paula.reinman@marconisociety.org

September 7, 2022—The Marconi Society is pleased to announce The Decade of Digital Inclusion 2022, a complimentary virtual symposium to be held on November 2 and 3 and in-person gala that will take place at the University of California, Berkeley’s Pauley Ballroom on November 3. The annual forum convenes leading visionaries in technology, business, policy, and digital inclusion to help build pathways to digital equity by 2030.  The event will honor the 2022 Marconi Fellow Siavash Alamouti, inventor of the Alamouti Code, which has democratized the Internet by improving mobile communications for billions of people. Alamouti is also the co-founder and executive chairman of mimik, a hybrid edge cloud technology company.

“The Decade of Digital Inclusion is a rare opportunity to create collaborative solutions to bridging the digital divide.  The Marconi Society, through our deep expertise in information and communications technology and connections in policy and digital equity,  is uniquely positioned to create this convening,” said Vint Cerf, Board Chair of the Marconi Society. “We are thrilled to celebrate Siavash,  a champion of open wireless standards and technology, and the embodiment of our vision of enabling everyone to fully participate in and benefit from digital connectivity.”

The symposium, now in its second year, is designed to generate concrete solutions to address digital inequity in communities around the world. The event will highlight diverse voices that lend different perspectives to the quest for digital equity, including keynote presentations by Shamina Singh, Founder & President of the Mastercard Center for Inclusive Growth, Angela Thi Bennett, Digital Equity Director at the National Telecommunications and Information Administration, and Nick McKeown, Senior Vice President and GM of the Network and Edge Group at Intel.

Critical interdisciplinary topics including business models for affordable and accessible internet, long-term funding streams for digital equity, and the need for inclusion and fairness in the digital revolution are part of the agenda.

The Marconi Society’s flagship event and gala fundraiser, The Decade of Digital Inclusion is hosted this year in partnership with the Institute for Business and Social Impact (IBSI) and Center for Effective Global Action (CEGA) at the University of California, Berkeley.  The two research centers have led valuable cross-disciplinary research on the intersections of financial technology, policy, and digital inclusion.

“The data economy, automation, and globalization have sparked dramatic changes in societies’ paradigms and in their economies. The opportunities are boundless, but the divides are stark and challenges persist. IBSI and CEGA’s research efforts are committed to studying the impacts, effects on equity, and unintended consequences of these unprecedented shifts,” says Paul Gertler, IBSI ‘s Faculty Director. “This knowledge is paramount to guiding evidence-based policy and shaping industry debates, as well as to ensuring that the digital revolution can truly foster a more resilient and inclusive future and ultimately improve the lives of marginalized communities or those living in poverty around the world.

Tickets for The Decade of Digital Inclusion’s virtual Symposium and in-person Gala  are now available.

About the Marconi Society

The Marconi Society is a nonprofit organization dedicated to advancing digitally equitable communities by empowering change agents across sectors. The Marconi Society celebrates and supports visionaries building tomorrow’s technologies upon the foundation of the connected world we helped create.

About the Marconi Prize

The Marconi Prize is the flagship award of the Marconi Society, given annually since 1975 to innovators who have made significant contributions to increasing digital inclusivity through the advancement of Information and Communications Technology (ICT).

The post Building Digital Equity through Cross-Disciplinary Collaboration: Marconi Society Announces 2022 Symposium and Gala appeared first on The Marconi Society.

taia@marconisociety.org

February 15, 2021—The Marconi Society today opened nomination periods for its 2023 Marconi Prize and 2022 Paul Baran Young Scholar Award. These prestigious awards, which recognize established and emerging scientists in advanced communications technology from around the globe, showcase the leaders in the field and celebrate their contributions to building a digitally equitable world.

The Marconi Prize, often referred to as the “Nobel Prize for Communications,” recognizes established Information and Communications Technology (ICT) luminaries whose contributions to the field have had a significant impact on widely used technology, and whose careers demonstrate significant leadership, entrepreneurship, and humanitarian impact. Nominations are accepted February 15–June 1, 2022, EST. The recipient will be announced in early 2023 and recognized at the Marconi Society’s 2023 symposium and gala.

Previous awardees include Siavash Alamouti, a visionary wireless leader and Executive Chairman of mimik,  Andrea Goldsmith, leader in the theory and practice of adaptive wireless communications and Dean of Engineering at Princeton University, Vint Cerf, one of the creators of the Internet and Chief Internet Evangelist at Google, and Sir Tim Berners-Lee, inventor of the World Wide Web and Professor at MIT. Alamouti will be celebrated at the organization’s 2022 symposium and gala, The Decade of Digital Inclusion. More details will be announced in the coming months.

The Young Scholar Award recognizes emerging scientists whose innovative scientific achievements, leadership and entrepreneurial characteristics, and dedication to improving society through their work stand out among their peers. 
Prospective Young Scholars must be 27 years or younger during the award year to be considered, and up to four candidates—usually graduate students or early career professionals—are awarded each year. Nominations are accepted February 15–June 1, 2022, EST. Recipients will be announced in early fall 2022 and recognized at the Marconi Society’s 2022 symposium and gala.

About the Marconi Prize

The Marconi Prize is the flagship award of the Marconi Society, given annually since 1975 to innovators who have made significant contributions to increasing digital inclusivity through the advancement of Information and Communications Technology (ICT). 

About the Paul Baran Young Scholar Award

Named for 1991 Marconi Fellow Paul Baran, the Young Scholar Award launched in 2008 and recognizes emerging leaders in advanced communications technology who demonstrate scientific excellence, leadership, entrepreneurship, and a socially engaged approach to their work. 

About the Marconi Society

The Marconi Society envisions a world in which everyone can create opportunity through the benefits of connectivity. The organization celebrates, inspires, and connects individuals building tomorrow’s technologies in service of a digitally inclusive world.

The post Honoring Transformative Leaders in Information and Communications Technology: Nominations Open for Marconi Prize, Paul Baran Young Scholar Award appeared first on The Marconi Society.

Contact: Taia Pandolfi, Marketing & Communications Manager, the Marconi Society taia@marconisociety.org

October 15, 2021—The Marconi Society, a nonprofit dedicated to digital inclusion, today announced three new Board members and a major gift from Marconi Fellow and Qualcomm founder Irwin Jacobs and his wife Joan Jacobs. The new Board members, Francine Berman (University of Massachusetts, Amherst), Arogyaswami Paulraj (Stanford University), and Dennis Roberson (Roberson and Associates and Illinois Institute of Technology), bring decades of experience in technology and policy to the Marconi Society’s Board.

“With this generous gift from Irwin and Joan Jacobs and the deep expertise of our new Board members, the Marconi Society will be able to continue accelerating our work and our impact,” said Vint Cerf, Chair of the Marconi Society and 1998 Marconi Fellow. “We believe that connectivity is a basic human right and we aspire to the day when we have true digital inclusion.”

The Marconi Society was founded in 1974 by Gioia Braga Marconi to celebrate the legacy of innovation in communications technology left by her father, Guglielmo Marconi. In 2019, the organization revised its mission to focus on bringing the life-changing opportunities of connectivity to everyone in the world. Through programming like The Decade of Digital Inclusion, a virtual event series with a Symposium scheduled for October 22, the Marconi Society collaborates with changemakers from technology, policy, and digital inclusion in order to address the complex causes of digital inequity. 

“We are grateful to welcome our new Board members and for this significant contribution from Irwin and Joan Jacobs,” said Samantha Schartman-Cycyk, Executive Director of the Marconi Society. “We believe an interdisciplinary approach is essential in the fight to address digital equity. As we continue to expand our community of leaders, we are invigorated by these important additions to our network and resources.”

Investing in Digital Inclusion

Irwin and Joan Jacobs, who are recognized globally for their philanthropic work, recently gave $500,000 to support the Marconi Society’s work to end the digital divide. 

“Joan and I are deeply committed to improving access to quality education,” says Jacobs. “In order to ensure the next generation is able to participate in the incredible opportunities offered by connected technology, we need to ensure they have access to tools, devices, education, and connectivity. The Marconi Society’s mission of digital inclusion is essential to our vision of a globally connected, educated society.”

Irwin Jacobs received the Marconi Prize in 2011 for his contributions to Information and Communications Technology (ICT) through his founding of two important companies—Linkabit and Qualcomm—and co-authorship of a seminal textbook on communications engineering.

The Jacobses have signed the Giving Pledge, an “international movement of philanthropists who commit to giving the majority of their wealth to philanthropy or charitable causes.” With their gift to the Marconi Society, they support programming like the Celestini Program (a mentorship program for underrepresented STEM students), broadband mapping efforts to provide accurate data on consumer connectivity, and the discussion of the decade, a first-ever survey of ICT and digital inclusion fields.

New Board Members

Chaired by Cerf, the Marconi Society’s Board oversees the organization’s mission and programming, working in close partnership with Schartman-Cycyk. Berman, Roberson, and Paulraj join a distinguished group of socially engaged technologists including John Cioffi (Stanford University), Zvi Galil (Georgia Institute of Technology), and others.

The new members bring valuable expertise and relationships within policy and digital inclusion to the Marconi Society. Berman, a professor of computer science at the University of Massachusetts, was appointed by President Obama to serve on the National Council on the Humanities in recognition of her leadership within data science and her perspectives on the socio-environmental impact of connected technologies. Paulraj, 2014 Marconi Fellow, is professor emeritus at Stanford University and is widely revered for his groundbreaking research in MIMO technology and its applications. Roberson, CEO of Roberson and Associates, is a nationally recognized expert in technology and also serves as Chairman of the Federal Communication Commission (FCC) Technological Advisory Committee. 

“I’m delighted to join the Board of the Marconi Society,” says Berman. “Their mission to connect people via technology and promote digital inclusion is a strong complement to my own work as a Public Interest Technologist to promote the benefits and reduce the risks of digital technologies. I look forward to this opportunity to contribute.”

“I am very honored to join the Marconi Society Board,” says Paulraj. “It has been a privilege to be a part of the Marconi family as a Fellow since 2014, with so many distinguished colleagues and promising Young Scholars. The organization has launched new initiatives from digital inclusion to big ideas. It will be a pleasure to advance these important efforts.”

“I am greatly honored to have the opportunity to serve on the Board of the Marconi Society,” says Roberson. “This is an amazing organization composed of many of the most illustrious names in the modern communications world. Given the wisdom and experience of those affiliated with the organization, it has enormous potential to serve the world in narrowing the broadband digital divide. This in turn should improve the well-being of people around the world in incredible ways that in many cases are only dreams today.”

About the Marconi Society

The Marconi Society envisions a world in which everyone can create opportunity through the benefits of connectivity. The organization celebrates, inspires, and connects individuals building tomorrow’s technologies in service of a digitally inclusive world.

Board Member Biographies

Francine Berman

Dr. Francine Berman is the Director of Public Interest Technology and the Stuart Rice Research Professor in the College of Information and Computer Sciences at UMass Amherst. She is a Faculty Associate at the Berkman Klein Center for Internet and Society at Harvard University and was selected as the 2019-2020 Katherine Hampson Bessell Fellow at the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study at Harvard University. 

Berman is a data scientist whose current work focuses on the social and environmental impacts of information technology, and in particular of the Internet of Things (IoT). Berman explores the overarching ecosystem needed to guide the development of information technologies that maximize benefits, minimize risks, and promote individual protections, the public interest, and planetary responsibility. Recent work has focused on data stewardship and preservation, particularly with respect to the policy, practice, and infrastructure needed to ensure the integrity, longevity, and usefulness of the data on which modern research relies. Berman’s interests are in the broad area of Public Interest Technology, and focus on strategies that promote technology as a tool to advance humanity.

Berman is a founder of the Research Data Alliance (RDA), a community-driven international organization whose mission is to build global infrastructure that enables data sharing and data-driven research.

Arogyaswami Paulraj

Professor Emeritus at Stanford University Arogyaswami J. Paulraj works in wireless technology. He served at Stanford from 1993 to 2010 where he supervised 50 doctoral and postdoctoral students. His group published over 400 research papers and are co-inventors on 80 U.S. patents. Paulraj is the pioneer of MIMO wireless communications, a technology now incorporated in all broadband wireless systems including 4G, 5G, and WiFi. His leadership in ICT won him the 2014 Marconi Prize.

In 1999, Paulraj founded Iospan Wireless Inc. where he developed MIMO-OFDMA based cellular networks. In 2004, he co-founded Beceem Communications Inc. The company became the market leader in 4G-WiMAX semiconductors. In 2014, he founded Rasa Networks to develop AI tools for managing large WiFi Networks. The three companies were acquired by Intel, Broadcom and HPE respectively.

During his 25 years in India (Indian Navy), prior to Stanford, he founded three national laboratories for the Indian Government (Center for AI and Robotics, Center for Advanced Computing, and Central Research Labs) and headed the development of a cutting-edge surface ship ASW sonar (APSOH).

Dennis Roberson

Roberson is President and CEO of Roberson and Associates, a wireless technology–focused consulting company, Chairman of Board of entigenlogic, an Artificial Intelligence based Natural Language Understanding product company, and the Caerus Institute, a patent development and support organization. He is also a Research Professor at Illinois Institute of Technology, where he was co-founder of IIT’s Wireless Network and Communications Research Center and co-founder of the Intellectual Property Management and Markets program. He currently serves on the Marconi Society’s Paul Baran Young Scholar Award Selection Advisory Committee.

His research focus has been on heterogeneous dynamic spectrum access networks; spectrum observation, measurement, and management; and wireless interference detection and mitigation. Previously he was Vice Provost for Research at Illinois Institute of Technology and before that Motorola’s EVP/CTO. He had an extensive corporate career including business and technology responsibilities at IBM, DEC (now part of HP), AT&T, and NCR. He has been and currently is involved with numerous technical, educational, and youth organizations including current board service on several technology-based companies. 

He has served as Chair of the FCC’s Technological Advisory Council for the past eight years and has served on the Commerce Spectrum Management Advisory Committee (CSMAC) for the past 10 years. Roberson has BSEE and BS Physics degrees from Washington State University and an MSEE from Stanford.

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Ash studied at Stanford University, where he secured a Fulbright fellowship. After graduation he worked at Standard Telecommunication Laboratories, then joined University College London as a professor. When he won the Marconi Prize in 1984, it was presented by His Eminence Sebastiano Cardinal Baggio, President of the Pontifical Commission for the City of the State of the Vatican. He was a Board member of the Marconi Society until 2008. 

“Our hearts go out to Sir Eric’s family and friends,” says Samantha Schartman-Cycyk, Executive Director of the Marconi Society. “His generous leadership in education and his contributions to technology exemplify the qualities that define the Marconi Fellowship. We honor his life and work.” 

“Sir Eric was an extraordinary contributor to our technology community,” writes Vint Cerf, Chairman of the Marconi Society’s Board. “Another giant has left our midst.”

“I can speak to his incredible energy to learn and understand from those around him—whether it was history, architecture, nature, performing arts, travel, an endless list—he was always interested at the deepest of levels,” writes Camilla Fritze, Board member. “He always made sure young people had a voice and were considered. He believed in the next generations and always welcomed opinionated youth into his home, and was genuinely interested in their work and challenges and successes. He has left an incredible legacy.”

The post Remembering Sir Eric Ash, 1984 Marconi Fellow appeared first on The Marconi Society.

Panelists:

We know the statistics—nearly half of the population is still not connected to the Internet. We’ve heard about the problems, from the homework gap to the lack of accessible health care to financial exclusion.

Experts from technology, policy, and digital inclusion will join forces to describe what the future could look like, the questions we need to answer, and the different points of view we have to consider. We will set the stage for the robust conversations that will take place at the Marconi Society’s Master Class and Symposium, The Decade of Digital Inclusion.

We will touch on the socio-economic issues of getting the right services to the right people, the role of governments in ensuring internet for all and the technologic possibilities and challenges for the next decade.

This event is free with registration.

The post The Decade of Digital Inclusion: Issues That Keep Us Up at Night appeared first on The Marconi Society.

In scientific disciplines such as astrophysics, biology, high energy physics, and similar hard sciences, it is standard practice for practitioners and researchers to assemble every decade to discuss and debate the direction research should head to yield important discoveries or resolve difficult questions. 

We have had the “decade of the brain” and decadal studies on climate change among many others. Astronomers and planetary scientists debate which galaxies, stars, planets, moons and asteroids deserve attention. Often these debates are critical because the instruments needed to make progress may be extremely expensive and may take many years to build before they can yield results. Some efforts could take decades, such as the Large Hadron Collider or the Stanford Linear Accelerator. The Laser Interferometry Gravity Observer project spanned decades, as did the Hubble Space Telescope. The Voyager spacecraft have been on their way since 1979 and have left our immediate solar system. Mars rovers have lasted for decades despite their original design life of 90 days. 

All of these efforts by the scientific community deserve great respect for the discipline shown by its members to maximize likely research gains especially when costs are high just to ante into the game. In the past 50 years, it has become eminently apparent that information and communication technology (ICT) represent an increasingly important part of daily life in all its dimensions: government, private sector, academia, and ordinary citizens. We are also discovering that these technologies have their strengths and weaknesses and that preservation of benefits while limiting deficits is going to take serious thought and action.

The Marconi Society envisions a world in which everyone enjoys the opportunities of the network. It is evident that, in addition to the massive contribution that ICT makes to our social and economic well-being, it is also abused by unscrupulous actors who do not have the best interests of others in mind. How can we make the products and services dependent on ICT safer, more secure, accessible, reliable, affordable, sustainable and resistant to abuse? 

Now is the time to convene a Decadal survey about ICT, with an end goal of true digital inclusion and all the implications that phrase brings to mind. To this end, the Marconi Society is facilitating discussions by groups of experts to formulate questions whose answers may guide research and development in the ICT space for the next decade. On October 22 at 1:00 eastern time, we will hold an open plenary at The Decade of Digital Inclusion to hear descriptions of critical challenges and the impact of solving them.  We hope that interested parties will join us in person in Washington, DC or virtually.

We ask ourselves: What hard problems to which we do not yet have answers would, if solved, offer a major step forward toward realizing benefits and diminishing deficits of ICT? What are the hard problems in the use of cryptography to protect privacy and confidentiality or to assure provenance and integrity of digital content? What are the hard problems in hardware design given the essential expiration of the classic Moore’s Law and how might they be solved? How can we develop methods for the creation of software that is error-free and does only what was intended and not something potentially harmful? How can we share radio spectrum more efficiently so as to take advantage of the properties to be found at lower and higher frequencies? How can we improve our implementations of machine learning and neural networks so that the behavior of these systems is more reliable and understandable or explainable? What problems must we solve to ensure that digital content is accessible and useful over centuries? How can we do a better job of predicting the social and economic impact of the increasing and more intense uses of ICT applications? How can we make ICT systems more sustainable and robust in the face of deliberate attack?

The list of questions is long and growing. How can we organize our thinking about these questions and choose paths forward that will lead to useful answers? Who should be consulted and who can carry out the research to yield results? How will these efforts be paid for and by whom or what agency?

I believe that it is timely to ask these and hundreds of other questions so as to formulate serious research programs for the decade ahead and I hope that readers of this essay will choose to engage to help formulate the questions and pursue the answers for the benefit of everyone. 

The Decade of Digital Inclusion is a semester long virtual master class led by experts in technology, policy and digital inclusion. Participants include Ana García Armada (Universidad Carlos III de Madrid), Doreen Bogdan-Martin (ITU), Vint Cerf (Google), John Cioffi (Stanford University and ASSIA), Muriel Médard (MIT), Sir David Payne (University of Southampton), Steve Unger (former Ofcom Director) and many more. Our Symposium will be held virtually and in person in Washington, DC on October 22.  Virtual student tickets are priced at $25 for the entire series and we offer special discounts for the in person event to student, faculty, nonprofit and government attendees. Please register here.

The post Why a Decadal Survey of Information and Communication Technologies is Imperative appeared first on The Marconi Society.

• The Marconi Prize
• The Paul Baran Young Scholar Awards

These awards, given by nomination only, recognize the leaders whose innovative approach to communications technology will improve digital inclusion, inspire the next generation of scientists, and shape the future of the field.

In line with our vision of a world in which everyone has access to the opportunities of connectivity, the Marconi Prize is extending its focus on technical excellence and impact to include recognition for social and humanitarian applications, as well as an expanded focus on entrepreneurship. The award, sometimes called the “Nobel Prize of Communications,” has recognized 54 leading scientists who have built our connected world.

Vint Cerf, Marconi Fellow and Chairman of our Board, Andrea Goldsmith, Marconi Fellow and Chair of the Selection Advisory Committee, and Dina Katabi, member of the selection committee and director of the MIT Wireless Center, discussed the nomination process and judging criteria for the Marconi Prize last month. You can view the recorded webinar here, and we are sharing their top tips for creating a successful nomination for the Prize.

1. Consider candidates from diverse geographies, communications technology disciplines, and demographics.

We actively seek nominations for candidates across the globe who represent the diversity of the field. Our outreach strategy has particularly prioritized geographic, ethnic/racial, and gender diversity. Additionally, we define Information and Communications Technology (ICT) broadly—past Marconi Fellows include those who have created vital communications companies, like Sergey Brin and Larry Page, founders of Google, and leaders in cybersecurity like Whitfield Diffie or Marty Hellman.

2. Make sure that your nomination is strong in all evaluation areas, including technical contribution.

We recognize a unique set of contributions that are instrumental in our connected world. In addition to technical excellence, we are looking for candidates who demonstrate an entrepreneurial spirit (who have either launched a product in the market, created a business, mentored entrepreneurs or have otherwise helped make their research or work impactful to the broader public) and who are invested in a digitally inclusive approach to technology.

3. Honor a colleague who would value being part of the lifelong Marconi Society Fellowship.

We are looking for candidates who are excited to participate as engaged members of the Marconi Society community. The Marconi Prize represents an induction into the Marconi Society, a group of thoughtful and engaged technologists. Marconi Fellows are invited to take a leading role in advanced communications in service of digital inclusion through our community and programs. Engagement opportunities include our decadal survey of ICT, mentoring underrepresented students in STEM and participating in programs and events..

4. Nominate a candidate that you know well.

While a high-profile nominator may seem like the most strategic choice, we’ve found that the most compelling nominations come from people who know and understand the candidate. Since the award criteria reach beyond technical excellence, a nominator should be able to create a strong case for the candidate’s entrepreneurial qualities and their humanitarian commitment—two things that may not be obvious from their research publications alone.

5. Allocate time to prepare a successful nomination.

While nominators have until June 1 to finalize their submissions, we recommend you start sooner rather than later. From the letters of recommendation to the nominator questions, a successful submission requires time and care. Do you have questions about the nomination process? Email info@marconisociety.org and we’ll help you navigate.

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Contact: Taia Pandolfi, Marketing & Communications Manager

taia@marconisociety.org

March 11, 2021—The Marconi Society today announced the committee for its upcoming symposium and gala, which celebrates 2020 Marconi Fellow Andrea Goldsmith and sets the agenda for the upcoming ten years of digital inclusion advocacy. The program committee includes leading technologists, policy advocates, and digital inclusion experts whose experience in the field and visionary leadership will shape this exceptional event.

“The Decade of Digital Inclusion will bring together a cross-section of leaders from critical disciplines  in a collaborative, generative program to discuss the major barriers to delivering the opportunities of connectivity to everyone on the planet and solutions for the next decade,” said Vint Cerf, Chair of the Marconi Society and 1998 Marconi Fellow. “We are honored to work with this distinguished program committee, which represents the communal effort required to connect the next billion people.”

The gala and symposium takes place on Friday, October 22, 2021, at the Ronald Reagan International Trade Center in Washington, D.C., and will include a significant online presence for those unable to travel. The program committee is co-chaired by Cerf and Samantha Schartman-Cycyk, the Marconi Society’s Executive Director. The committee will focus on creating an engaging, impactful event that draws on the strengths of the technology, policy, and advocacy communities and presents new opportunities for collaboration.

The Decade of Digital Inclusion Program Committee

Mohamed-Slim Alouini
Distinguished Professor, King Abdullah University of Science and Technology

Mohamed-Slim Alouini is a Distinguished Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering at  King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST). He is a Fellow of the IEEE and OSA and he is currently actively working on addressing the uneven global distribution, access to, and use of information and communication technologies in far-flung, low-density populations, low-income, and/or hard-to-reach areas.

Ana Garcia Armada
Professor, Universidad Carlos III de Madrid

Ana Garcia Armada is a professor of the Signal Theory and Communications Department at the Universidad Carlos III de Madrid, where she has served as Head of Signal Theory and Communications Department, Vice-dean of Electrical Engineering, and Deputy Vice-Chancellor of International Relations. She has received awards from University Carlos III of Madrid, third place Bell Labs Prize 2014 and outstanding service award from the IEEE ComSoc Signal Processing and Communications Electronics technical committee and the IEEE ComSoc Women in Communications Engineering standing committee.

Jane Coffin
Senior Vice President, Internet Growth, Internet Society

Jane Coffin is responsible for the Internet Society’s Internet Growth project teams, which are focused on Community Networks, Internet Exchange Points (IXPs) & interconnection, peering, community development, and a new critical project on measuring the health of the Internet. Coffin is a longtime leader in Internet and telecommunications policy issues, with experience at the National Telecommunications and Information Administration, USAID projects, FCC, and AT&T.

Elza Erkip
Institute Professor, NYU Tandon School

Elza Erkip is an Institute Professor in the Electrical and Computer Engineering Department at New York University Tandon School of Engineering. Her research interests are in information theory, communication theory, and wireless communications. Dr. Erkip is a member of the Science Academy of Turkey and is a Fellow of the IEEE. She was a member of the Board of Governors of the IEEE Information Theory Society 2012–2020, where she was the President in 2018.

Edward Frank
CEO, Brilliant Lime; Vice Chair, Board of Trustees, Carnegie Mellon University

Dr. Edward H. Frank is presently co-founder and CEO of Brilliant Lime, Inc., a very early-stage technology development startup. In 2018, he was elected to the National Academy of Engineering for his contributions to the development and commercialization of wireless systems. Frank has been a Trustee of Carnegie Mellon University since 2000 and is currently a Vice Chair of its Board of Trustees. He presently is an advisor to several Bay Area Venture capital firms and startups.

Chris Lewis
President and CEO, Public Knowledge

Chris Lewis is the President and CEO at Public Knowledge (PK), where he previously served as Vice President for Government Affairs. Before joining Public Knowledge, Lewis worked in the Federal Communications Commission Office of Legislative Affairs, including as its Deputy Director. He is a former U.S. Senate staffer and an experienced political organizer and advocate in both the nonprofit world and political campaigns from local to the presidential level.

Beth Noveck
Director, The Governance Lab; Chief Innovation Officer, The State of New Jersey; Professor, NYU Tandon School

Beth Simone Noveck directs the Governance Lab (The GovLab) at New York University’s Tandon School of Engineering where she is also a Professor in Technology, Culture, and Society and affiliated faculty at the Center for Urban Science and Progress. She is also a Fellow at NYU’s Institute for Public Knowledge. Noveck served in the White House as the first United States Deputy Chief Technology Officer and director of the White House Open Government Initiative under President Obama.

Milo Medin
Vice President of Access Services, Google

Milo Medin has been part of the Internet development community for more than 25 years. He is currently the vice president of access services at Google, where he oversees a number of projects to improve access to the Internet, primarily focused on expanding the speed, robustness and pervasiveness of wireless networks. Medin sits on the FCC’s Technical Advisory Committee and Broadband Deployment Advisory Committee. Since 2016, he has served on the Defense Innovation Board.

Angela Siefer
Executive Director, National Digital Inclusion Alliance (NDIA)

Angela Siefer has been working in digital inclusion since 1997. From physically setting up computer labs in underserved areas and managing local digital inclusion programs to consulting for the U.S. Department of Commerce and testifying before Congress, Siefer develops national strategies and solutions from the ground up. In 2015, she helped found the National Digital Inclusion Alliance,  a unified voice for home broadband access, public broadband access, personal devices and local technology training and support programs.

Theresa Swinehart
Senior Vice President, Global Domains and Strategy, ICANN

As Senior Vice President of Global Domains and Strategy at the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), Swinehart oversees a global team responsible for a range of work relating to ICANN’s stakeholders and contracted parties, including policy implementation, review recommendations, and strategic initiatives. Swinehart also serves as co-deputy to ICANN’s President and CEO. She is a leading advocate for an open and secure Internet and an expert in global Internet governance and cooperation.

John Windhausen
Executive Director, Schools, Health, and Libraries Broadband Coalition (SHLB)

John Windhausen, Jr., is the founder and Executive Director of the Schools, Health, & Libraries Broadband (SHLB) Coalition, a non-profit, public interest group based in Washington DC. SHLB has over 230 members and promotes open, affordable, high-quality broadband services for anchor institutions and their communities. Windhausen previously was President of a telecommunications trade association and from 1987 to 1996, he served as staff counsel for the U.S. Senate Commerce Committee.

About the Marconi Society

The Marconi Society envisions a world in which everyone can create opportunity through the benefits of connectivity. The organization celebrates, inspires, and connects individuals building tomorrow’s technologies in service of a digitally inclusive world.

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We believe Internet access is a basic human right. In order to connect the next billion people, leaders in policy, technology, and digital inclusion advocacy must collaborate to identify the most critical problems and develop innovative, practical solutions.

The Decade of Digital Inclusion brings these communities together in service of a digitally inclusive future. This timely conversation can only be hosted by the Marconi Society, a nonprofit that bridges the communities of advanced technology and digital inclusion.

In addition to the symposium, we will make history by recognizing and honoring one of the wireless industry’s leading stars, Andrea Goldsmith, as our newest Marconi Fellow.

Who Should Attend:

• Technologists from academic and corporate environments
• Digital inclusion stakeholders, including practitioners and advocates
• Policy makers from all levels of government and GovTech
• Philanthropists in the digital inclusion and technology for good spaces

BUY AN EARLY BIRD TICKET

October 22 Schedule

We are honored to welcome some of the world’s leading voices to present during the Decade of Digital Inclusion, including 2020 Marconi Fellow Andrea Goldsmith, Doreen Bogden of the International Communication. Union, and Internet Hall-of-Famer Larry Irving.

See the Event Schedule

Program Committee & Speakers

We have assembled some of the world’s leading voices on technology, public policy and advocacy for digital inclusion.  Meet the speakers that you will hear from and interact with during her symposium and master class on connecting the next billion.

See the Program Committee & Speakers

Sponsorship

In order to realize our vision of a connected future, the Decade of Digital Inclusion requires support. As a sponsor, your brand will be featured alongside exciting content from a dream team of leaders from the technology, policy, and digital inclusion practitioner communities. This is your opportunity to join industry leaders like Crown Castle, Medtronic, Qualcomm, and others and show your organization’s commitment to connecting the next billion by supporting this agenda-setting program.

Sponsorship Pamphlet

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We are three engineers who worked on some of the foundational pieces of the Internet and our global wireless communications network. Our perspectives on technology trends to watch are informed by decades of iterative and breakthrough discoveries. From blockchain to cybersecurity to wireless, here are three trends we are focused on:

Blockchain and Cryptocurrencies

To create the applications and systems that will make order-of-magnitude improvements for businesses and consumers, silos are breaking down, creating complex intersections of areas such as networking, communications, distributed systems, privacy, transparency, security, fairness, and cryptography. The technologies of blockchain and distributed ledgers are poised to have a significant impact.

The penetration of blockchain is accelerating as mainstream financial and commercial organizations recognize its value and utility. As they deploy and engage the broad public audience, we will likely see a flow of activity leveraging this technology in the next year or two. Much of this will focus on cryptocurrencies, which rely on blockchain for their underlying design. For example, Visa is planning to reward customers with Bitcoin instead of airline miles or cash. PayPal recently announced that its 26 million merchants will be able to use cryptocurrency as a payment alternative. JP Morgan has launched its own stablecoin, JPM Coin, and is working with Russia’s largest state-owned bank, Sberbank, which is considering the launch of a digital asset trading platform and its own digital currency. Healthcare and supply chain management are not far behind.

Emerging major technology innovations are poised to utilize the advantages of open, secure, immutable, and irrevocable distributed ledgers. The Internet of Things (IoT), requiring both security and openness, is poised to incorporate such ledgers and protection.

Near Term Internet Security

The growth in the IoT, along with advanced capabilities of rogue players and the complexity of software, make Internet security, safety, and confidentiality one of our most critical issues. Keeping the world’s Internet users safe and secure and their transactions private will require “under the hood” infrastructure. These technologies, though not very visible, will be important.

We will see a strong preference for all web sites to require the use of HTTPS (Secure Hypertext Transport Protocol). Misrouting attacks, which can disrupt all services, will be inhibited by strong authentication of routing updates in which Routing Public Key Infrastructure is applied to the Border Gateway Protocol (BGP). As IoT populates the Internet with billions of networked devices, there will be continued implementation of IPv6 (the large address space version of the Internet Protocol). To protect users from having their accounts hijacked, even if their usernames and passwords have been exposed, we will ideally see further spread of two-factor authentication (2FA). Finally, protections against Domain Name spoofing, such as Domain Name System Security Extensions (DNSSEC), should be promoted. 

5G for Emerging Countries

5G, the next generation of cellular communications technology, has evolutionary and revolutionary services that could have a deep impact on the global economy. In the next couple of years, 5G will unleash new economic opportunities and societal benefits enabled by higher speed Internet with speeds ten times higher than 4G. Some early applications include smart cities utilizing 5G for real-time traffic control or wireless delivery of high-resolution streaming media. 5G will also enable emerging countries to leapfrog traditional barriers while advancing ‘digitalization’ by improving access to resources and services for economically vulnerable populations.

5G standards envisage various types of wireless services—high-speed links with peak rates up to 20 Gbps for applications such as true distance learning and telemedicine, low-speed links with high-connection density (one million per Sq. Km.) for IoT devices, environmental monitoring and smart grids, and a new class of links that achieve both low latency (less than 1 millisecond round trip time) and high connection reliability (link reliability of 0.99999) for autonomous vehicles and factory automation. 

Together, these services have the potential to create a revolutionary class of applications including virtual and augmented reality, autonomous and remote driving, edge computing, and Industry 4.0 (the automation of traditional manufacturing processes using smart technology). 5G will extend the use of wireless technologies across completely new sectors of the economy, enabling innovative applications for individuals and economic verticals from industrial, commercial, educational, healthcare, agricultural, financial, and social sectors.

Vint Cerf, 1998 Marconi Fellow; Chief Internet Evangelist, Google

Leonard Kleinrock, 1986 Marconi Fellow; Distinguished Professor of Computer Science, UCLA

Arogyaswami Paulraj, 2014 Marconi Fellow; Professor Emeritus of Electrical Engineering, Stanford University

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