Keynote Speakers

Rajiv Laroia, Qualcomm, Founder of Flarion

   Rajiv Laroia is the founder of Flarion. As the company's CTO, he is responsible for overseeing all R&D activities and setting product and technology direction. He is an expert in OFDMA, CDMA, TDMA and other cellular multiple access technologies and is intimately familiar with current and next generation of wireless standards including IS-95, UMTS, CDMA 2000, IS-136, GSM and EDGE. Dr. Laroia has a very broad background that spans wireless communication, data transmission, information theory, VLSI design and architecture, analog mixed-signal and RF circuit design, high-speed AD/DA data converters, speech image and video compression.

   Prior to launching Flarion, Dr. Laroia was with Lucent Technologies Bell Laboratories since 1992 when he joined the prestigious Mathematical Sciences Research Center. In 1997, he became head of Bell Labs' Digital Communications Research Department in the Wireless Research Center where he and his team started to develop FLASH-OFDM technology based wireless data system. His years at Bell Labs have generated numerous publications and over 35 patents (granted and applied) with total patent licensing revenue in excess of $25 million.

   He received his Ph.D. and Master's degrees from the University of Maryland, College Park in 1992 and 1989 and a bachelor's degree in 1985 from the Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi-all in electrical engineering. Parts of his Ph.D. research are taught in advanced communication courses in most prominent universities. His thesis also contributed to V.34, the ITU voice-band modem international standard and led to a patent that has generated over $2 million for the University of Maryland, College Park. He was the recipient of the Best Graduate Student of the Year Award at the University of Maryland in 1992. From 1994 to 1997 he was the associate editor for IEEE transactions on information theory.
Dr. Laroia is a Fellow of the IEEE.

Paul Kolodzy, Advanced Wireless and Networking Technology, and Former DARPA Program Manager

Dr. Paul Kolodzy has 20 years of experience in technology development for advanced communications, networking, electronic warfare, and spectrum policy for government, commercial, and academic clients. He is currently a Communications Technology Consultant in Advanced Wireless and Networking Technology based near Washington DC.

Prior to being a consultant, Dr. Kolodzy has been: Director of the Center for Wireless Network Security (WiNSeC) at Stevens Institute of Technology; during 2002, the Senior Spectrum Policy Advisor at the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) and Director of Spectrum Policy Task Force charged with developing the next generation spectrum policy;Program Manager at the Defense Advanced Projects Agency (DARPA) in the Advanced Technology Office managing R&D for communications programs to develop generation-after-next capabilities; Director of Signal Processing and Strategic Initiatives at Sanders, A Lockheed Martin Company; and a Group Leader/Staff Member at MIT Lincoln Laboratory in the areas of Optical Systems for Laser Radars, Signal Processing, and Target Recognition for Acoustics, RF (SAR), and Optical signatures.

He received his PhD and MS in Chemical Engineering from Case Western Reserve University and his BS in Chemical Engineering from Purdue University.