The Wireless Innovation Forum Announces 2011 Board of Directors at Annual Meeting

WASHINGTON--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Wireless Innovation Forum members elected new members of its board of directors during its annual meeting, held at SDR’10, the premier event for the reconfigurable radio community, on December 2, in Washington, D.C.

“Software Defined Radio: The Software Communications Architecture”

Board members returning to their current positions include Bruce Oberlies (Motorola) as Chair of the Forum, Ruediger Leschhorn (Rohde & Schwarz) as Vice-Chair of the Forum, Mark Turner (Harris) as Treasurer, Claude Belisle (Communications Research Center Canada) as Technical Director, Manuel Uhm (Xilinx) as User Requirements Committee Chair, Peter Tenhula (Shared Spectrum) as Regulatory Committee Chair, David Renaudeau (Thales) as ITU Region 1 representative, Paul Kolodzy (Kolodzy Consulting) as ITU Region 2 representative, Seung-Hwan Lee (ETRI) as ITU Region 3 representative, John Glossner (Optimum Semiconductor Technologies) as Small Company representative, John Powell (National Public Safety Telecommunications Council) as Government and Non-profit Class representative, Paul Sutton (CTVR) as the Academic representative, Hiroshi Harada (National Institute of Information and Communications Technology) as an at-large Director, and Pekka Heikkinen (Elektrobit) as an at-large Director.

Board members changing positions include Rafael Aguado (Indra Sistemas), formerly Medium Company representative and now Forum Secretary, Eric Christensen (General Dynamics C4Systems), formerly Forum Secretary and now Chair of the Board of Directors, Bob Schutz (ViaSAT), formerly Large Company representative and now Medium Company representative, and Peter Cook (HYPRES), formerly Chair of the Board and now an at-large Director.

In addition, the Board of Directors welcomes the following 3 new members:

• Claudio Armani, Selex Communications, joins the Forum’s board as the Large Company representative. Mr. Armani has experience in civilian telecommunications businesses, Professional Mobile Networks and most recently Military and Satellite telecommunications. He has been involved in R&D design, system networking and radio, research/technology and program management. Currently, he is Head of Wireless System Innovation of Military and Satellite Business Unit at Selex. He specializes in Broadband/Wideband Radio with focus on Broadband/Wideband MANET especially in a Software Defined Radio environment, and has been involved in EDA projects.
• Vincent Kovarik, PrismTech, was elected as an at-large Director. With over 30 years of systems and software development, Dr. Kovarik has been involved in Software Defined Radio (SDR) technology development for the last decade. As a member of the Modular Software Radio Consortium (MSRC), he worked on the initial version of the Software Communications Architecture (SCA). He was the product manager for the Domain Management ToolKit (dmTK), a commercial off-the-shelf product that implemented the Software Communications Architecture (SCA) first available in 2000. He is co-author with Dr. John Bard of “Software Defined Radio: The Software Communications Architecture,” published by Wiley and Sons and a contributing author to “Cognitive Radio Technology,” Dr. Bruce Fette, Editor, published by Academic Press. Dr. Kovarik led the software team that successfully inserted the DARPA XG Dynamic Spectrum Access technology into the Harris Falcon III tactical radio and subsequent field test at Yuma Proving Grounds. As Chief Technology Officer at PrismTech, Dr. Kovarik is leading the coordination and definition of multiple SDR products including advanced modeling tools, object request broker and the Software Communications Architecture (SCA) core framework.
• James Neel, President of Cognitive Radio Technologies, was elected as an at-large Director. Dr. Neel founded Cognitive Radio Technologies in 2007 with Dr. Jeff Reed to commercialize cognitive radio research from Virginia Tech. Cognitive Radio Technologies is the leading small business for incorporating artificial intelligence into wireless networks with three SBIRs on cognitive spectrum management and contracts on topics ranging from applying behavioral learning to detecting the intention of wireless networks to rapidly deployable networks for disaster responses. Dr. Neel is the Chair of the Cognitive Radio Work Group in the Wireless Innovation Forum (formerly the SDR Forum), and has received three paper awards for the design of cognitive radio networks.

The Forum would also like to thank outgoing board member Dave Murotake (SCA Technica), who served on the board for several years, for his service and hard work.

To learn more about the benefits of Forum Membership, visit our web page.

About the Wireless Innovation Forum

Established in 1996, The Wireless Innovation Forum (SDR Forum Version 2.0) is a non-profit mutual benefit corporation dedicated to driving technology innovation in commercial, civil, and defense communications worldwide. Members bring a broad base of experience in Software Defined Radio (SDR), Cognitive Radio (CR) and Dynamic Spectrum Access (DSA) technologies in diverse markets and at all levels of the wireless value chain to address emerging wireless communications requirements. To learn more about The Wireless Innovation Forum, its meetings and membership benefits, visit www.WirelessInnovation.org.