commercially available DMT ADSL chipset. In 1995, Paul took the lead for all Alcatel research activities on ADSL and VDSL. In 1999 he was appointed General Manager of the Alcatel VDSL Virtual Company that developed the first DMT VDSL chipset. Since 2002, Paul has been responsible for Alcatel-Lucent’s xDSL technology strategy, a role that he retained after the acquisition of Alcatel-Lucent by Nokia.
Paul Spruyt also actively contributed to the standardization of ADSL and VDSL in the former U.S. standardization committee T1E1.4 (now NIPP-NAI). Since 2005, he has been a member of the ARCEP Experts Committee for the introduction of new xDSL technologies in France.
Paul received the Blondel Medal (2000) for his noteworthy scientific and other contributions to the advance of the telecommunications industry in the domains of ADSL and VDSL. He was nominated Alcatel Fellow (2006) and Bell Labs Fellow (2010). In 2015, Paul received a special recognition from the International Telecommunication Union for his outstanding contribution to the advancement and development of ICT worldwide.
Abstract
In this presentation, Paul will review recent advances in copper access technologies with a focus on G.fast and MGfast.
Steen (ste@fullrate.dk) currently holds a position as Head of Department, Net R&D at Fullrate A/S, a subsidiary of TDC A/S. Responsible for the access platform, provisioning and support systems, and any equipment placed in the subscribers home. Steen has a strong interest in data analysis, decision-aiding systems, and techniques to automatically detect and remedy issues, before the subscriber makes the call to helpdesk.
In 1996 he joined the research and development department of Swisscom. Since the early days of the ADSL deployment, he works in the engineering of the copper-based access network, playing an active role in the evolution of the network from ADSL to VDSL2 to vectoring and to G.fast. His areas of expertise include spectrum management issues.
Since 1999, he is Swisscom’s representative at the ETSI TM6 Standards Committee dealing with the European DSL standardization.
In the past decade Reg has successfully completed over 200 projects. Especially the Dutch public sector makes use of his knowledge and expertise. Clients include: Ministries (Interior, Economic Affairs & Climate, Finance), all provinces, many municipalities and (semi-)public organisations (utilities, security, regional development, academia). He also worked for international organizations such as the ITU, World Bank, OECD, Europese Commissie, Eurostat, UNESCO and The Conference Board.
In addition to his project work is Reg partner at Dialogic. In this role, he is responsible for both the management and the strategic direction of this company of approximately 30 employees. Reg (1978) has the Dutch nationality and studied in Eindhoven. Here he obtained three engineering degrees: Electrical Engineering, Industrial Engineering and Innovation Sciences. Later in his career he completed an international MBA with a specialization in finance at TIAS (the best business school in The Netherlands according to the Financial Times
I carry out work for a variety of (semi)public and private organisations, including ABN Amro, Agentschap Telecom, Alliander, Enexis, Eurostat, FEI, ITU, Chamber of Commerce, Nauta Dutilh, OESO, Sligro, TenneT, T-Mobile, Wolters Kluwer and several Dutch provinces and ministries. At Dialogic I am responsible for the development of our tools and platform providing online services.
I completed my master’s degree in Innovation Sciences at Eindhoven University of Technology and Università L. Bocconi in Milan, with an internship at Philips IP&S. Since 2010 I have been developing apps and web applications through my own company Pixelspark. I enjoy endurance sports like cycling and running as well as snowboarding and sailing.
Wilhelm regularly participates in national and international working groups in the area of NGA and NGN. He is Co-Chair of the NGN expert working group of the Body of European Regulators for Electronic Communications (BEREC).
Before he joined the Austrian Regulatory Authority for Broadcasting and Telecommunications in 2001 he worked eight years for the Austrian Academy of Sciences.
Wilhelm holds an MSc in Electrical Engineering and a PhD in Technical Sciences from Vienna University of Technology.
Abstract
The presentation provides an overview of the results of the BEREC report ‘New forms of sharing passive optical networks based on wavelengths division multiplexing’ that BEREC published in October 2017. New forms of sharing passive optical networks (PON) have become possible, in particular with the adoption of the new PON standard NG-PON2 (G.989.2) that was approved at the end of 2014. The presentation begins with an overview of PON technologies and the current and expected future deployment of NG-PON2. Then it analyses whether wavelength unbundling has been imposed in any of the EU countries in which national regulatory authorities had taken a decision on the wholesale local access market (Market 3a) since the standardisation of NG-PON2. It also discusses aspects that may be useful for national regulatory authorities to take into account when considering whether or not to impose wavelength unbundling on the significant market power (SMP) operator. Finally, it explores whether wavelength unbundling based on NG-PON2 might increase network operators’ interest in co-investing in PON.
Since then John has been involved in the design, simulation, specification, evaluation, standardisation and deployment of various Digital Subscriber Line (DSL) based digital transmission systems in the UK access network.
He is currently responsible for managing a team of engineers at Adastral Park, Ipswich with a particular interest in improving the performance of Next Generation Access (NGA1 and NGA2) transmission systems. In addition, John is Vice Chairman of the ETSI TM6 Standards Committee.
John was awarded the UK IEE/National Physical Laboratory Measurement Prize in 1998 and the BT Gold Award for Innovation in 2011.
John is a Chartered Engineer and a Fellow of the Institution of Engineering and Technology.
Els has been part of the Fixed Networks journey for more than 8 years, driving marketing and product innovation for Nokia. She has a master’s degree in electrical engineering from the university of Ghent, Belgium and is currently living in Sydney, Australia where she has supported the nbn become successful in their journey to connect everyone in Australia.
Throughout the different roles and different locations, Els has a broad range of knowledge to help operators find the best solution for their network.
In February 2018 the Dutch regulation authority ACM has published its draft version of the market analysis decision on access to fixed telecom networks. ACM proposes that both KPN and VodafoneZiggo must grant competitors access to their fixed telecom networks. This will solve competition problems that are the result of collective dominance of KPN and VodafoneZiggo on the Dutch market for wholesale fixed access. In this presentation ACM will explain how it is has come to this conclusion, and describe what specific obligations will be imposed in order to grant access to KPN’s copper and fiber network, and to VodafoneZiggo’s cable network.
Speaker bio
Onno Mantel is Senior Technical Advisor at the Dutch Authority for Consumers and Markets. As such, he is currently involved in several projects related to the regulation of the Dutch telecommunications sector. Relevant topics include fixed access regulation, net neutrality, and 5G. Before he started his current position at ACM in 2017, Onno has worked at KPN Research and TNO as a project leader and consultant on mobile network planning and optimization. Onno has a Ph.D. in physics.
– Kristof Obermann has more than 20 years experience in the field of telecommunication, especially in strategic network planning, network protocols and architecture both for access and backbone networks
– Kristof Obermann is teaching communications engineering at the university of applied science in Giessen (THM). He wrote a book about data network technologies for next generation networks. From 1998 to 2006 he was with Vodafone Germany (Arcor), where he was responsible for the stragic planning of Vodafone fixed network.
Expertise and Consulting Focus
– Strategic planning of fixed networks
– Technical and commercial evaluation of network technologies
Selection of Project Experiences
– Strategic network planning and evaluation of different network technologies for various customers
– Evaluation of the technical performance of DSL and TV cable based access technologies
– Commercial and technical evaluation of fixed wireless broadband access technologies
Academic Background
– Study of electrical engineering at the RWTH Aachen and TU Berlin
– PhD in optical communication technolgies
– Member of the VDE Fachausschuss 5.3 „Optische Nachrichtentechnik“ and Fachgruppe 5.3.3 „Photonische Netze“
– Member of “Technischer Beirat der BREKO”
Next to his lecturing duties, Dr. Smulders is doing research on high data rate wireless technology for 30 years. As such he addressed broadband WiFi and 3G, 4G and 5G radio technology including spectrum and regulation issues. He contributed to many national and international projects in close cooperation with, amongst others, NXP, TNO, IMST, Catena, Bell Labs, Thales, KPN, Samsung and Philips. He also contributed to a large number of demo- and pilot systems. One example is an own-developed pilot system that demonstrated, for the first time, wireless HDMI operation in the newly defined 60 GHz band.
After finishing his Ph.D. in the field of semiconductor physics and light-matter interaction
at the Technical Unversity Ilmenau, he joined the R&D department of AVM.
Since 2016, Philipp investigates solutions for CPE based copper line diagnostics and
optical communication technologies.
WOJTEK, CHIEF TECHNOLOGY OFFICER
Wojtek is in charge of defining the company’s overall technological strategy and of driving its innovation and strategic product vision to further position SoftAtHome as an industry leader. He is also Deputy Chairman of the Technical Working Group for the Home Gateway Initiative, mainly focused on the Media Gateway and Smart Home projects. Wojtek has 20+ years experience in the IT industry where he has held various product development and leadership positions. He specializes in the telecom area focusing on Operational Support Systems, Location Based Services infrastructure, convergent pervasive applications and the Digital Home. He has a strong multi-cultural business background – having served for several companies in different European countries, including France, Poland and the United Kingdom. Wojtek started his career in 1990 in France as an IT Engineer developing a billing mediation solution for France Telecom. He then became the leading director of this multi-year project. Since the mid-1990s he founded or joined several start-up companies where he held positions of CTO, VP Engineering and CEO.
Wojtek holds an MSCS from Polytechnic School & IT Institute, Poland where he graduated top of this class.
A large part of my research and consultancy work is for Dutch ministries, provinces, municipalities and other (semi)public organizations. Beyond the Netherlands, I have worked for the Flemish government (EWI) and advised on international partnerships, for example between Energinet.dk and TenneT.
After my studies in Innovation Sciences at TU Eindhoven and Chalmers University (Sweden), I worked at KPN Consulting for a year and a half. I enjoy living in Rotterdam, where I am the coach for a new cycling club CS010. We cycle across the entire region on our racing bikes and MTBs and make great trips at home and abroad.
Avoiding the bottleneck: Delivering gigabit speeds throughout the home
Abstract:
For the perfect user experience, highspeed access must be combined with home networking solutions that make this power available across the entire home. Otherwise the home network becomes a bottleneck. In his keynote, Michael Himmels will illustrate, how high-performing home networks avoid this issue. They are characterized by three key aspects: Firstly availability, ensured by a distributed network of several access points, secondly performance, secured by a combination of the next generation of powerline communication and WiFi technology and thirdly convenience – based on advancements in the way, distributed networks organize and manage themselves.
CV of speaker:
Michael Himmels, Vice President Engineering, devolo AG
Michael Himmels has been part of devolo AG since the company was founded in 2002. He led the development of the company’s groundbreaking powerline communications products (PLC) thus helping to lay the ground for devolo’s success as PLC pioneer and expert for high-performance home networking solutions. Michael holds a degree in engineering sciences from the University of Applied Sciences in Aachen, Germany.
Proximus started with a technical field trial for G.fast FTTBuilding end 2016. The findings and learnings of the last 18 months will be presented.
Besides its involvement in state-of-the-art technology validation and deployment, Proximus is constantly striving to improve the customer experience of its existing VDSL2 installed base. In this context, the impact on the VDSL2 line quality of in-home power-line communication (PLC) devices was investigated. We will explain the mechanism of interference between PLC and DSL and present statistical findings from our VDSL2 network.
Presenter Bio
Carine Neus obtained a PhD in Electrical Engineering at the Vrije Universiteit Brussel in 2011. She has been working at Proximus as DSL expert since 2012, with main focus on G.fast physical layer testing and validation.
Proximus started with a technical field trial for G.fast FTTBuilding end 2016. The findings and learnings of the last 18 months will be presented.
Besides its involvement in state-of-the-art technology validation and deployment, Proximus is constantly striving to improve the customer experience of its existing VDSL2 installed base. In this context, the impact on the VDSL2 line quality of in-home power-line communication (PLC) devices was investigated. We will explain the mechanism of interference between PLC and DSL and present statistical findings from our VDSL2 network.
Speaker bio
Iancu Avram obtained a PhD in Electrical Engineering at Ghent University in 2015. He is currently working at Proximus as an expert on the DSL physical layer. His main areas of interest are VDSL2 35b, statistical analysis of DSL quality data and physical layer engineering and validation.