Moderator List

» How Managed Connectivity Can Improve Your Cloud Experience

Airespring Inc

Daniel Lonstein

COO

Daniel LonsteinDaniel Lonstein is the Chief Operating Officer of AireSpring, an award-winning provider of managed connectivity and cloud communications solutions. Since the company was founded in 2001, he has consistently anticipated and led the transition from legacy services to VoIP and cloud solutions. In his position at the forefront of change in the industry, Mr. Lonstein has participated in panels, including The New Role of the Reseller at ChannelVision Expo, and published blogs on topics such as Death of the T1 for Channel Partners. In addition to his prior position as co-founder and COO of ADDTEL Communications, Mr. Lonstein has extensive experience in the sales process both inside and outside of the communications industry. He has previously held positions at On Target Market Research and Tel-Aviv based USTM Partners, and has consulted for various international telecommunications conglomerates. He has also contributed articles to Haaretz Magazine on how Israeli companies can market development and technical services to US firms.

Session(s):

AudioCodes

Avi Perpinyal

Sales Engineer

Avi Perpinyal, Sales Engineer for AudioCodes, has over 7 years of experience in the communications industry. He’s held positions at Oracle, Acme Packet and Salcom Voice Services. He holds an MBA in Business Administration and Bachelors in Electrical and Electronics Engineering from University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg. Avi is experienced in VoIP infrastructure design and implementation across large enterprise, SMB and Tier 1 carrier implementations. He holds a particular interest in VoLTE, advanced Unified Communications and IMS. When not working with customers to build solution based on AudioCodes technologies, Avi enjoys his time as a husband and father to his young son. Avi is looking forward to sharing his thoughts with you and invites you to connect with him on LinkedIn.

Session(s):

» Skype for Business and PBX Replacement for Enterprise Voice

» Security, Compliance, Recording, and E911 – What’s the Big Deal?

AudioCodes

Mike Erps

UC Solutions Manager

Mike Erps, Unified Communications Solution Manager for AudioCodes, has over 8 years of experience in the communications industry. For the last four years, Mike has focused his area of expertise on Microsoft Lync / Skype for Business. Possessing Microsoft certifications in Core Solutions of Microsoft Lync Server 2013 and Enterprise Voice & Online Services with Lync Server 2013, Mike brings with him a deep knowledge of S4B and Lync that is amplified by his prior role experience as Manager of Lync Infrastructure Services and Sr. Lync Consultant. Mike is an up and coming thought leader on Unified Communication trends. In his spare time Mike is a true fan of all things sports, specifically enjoying a Giants, Mets or Rangers game.

Session(s):

» Common Questions Answered about Skype for Business

Avaya

Mohammad Nezarati

General Manager and Vice President UC Applications

Mohammad Nezarati leads the UC applications group, including audio conferencing and messaging solutions for Avaya. Prior to joining Avaya, Mohammad founded Esna Technologies in 1989 to deliver innovative communications and collaboration solutions to enterprise customers, which was acquired by Avaya in May 2015. He served as both CEO and Chief Technologist for Esna, and was the primary architect and developer of the company’s first award-winning UC solution, Officelinx. Mohammad has more than 25 years of leadership experience and has been honored with the Canadian CTI Pioneer award for his experience in the messaging and communications industry.

Session(s):

» Keynote Presentation by Avaya
The Evolution and Future of Communications

BroadSoft, Inc.

Will Ng

Director, Market Offers

Focused on Unified Communications by identifying and fixing deployment roadblocks, building leadership position in market, and refining position vs. competitors. Will services BroadSoft customers from around the world addressing the different challenges faced in each region. Will comes to BroadSoft from DSCI, a New England based BroadWorks service provider, where he launched UC-One in 2013. Will has lead both product development and management teams to release products to place DSCI as the leader in their market and one of the more advanced BroadWorks customers.

Will has further product management experience expanding beyond telecom with time spent in the lighting industry. Focusing on LED and CFL offerings for the cabinet display makers of the world servicing brands like Sephora, Macy’s, Tommy Bahama’s, Tag Heuer and many others. His success in the lighting industry lead him to participate in two episodes of Extreme Makeover Home Edition.

Will has an Accounting an Information Systems B.A. from UMass, MBA from Babson College and is the first Pragmatic Level 6 certified Product Manager in the nation.

Based in Boston, MA, Will is married with a 2 year old boy.

Session(s):

» Unified Communications to Support "Conferencing in Motion"

Call Cabinet Corp

Joseph Roman

Vice President

Session(s):

» Security, Compliance, Recording, and E911 – What’s the Big Deal?

Carenection

Muthusamy Selvaraj

VP, Product Management & Development

As the VP of Product management and Development at Carenection, he leads the development of next generation CTDN ( Carenextion Teleheath Delivery Network).product life-cycle, road maps and delivery. Carenections mission is to improve the quality, accessibility and affordability of healthcare by building the most comprehensive telehealth marketplace in the United States. Carenection offers the clients single-vendor simplicity for all their telehealth needs over a private, HIPAA-compliant broadband network specifically tuned for delivering telehealth services, thus increasing scalability and reliability while easing support burdens.

He joined Carenection from Polycom, where led the Global the Advanced Services Portfolio, focusing Custom Business Solutions in Polycom. In that role, he was responsible for the entire Portfolio life cycle, including Offer definition, GTM strategy and Delivery. The custom business solutions group develops Software solutions that enable seamless integration of Polycom RPP in customers’ business process. Muthu’ s group consults and advises enterprises on CEBP (Collaboration Enable Business Process) - to make Unified Collaboration as a part of the normal business flow. He spearheaded the launch and delivery of Custom App development services in 18 countries and under his guidance the group continuously delivered triple digits growth year over year.

Muthu has over 19 years of experience in the communication Technology industry in various leadership roles at Bell Labs ( Alcatel-Lucent), 3COM ( Now HP) and NEC C&C (Japan) . Muthu . He holds a Bachelors and Masters in Computer Science engineering and an MBA from Kellogg School of Management, Evanston IL. He is also a regular speaker at industry forums such as ITEXPO, TSIA and others.

Muthu is an avid traveler, who has visited over 51 countries and lived in 4. Muthu also volunteers in the Board of Kellogg Alumni Club of Chicago, a Key Volunteer at the Chicago Marathon, Tamilnadu foundation and advisory role for Chicago area Indian associations.

Session(s):

» How to Make Your UC Investment Pay Off

Clarity Connect

Jeremy Puent

Product Manager

Jeremy Puent, The Product Manager for Clarity Connect has spent over 14 years in the communication industry. Armed with certifications on Cisco UCCX, Interactive Intelligence and numerous WFM and QA/QM products, Jeremy spent over 10 years as a contact center consultant, creating and managing contact centers from small help desks up to 11,000 seat contact centers. In his current role, Jeremy brings his deep expertise in contact centers to help guide the direction of the Clarity Connect product and evangelizes Connect’s unique approach to a native Skype for Business Contact Center and the benefits that a truly unified communication based contact center can provide. Jeremy contributes thought leadership across social media from LinkedIn to Twitter as well as the Clarity UC Blog. A Veteran of the Marine Corps, father and husband, Jeremy loves the outdoors, rock climbing, fishing and classic cars. Jeremy is available for speaking engagements or webinars and more.

Session(s):

» Fueling Growth through Engagement, Social Interaction and Analytics

codebyts Pty Ltd

TJ Gokcen

CEO

TJ Gokcen is the CEO of codebyts, specializing in software development and continual process improvement.

TJ’s work has included implementing software programs to automate systems and processes for several large manufacturing companies in Europe as well as designing and implementing customized software solutions in the USA and Australia.

He does extensive work facilitating systems approach and process improvement initiatives for Fortune 500 companies in the USA, Europe and Australia. He regularly speaks at technical conferences about database and software development in addition to national and international process improvement conferences.

TJ is an avid systems thinker with a holistic approach to software development, statistical analysis and user and customer experience. This places him in a unique position to deliver solutions that are not only technically superior but also aligned with corporate culture and goals.

He is currently the host of The Sydney Limited WIP Society, the AgiLean Society meet-ups and the co-host of the Sydney .NET User Group. He presented his latest research paper, Aim as a System, at the 21st Annual Deming Research Seminar in March 2015 in Washington DC. The paper was one of the most highly attended and rated sessions at the conference and was very well received by the Deming Community.

Session(s):

CognitiveScale

Andrew Chen

Director of Project Management

Andrew Chen is a technology innovator in artificial intelligence for healthcare, web analytics, social media analytics, and enterprise software-as-a-service (SaaS). Currently the Director of Product Management for Healthcare at CognitiveScale, Inc., he has held leadership roles in some of the fastest growing software companies such as Spredfast, and Bazaarvoice, (NASDAQ: BV), a leading integrated ratings and reviews provider. Several of his innovations have pending or issued patents.

Session(s):

» How to Build Wildly Addictive Cloud Based Software

ConnectSolutions

Christopher Martini

VP, Skype Business

Christopher brings twenty years of experience in enterprise technology, including many years as a sales executive for Unified Communications managed services. Prior to CoSo, he managed Channel Sales for Avanade and held high-level leadership positions at Primitive Logic and Microsoft. Christopher served as Chairman of the Microsoft VAR Leadership Council for two years, helping Microsoft deepen relationships with some of their largest VAR partners. Christopher attended Johnson & Wales University and completed the Leadership in Management Program at the Leadership Trust in Herefordshire, UK.

Session(s):

» ROI with Skype for Business

Dialogic

Jim McLaughlin

Product Marketing Manager

Jim McLaughlin has 28 years of experience with marketing and selling voice and data communication technologies to both fixed and mobile Service Providers globally. He is a member of Dialogic’s Service Provider Product Marketing organization, and currently focuses on IMS/VoLTE/VoWiFi solutions. Jim is a professional engineer and a registered CPA, holding a BSEE from the University of Toronto and an MBA from the University of Dallas.

Session(s):

» Agile Service Delivery in an IMS Network with NFV

Dialogic

Alan Percy

Senior Director, Product Marketing

Mr. Percy is the Senior Director of Product Marketing at Dialogic, responsible for the global marketing efforts to nurture the growing community of real-time communications and WebRTC applications developers with the rich media processing solutions from Dialogic. Included in his role, Mr. Percy is also responsible for developing and managing a number of strategic industry, consultant and analyst relationships. He is also a frequent industry speaker and contributes to a number of industry journals, podcasts, webcasts and blogs covering a range of communications and technology adoption topics.

Session(s):

» Research report: selling UC to the SMB

Edgewater

Brian Gregory

Sr. Director of Product Management

Session(s):

Enghouse Interactive

John De Los Reyes

Vice President of Sales

Session(s):

» Mastering the Omni-Channel Customer Experience

Enghouse Interactive

Dave Bentsen

Regional Director

Session(s):

Enghouse Interactive

Kyle Howard

Engineer

Kyle Howard is the Strategic Accounts Technical Manager for Enghouse Interactive, with a specific focus on cloud enablement of the global service provider community. He has worked in the technology and contact center space for 15+ years with a diverse background in engineering and IT management. As a technology early adopter Kyle has been working with IP based solutions since 2001 and began implementing a video based contact center in 2004.

Session(s):

» The Benefits of Transitioning to IP Data Connectivity within the Contact Center

FBI/NDCAC

Brian Hanlon

Session(s):

» Introduction to the National Domestic Communications Assistance Center

FBI/NDCAC

Henry Hodor

Session(s):

» Lawful Intercept Introduction

FBI/NDCAC

Bruce Adamo

Supervisory Special Agent

Session(s):

» Introduction to the National Domestic Communications Assistance Center

» How to Catch a Criminal

Fiber Mountain

M.H. Raza

Founder and CEO

Raza founded Fiber Mountain, Inc., and as CEO he leads day-to-day execution of the company’s vision of transforming network infrastructure everywhere. Previously, Raza was VP/GM for ADC Telecommunications’ global enterprise business, where he invented and executed the development of a cable intelligence technology; ADC was acquired by TE Connectivity. Prior to that he was Senior Director for 3Com’s IP Telephony division, where he led the integration of telephony into IBM’s System-i environment; HP acquired 3Com. Raza was VP/GM for Fujitsu BCS, where he was responsible for Switches/Routers, ATM, SONET, and Telephony, as well as Director Product Management for General DataComm in the earliest ATM deployments for service providers in the US and globally. Raza has a BS in Electrical Engineering from the University of Oklahoma and holds several patents in the networking arena.

Session(s):

» Effective Delivery of Next-Generation Services and Apps with SDN and NFV

Folio3

Adnan Lawai

Chief Executive Officer

Adnan is the CEO of Folio3 that developed Meeting Mogul – a one-touch conference calling app that makes connecting to meetings easy and inexpensive for employees on-the-go. He is also a seasoned technologist and entrepreneur with extensive experience in product development, sales, business development and marketing. Prior to Folio3, Adnan was Chief Technology Officer at Clickmarks, a venture backed company focused on providing a rapid, cost effective solution for performing integration and wireless enablement of enterprise applications. At Clickmarks, Adnan was responsible for defining and executing on the technical direction of the company as well as its key technical sales and marketing activities, including its alliances with Sun Microsystems and Plumtree Software. Before Clickmarks, he was a Member of Technical Staff at Silicon Graphics (SGI), where he worked on Digital Media, Advanced Graphics, and led SGI’s involvement at the MPEG-4 forum. Adnan has also worked at General Instrument (now part of Motorola) and as a graduate researcher at the MIT Media Lab on digital video and on advanced modem design. He has a BS and a MS in Electrical Engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).

Session(s):

» The Modern Meeting: Collaboration Trends and How to Keep Up

» Driving Corporate Growth Through Internal Collaboration and Engagement

Hewlett-Packard Company

Richard Arthur

WW Sales Enablement Team Manager

Richard Arthur has enjoyed the wild ride of last two and a half decades of the communication and Internet revolution. He leads a team of Sales Enablement professionals within HP’s Network function Virtualization (NFV) business – a business targeted at Telecom operators and their suppliers and embracing all of HP’s enterprise offer. His team’s top responsibility is to ensure that HP sales teams have customer-ready content and the training required to sell HP’s NFV solutions. The team also supports industry events, social media programs, AR/PR and thought-leadership activities for the business.

Network Function Virtualization (NFV) is about helping Communications Service Providers (CSPs) create greater business agility by moving networking and telecom applications from traditional and propriety hardware, to open IT based on cloud.

Richard’s team covers the entire HP NFV offer, spanning hardware, software and services - including servers, storage, networking, virtual computing and networking, and OSS and management.

Session(s):

» Moving Your Telecom Apps to NFV – A Snakes and Ladders Game?

IBM

Santosh Borse

Lead Architect- IBM Social Dashboards

Santosh Borse is a Technical Lead and Architect at IBM focusing on Social analytics. He has spent over 10 years in developing and architecting various software systems. He has worked with many clients across the globe.

He has deep experience in Big data & Analytics, His current area of focus is Social Media Analytics. He holds masters degree in Computer Science.

Santosh is proud father of 5 year old boy and 5 months old daughter. In his free time, he loves to code and read historical non-fiction literature.

Session(s):

» Engagement Analytics: Putting People at the Center of your Analytics Strategy

InfoCision Management Corporation

Steve Brubaker

Chief of Staff

Steve Brubaker began his career at leading contact center solutions provider InfoCision in 1985, where he currently serves as chief of staff. Hes also a member of the Direct Marketing Association, the Professional Association for Customer Engagement, and the Society of Consumer Affairs Professionals.

Brubaker is the recipient of numerous industry and other awards. In 2007 he was honored with the prestigious Fulcrum Award from the American Teleservices Association (now known as PACE) in recognition of his extraordinary contributions to the call center industry. In 2012 he was selected by The University of Akron to receive the Simonetti Distinguished Business Alumni Award. And just last year he accepted The University of Akron Honors College Distinguished Alumni Award.

The InfoCision executive is also known for his popular blog, The-Right-Call, in which he offers tips on such topics as how to create a personalized customer care experience, how to ensure all employees deliver a consistent face for the brand, and how to keep workers motivated so they can deliver the best possible customer experience.

Steve just released the new book, Taking Your Customer CareTM to the Next Level, which looks at the role of content, leadership, listening, marketing, mobile, people, personalization, social media, training, and video in taking customer care to the next level.

Session(s):

» Designing Your Technology Strategy to Take Customer Care to the Next Level

Ingate

Khris Kendrick

Vice President Business Development and Sales

Khris Kendrick brings more than 20 years of direct experience to his role as Vice President of Business Development and Sales to Ingate Systems. Previously the Director of Business Development and Marketing at CounterPath, Kendrick set the vision for service provider wireline and wireless converged services, SaaS and security products. Prior to CounterPath, he worked for Sonus Networks and held senior marketing positions at Grandstream Networks. Kendrick has worked as an independent sales consultant at Squared, was the Senior Product Manager with Spectel (Avaya), Iperia Inc. (Genband), and Lernout & Hauspie (Nuance), and senior Marketing Manager at Polaroid Corporation where he formulated marketing and OEM strategies for digital imaging and printing.

Session(s):

» Keynote Presentation by Intel Security
Digital Freedom: A risk to corporate security?

Intel Security

Candace Worley

Senior Vice President & General Manager, Endpoint Security

Candace Worley is the senior vice president and general manager for the Endpoint Security Business, responsible for developing and executing the strategic direction around Endpoint Protection for PCs, laptops, tablets, mobile phones, and embedded devices. She is also responsible for Data Center Security for physical, virtual and cloud environments; and Data Protection solutions for corporate assets. Worley leads the engineering, marketing, and sales functions that drive worldwide growth for the Endpoint Security business and is accountable for the business unit P&L.

Worley joined McAfee in 2000 and has 20 years of technology leadership and enterprise product management experience. Prior to McAfee, she spent seven years with Mentor Graphics where she led a team of product managers responsible for electronic design automation and electronic component software.

Worley holds an MBA from Marylhurst University and a bachelor’s degree in management from Oregon State University.

She resides in Beaverton, Oregon and enjoys hiking and gardening in her free time.

Session(s):

Intelepeer

Phil Bronsdon

Chief Technology Officer

Phil Bronsdon oversees all engineering and technical operations activities at IntelePeer, Inc. He leads the team of VoIP and innovation engineers responsible for the delivery of the company¹s carrier service offerings globally.

Phil has over 20 years of engineering and operations expertise in the telecommunications industry. Prior to joining IntelePeer, Phil was a Client Principal in the Americas Consulting & Integration vertical for Communications, Media, & Entertainment at Hewlett Packard Corporation.

Previously he held the position of Vice President of Operations for ooma Inc. where he was responsible for implementing all operations functions for a consumer VoIP venture funded start-up. Prior to ooma, Phil held a series of significant management roles at Qwest Communications as their Director of Voice Planning & Engineering, Director of IP & ATM Network Engineering, Vice-President of Switch Engineering, and Senior Director of Emerging Technology.

Phil has also served as a Brigade Commander, with the 37th Armored Brigade, Ohio Army National Guard and holds a MBA from Ohio University and a BS, Computer Science Engineering from Ohio State University.

Session(s):

» Deployment Considerations - Cloud, On-premises or Hybrid

» The Benefits of Transitioning to IP Data Connectivity within the Contact Center

» Designing Your Technology Strategy to Take Customer Care to the Next Level

Interactive Intelligence

Karina Howell

Solutions Marketing Manager

Karina Howell has 15 years of experience in the contact center industry, and is currently Solutions Marketing Manager at Interactive Intelligence. She has broad expertise in the telecommunications space, having served as an industry analyst at Frost & Sullivan, product marketing manager at Genesys Telecommunications, and an independent consultant advising solutions vendors. Her experience includes advising end users on choosing the technology architectures to best fit their business needs, including traditional and virtual models using premise and cloud deployment model.

Session(s):

InterCall

Sascha Mehlhase

Director of Product Development

As director of product management for InterCall’s core conferencing services, Sascha is responsible for product innovations, from conceptualization to design. He was instrumental in creating and taking to market InterCall’s first generation of mobile conferencing apps, including running a global beta tester network and assuring quality. In addition, he works with various development teams to ensure features and functions are implemented and the strategic vision advances according to targets as well as guides the user experience, user interface design, billing, pricing, marketing efforts, global rollouts and support. Prior to joining InterCall, Sascha worked as a consultant and served as a product manager at companies in various growth stages. Connect with Sascha at https://www.linkedin.com/in/smehlhase.

Session(s):

» Unified Communications to Support "Conferencing in Motion"

IR

John Hand

Global Microsoft Alliance Director

John Hand is IR’s Global Director for their Microsoft Alliance. John works directly with IR’s global sales leaders to build strategic relationships and develop strategies that enable IR to work closely with Microsoft and their partners to help their joint customers deploy, adopt and consume Skype for Business. Under John’s leadership IR has become a national sponsor for the Lync User’s Group and a Microsoft Gold Partner for Communications. Prior to joining IR John worked for over 20 years with Microsoft in various leadership roles helping to launch major releases of Windows, Office and Project. John lives in the Seattle area and when not working enjoys photography and traveling with his wife and three children.

Session(s):

» Managing a Skype for Business solution end to end.

Juniper Networks

Muckai Girish

Sr. Director, Corporate Business Development

Girish is part of the Corporate Development & Strategy organization at Juniper and drives partnership and business development initiatives to enable Junipers customers to offer innovative and cutting-edge solutions. Prior to Juniper, Girish held leadership positions in business development, strategy, marketing and product management in the cloud, mobile, cable, telco and semiconductor industries. Girish holds an MBA from the Wharton School, Ph.D. From Boston University and B.Tech from the Indian Institute of Technology, Madras.

Session(s):

» Evolution to a Software Defined Network and NFV Ecosystem

LA County DA's Office

Antonella Nistorescu

Session(s):

» Case Studies: Law Enforcements and Industry working Together

MarketUS, LLC.

Michael Price

Founder

Since MarketUS® was founded in 1986, it has aided companies in obtaining over $50 billion in GSA Schedule business. After signing their first client, Dell Computer, in 1986, the company has represented some of the top names in the industry, including Voneto, CTC Supply, PL Custom, List Industries, Airbus, InFocus, Yahoo, EDS, Jabra, Ameritech, Hyundai, TRW, Total Gym, Fire-Dex and Harvard Business School. MarketUS® is a Service Disabled Veteran Owned Small Business (SDVOSB)

Session(s):

» Penetrating the Government Market to Expand Your VoIP Business

Masergy Communications, Inc.

Dean Manzoori

Vice President of Global Cloud Communications

Dean Manzoori is Vice President of Global Cloud Communications at Masergy, a managed networking and cloud services provider. He brings over 25 years of telecommunications experience in a variety of roles including operational management, strategic planning and business development. Dean co-founded In 2004, Dean Co-founded Broadcore to bring cloud communications capabilities to enterprises globally. Broadcore was acquired by Masergy in July 2012. In his current role Dean is responsible for Cloud Unified Communications product strategy at Masergy. He holds a BSEE from CSU, Long Beach with Great Distinction and an MBA from Pepperdine University. Dean is a frequent speaker at industry events including ITEXPO, Channel Partners Conference and ITPX Telecommunications Conference.

Session(s):

» The Modern Meeting: Collaboration Trends and How to Keep Up

» Facial Recognition - Changing The Communications World

Mera Software Services, Inc.

Michael Dundon

Senior Director

Michael brings over 20 years of experience in Information Technology, network operations, network systems design and telecommunications. He has held leadership positions with MCI, Ericsson, Domain Networks, and Avaya. Michael obtained a patent in 2003 in Virtual Reality.

Session(s):

Metaswitch

Martin Price

Director, Product Management

Martin Price has 18 years of experience in the networking and communications industry, all with Metaswitch Networks and parent company Data Connection. After working on the initial development of Metaswitch’s carrier products in the UK Martin relocated to San Francisco and has worked in both Customer Support and Business Development roles. He is now Director of Product Management for Metaswitch’s Business Communications solutions with a focus on Hosted PBX. He holds a Master of Engineering degree from the University of Southampton in the UK.

Session(s):

» Research report: selling UC to the SMB

Microsoft

Skip Chilcott

Senior Product Marketing Manager

Skip Chilcott is responsible for US midmarket sales and marketing for Lync and Unified Communications at Microsoft. A 20 year veteran of the communications and collaboration technology, spending the last 10 years at Microsoft involved with the Unified Communications, Cloud Services, Real-time Collaboration, Productivity, and more for products including Lync, Office 365, Office, Office Live, OCS, Live Meeting, Exchange, and BPOS to name a few. He has a passion for helping businesses both large and small to maximize success, productivity effectiveness, and growth through the use of innovative technology.

Session(s):

» Skype for Business is here - So what exactly is it?

» Skype for Business Meetings and the Modern Workplace

» Deployment Considerations - Cloud, On-premises or Hybrid

» ROI with Skype for Business

» Skype for Business and PBX Replacement for Enterprise Voice

» Skype for Business Audio and Video Device Considerations

Microsoft

Paco Contreras Herrera

Director WW Product Marketing, Skype for Business

Paco Contreras leads worldwide marketing and sales strategy for Skype for Business where he responsible for global go-to-market strategy and execution for Skype for Business. Paco joined Microsoft in August 2003, serving in many leadership roles in Product Management, Marketing, and Strategy with business groups including Productivity, CRM, and Unified Communications, covering products including Lync and Skype for Business, Office, Office 365, and Dynamics CRM. Prior to Microsoft, he held roles in consulting and sales with KPMG and Oracle, covering multi-national enterprise customers. He holds an Engineering degree from the Universidad Panamericana in Mexico and an MBA from the Darden School of Business at the University of Virginia.

Session(s):

» Keynote Presentation by Microsoft

Midokura

Chris Calandro

Regional Sales Manager

Chris joins Midokura as the Regional Sales Manager for the Western US with over 15 years of high tech experience. He joined Midokura from Chelsio Communications, where he sold unified networking and storage products to the HPC and enterprise verticals. He was a member of the executive working group in the OpenFabrics Alliance and actively involved in the Ethernet Alliance. Prior to Chelsio, Chris was with AMD selling networking, storage and computing products to customers ranging from emerging accounts to large multinationals. Chris holds a degree in Electrical Engineering from Southern Methodist University. When Chris is not in the office, you will find him hiking, camping, or listening to live music throughout the Bay Area.

Session(s):

» DevOps for Networking: Pets or Cattle?

Nectar Services Corp.

Michael Butler

Sr. Director of Strategic Alliances

Michael’s passion has been working to align network capabilities to application requirements for his entire career; first by designing enterprise WAN/MANs then with the partner engineering team within the Lync/Skype product group. As part of Nectar Services Corp. Michael is working to drive monitoring and diagnostics into all UC topologies while contributing to the evolution of Software Defined Networking, which should facilitate reliability into shared services infrastructures.

Session(s):

» Common Questions Answered about Skype for Business

Nectar Services Corp.

Matt Christopher

Director of Microsoft Enterprise Programs

Matt Christopher practically grew up in telecom. The son of a Pacific Bell field technician, Matt spent many weekends in crawl spaces helping to pull wire for side jobs. He interned at AT&T throughout High School and College. His first job out of college was with a custom IVR development firm. After 5½ years selling advanced telephony applications for Lucent, Expanets, and Avaya, Matt moved to Nortel. In 2007, Matt bridged into the world of UC and software-powered voice when he joined the Nortel-Microsoft Innovative Communications Alliance (ICA) team. He completed the transition to UC and software when he joined Microsoft in 2010 as part of the global Voice Incubation team. In 2013, Matt left the hallowed halls of Microsoft to join the Lync partner community. For Nectar, Matt is the Director of Microsoft Enterprise Programs. In this role, Matt helps drive initiatives around Nectar’s participation in Microsoft’s SDN API Depth Partner Program as well as their IT Pro Tools program. Matt also works with the Microsoft field and Microsoft voice partners to better understand how Nectar’s assessment, monitoring, diagnostics and reporting tools can help make Lync and Skype for Business deployments as successful as possible. @mc_on_uc

Session(s):

» Managing a Skype for Business solution end to end.

Netformx

Robert Klotz

VP od Product Strategy

Mr. Klotz is responsible for product strategy at Netformx to define overall product direction. He has more than 25 years of experience developing platforms used to increase revenue and bottom line profits. For the last 15 years he has been a senior level executive working for and with value added resellers and OEMs worldwide who are still using these platforms today. Having worked all sides of the equation including OEM, channel, and end user this experience brings great perspective to the needs of the market and innovative ways to solve its challenges.

He came to Netformx as the CTO and Founder of VARcompliance which was purchased by Netformx in 2013. His more recent experience includes management positions at Akibia (purchased by Zensar), SilverBack Technologies (purchased by Dell), Bay Networks (purchased by Nortel).

Mr. Klotz also holds a patent as the co-inventor of a distributed network monitoring and control system.

Session(s):

» Unmasking Hidden Margin Dollars Using Business Intelligence

NetSapiens

Anand Buch

Co-Founder & CEO

Anand Buch holds more than 20 years of experience in the converged communications industry, dating back to the early days of commercial “Voice over Data Networks” applications. He began his career in 1993 as a DSP Engineer with PCSI, an early producer of voice and data convergence technology. This was followed by roles in Systems Engineering and Product Line Management, culminating as a Director at the PCSI spin-off and VoIP pioneer, Nuera Communications.

Today, Anand is the CEO and Co-Founder of NetSapiens Inc. NetSapiens is focused on delivering advanced software solutions to competitive service providers, enabling them to become cloud-based unified communications providers. As CEO, he leverages his multi-disciplinary experience in business and technology to guide the conception, realization, and delivery of these solutions to the marketplace. Anand has made it his mission to empower a new community of service providers who are joining together as a collective force and successfully competing for the same revenue as the largest and most established providers.

Anand Buch holds a Masters in Business Administration from San Diego State University and a Bachelors in Electrical and Computer Engineering from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

Session(s):

» Open Source vs. Commercial Softswitches

» Right-sizing Your Cloud UC for Any Business

Nokia Networks

Sandro Tavares

Head of Telco Cloud Business Development

Sandro Tavares has more than 14 years of international experience in the telecoms industry, holding positions in sales and marketing, and participating in industry breakthroughs such as the launch of the One Voice Initiative for VoLTE. He has worked with the Nokia family of companies for more than 10 years, and currently oversees Nokias Telco Cloud business development activities in Americas. In this position, his current topics of coverage include NFV, data center infrastructure, orchestration and cloud management.

Sandro holds a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering from Universidade de Brasilia, and a corporate MBA from Fundacao Dom Cabral in Brazil. He is currently based in Dallas, Texas.

Session(s):

» Agile Service Delivery in an IMS Network with NFV

» Bringing NFV to mainstream: How do we get there?

Numonix

Evan Kahan

Chief Operating Officer

Evan Kahan is COO and co-founder of Numonix, which delivers interaction recording and quality management solutions that boost its customers’ business success and support regulatory compliance. At Numonix, Kahan is responsible for operations as well as technology and product development for Numonix’s award-winning RECITE interaction recording solutions.

Prior to co-founding Numonix, he was vice president of operations for Majuda Corporation, which delivers call recording solutions to small businesses. After completing his bachelor’s degree in Israel, Kahan became the youngest junior project manager at Biopharmax, a leading biotech and chemical engineering firm, where he was involved in daily operations, engineering and IT infrastructure designs for its global client base, which comprised projects totaling more than $25 million.

Session(s):

» Security, Compliance, Recording, and E911 – What’s the Big Deal?

OnSIP Business VOIP

Michael Oeth

CEO

Mike Oeth is the CEO of OnSIP Business VoIP and winner of the Telecommunications Executive of the Year in the 2013 American Business Awards. Mike graduated from Harvard College in 1991 with a degree in Economics and has since worked for technology companies, cofounding OnSIP in 2004. Mike is an active community member and father, balancing his roles as board member of the local YMCA, member of the father-daughter Y-group Adventure Princesses, and basketball coach for his three daughters’ basketball teams. Mike also enjoys rock climbing with his teenage son.

Session(s):

» Driving Corporate Growth Through Internal Collaboration and Engagement

Oracle

Stefan Karapetkov

Enterprise Architect

Stefan Karapetkov is driving the transformation of Oracles communication and collaboration network towards increased employee productivity and team efficiency. In his role, he continuously evaluates new technologies, and looks for opportunities to deploy them on the Oracle network, meet emerging use cases and new business requirements, and deliver superior business outcomes. Stefan interacts daily with equipment vendors and service providers through series of strategy session, workshops, briefings, and demonstrations, or as part of a formal RFI/RFP process, and has developed unique understanding of the organizational interdependencies when deploying new technologies in the enterprise.

Prior to Oracle, Stefan worked in product management, new technology development, and enterprise product definition at Siemens and Polycom; he therefore understands the vendor side of the sales engagement. He holds an MBA from Santa Clara University and an MS degree in Engineering from the University of Chemnitz (Germany).

Session(s):

Phone.com

Ari Rabban

CEO

Ari is a veteran of the IP-communications industry. He served as president and advisor for two VoIP companies that were acquired. Also as senior executive at VocalTec Communications, the VoIP industry pioneer, and a strategy manager for Lucent Technologies. Ari currently serves on the boards at the NJ Technology Council and the Institute for Entrepreneurial Leadership. He holds an MBA from Carnegie Mellon University, and a law degree and BA in Economics, both from Tel Aviv University.

Session(s):

» What's Next in Mobile UC and VoIP

» Closing the Deal: Selling Managed Services Successfully

Phone.com

Alon Cohen

EVP/CTO

Alon is an entrepreneur, inventor and is widely recognized as one of the creators of the Voice over IP industry. He joins Phone.com after founding and managing a successful series of recent business ventures, including BitWine and RemoteAbility. Alon was the co-founder of VocalTec Communications (NASDAQ:VOCL), the first company to provide Internet voice technology worldwide, which in 1996 was one of the earliest successful Internet IPOs.

Session(s):

» Open Source vs. Commercial Softswitches

phone.com

Ramesh Elaiyavalli

COO

Ramesh Elaiyavalli is the Chief Operating Officer at Phone.com. He has over 20 years of technology & leadership experience managing a variety of high-tech businesses. At Phone.com, Ramesh is in charge of managing all operational aspects of the company, and is instrumental in transforming Phone.com to scale new heights. Ramesh along with the executive leadership team have successfully implemented several new products and solutions that enabled Phone.com to emerge as the most exciting business to partner with for Cloud Based PBX and API solutions.

Rameshs key areas of focus are Session Border Controllers, Telecom Billing systems, LCR technologies, Fraud mitigation solutions, Software and Cloud Based Integrations, Mobile Applications, Data Analytics and building robust teams in System Engineering, Software Development, Customer Service, Technical Support and Product Development.

Prior to Phone.com, Ramesh was the CTO of WikiRealty - a successful real estate startup that provides unique perspectives in subjective locational intelligence. Ramesh also spent over a decade managing large distributed teams at CoreLogic, where he served as the Senior Director, Vice President responsible for successful rollout of several fraud, risk and credit based solutions.

Ramesh serves as a board member at City Heights Community Development Corporation. Ramesh has a Masters in Engineering from BITS, Pilani, India.

Session(s):

» Industry’s Experiences with Lawful Intercepts

phone.com

Joel Maloff

SVP

Session(s):

» Industry’s Experiences with Lawful Intercepts

Pica8

Yaron Ekshtein

Head of Technical Sales

Session(s):

» Agile Service Delivery in an IMS Network with NFV

» Using SDN at the Provider Network Edge

» Future of Voice - Evolution Options in the NFV Era

PKE Consulting LLC & UC Strategies.com

Phil Edholm

President and Principal

Phil Edholm is the President of PKE Consulting. PKE consults to end users and vendors in the communications and networking markets. Phil is the organizer of WebRTC World Conf & Expo, the global eco-system event for WebRTC. Phil Edholm has over 30 years experience in creating innovation and transformation in networking and communications. In his career, Phil has worked with all of the major vendors and with hundreds of large customers around the world. He is recognized as an industry expert in VoIP, networking for real-time usage, Unified Communications, and business models for technology adoption. Prior to founding PKE , he was Vice President of Technology Strategy and Innovation for Avaya. In this role, he was responsible for defining vision and strategic technology and the integration of the Nortel product portfolio into Avaya. He was responsible for portfolio architecture, standards activities, and User Experience. Prior to Avaya, he was CTO/CSO for the Nortel Enterprise business for 9 years. At Nortel, he led the development of VoIP solutions and multimedia communications as well as IP transport technology. His background includes extensive LAN and data communications experience, including 13 years with Silicon Valley start-ups.Phil is recognized as an industry leader and visionary. In 2007, he was recognized by Frost and Sullivan with a Lifetime Achievement Award for Growth, Innovation and Leadership in Telecommunications for dreating the VoIP industry. Phil is a widely sought speaker and has been in the VoiceCon/Enterprise Connect Great Debate three times. He has been recognized by the IEEE as the originator of “Edholm’s Law of Bandwidth” as published in July 2004 IEEE Spectrum magazine and as one of the “Top 100 Voices of IP Communications by Internet Telephony magazine. Phil was a member of the IEEE 802.3 standards committee, developed the first multi-protocol network interfaces, and was a founder of the Frame Relay Forum. Phil has 16 patents and holds a BSME/EE from Kettering University.

Session(s):

» Cisco vs Microsoft: Friend or Foe in Your Infrastructure

Plantronics

Debbie Hubaud

Sr. Manager – Strategic Alliances

Debbie Hubaud is the Sr. Manager, Strategic Alliances working with Microsoft Lync/Skype for Plantronics. This includes developing strong partnerships with Microsoft, the Microsoft eco-system and Voice Partners, global marketing initiatives, and a stronger integration with the 3rd party platforms. Over the last 6 years, she has gained a significant amount of insights and “best practices” around a successful voice deployments, user adoption, and change management.

Debbie has been with Plantronics for 8.5 years and has held various positions including, Southwest Territory Manager. Previous to Plantronics, she worked in various roles at USR, Diamond Multimedia, and Ingram Micro.

Session(s):

» Skype for Business Audio and Video Device Considerations

Polycom

Paul Gurman

Microsoft Solutions Architect

Session(s):

» Common Questions Answered about Skype for Business

Polycom

Emilio Rivera

Voice Solutions Architect

Session(s):

» Skype for Business and PBX Replacement for Enterprise Voice

Polycom

Jose Mateo

Consulting Engineer

Session(s):

» Telepresence Options

» Skype for Business Meetings and the Modern Workplace

» Skype for Business Audio and Video Device Considerations

» Polycom Presentation in the Skype for Business Pavilion

Polycom

Laura Marx

Sr. Director, Alliances Marketing

Session(s):

» Polycom Presentation in the Skype for Business Pavilion

Powernet

Brent Baker

Network Services Manager

During his 8 years at Powernet, Brent has driven the expansion of Powernets VoIP offerings from purely minutes based to a full suite of business VoIP offerings. As Manager of Network Services, Brent is responsible for overseeing Powernet’s Voice engineering, Wi-Fi and Network operations teams. Brent delivers cutting-edge communication solutions quickly and efficiently to businesses as well as designs solutions for agents. Since starting at Powernet, he has been a vocal proponent of the growth potential available with hosted business services and smart Wi-Fi solutions. Brent frequently contributes as an industry speaker and author of blog posts on a variety of industry topics.

Session(s):

» Increasing Profits as a VoIP Provider

Redbooth

Charles Studt

VP, Marketing

Session(s):

» Driving Corporate Growth Through Internal Collaboration and Engagement

ReInvent Telecom

Ray Napoletano

Director of Sales and Service

Ray Napoletano is the Director of Sales and Service for ReInvent Telecom, a wholly owned division of Saddleback Communications. He manages sales, service and product development for ReInvent’s Wholesale Cloud Based Hosted UC services business. He has held that role for more than 6 years since early 2009. Prior to that he was Vice President of Sales for Integra Telecom – Arizona, and Vice President of Sales and Marketing for Mountain Telecommunications Inc., an Arizona based CLEC. Mr. Napoletano has over 30 years of experience in the Telecommunications industry.

Session(s):

» Right-sizing Your Cloud UC for Any Business

ServiceNow

Tim Pietro

Business Transformation & Financial Management Evangelist

Highly experienced IT Executive with over 16 years of intensive experience in a diverse, fast-paced environment. Proven ability to turn around under-performing functional groups to create highly organized operational excellence through focused processes such as demand management, project management, resource management, financial management and end-to-end portfolio management. Spent fifteen years at Cisco Systems with the last couple of years helping Cisco transform into a services organization. Prior to joining ServiceNow, Tim worked with our current Federal CIO, Tony Scott helping VMware IT create their initial IT Service Catalog leveraging Informatica’s Enterprise Architecture BOST Framework. Published author.

Session(s):

» Running IT as a Business enabled by Service Costing

SimpleWan

Erik Knight

Founder and CEO

Erik Knight is the Founder and CEO of SimpleWan. He is a foremost expert in the field of cyber security having over 20 years of experience in securing businesses from cyber hacks and identity theft. Due to his leadership, SimpleWan is now recognized globally, as an affordable defense system for businesses so that IT specialists can track real-time statistics, network health such as temperature, traffic, latency, link connectivity and more, on all of their devices from the dashboard and respond to threats immediately.

Prior to SimpleWan, Knight started COMVOICE, an early to market hosted VoIP company, and also an IT company; both successfully sold and rolled up by other companies. Knight also founded DirtSearch.org, which is a free background search site. Knight currently has a series of patent pending; all involving development and inventing new technologies. His specializations and experience include: Oracle DB; MYSQL/PHP; Cisco CCNA; Microsoft; Windows/Servers; and FreeBSD/Centos/Linux/Solaris. With programing experience in over eight computer languages, Knight’s technologies and security experience has been reviewed by and used by fortune 500 companies and government organizations.

He is a strong believer in investing back into the community. His philanthropy includes: Operation Home Front, St Joseph Hospital, Toys for Tots, Christmas Angel Program, ChildHelp USA, Make a Wish Foundation, Team Lizzy Bell, The Cade Purdue Foundation, CRS (Children’s Rehabilitation Services), and many more.

Knight has been quoted as an industry expert and is a regular on NewsMax’s The Daily Wrap, Enterprise Tech, WSJ Radio, Government Technology, Chase News & Stories, American Express, among several other top tier publications. You can find his commentary and latest thoughts and opinions on the cyber security industry here: https://sites.google.com/a/simplewan.com/news/

Session(s):

» Protect Your Business from the Next Cyber Attack in 2015

Sonus Networks

Brad Chapin

Director Strategic Alliances

Brad has more than 15 years of experience in telecommunications and brings a unique combination of skills to Sonus based a broad set of experiences over his career including; product management, product and technical marketing, sales engineering, consulting and business development. Prior to coming to Sonus, Brad was a Director of Sales Engineering at Unify and he now serves as Director of Strategic Alliances working to define alliance management strategy and ensure successful go-to-market activities across a cross functional team to drive proactive collaboration with key partners. Brad has a Bachelor of Science from UCLA.

Session(s):

» Common Questions Answered about Skype for Business

» Protecting Carrier Revenue Loss Due to IP PBX Fraud

Sonus Networks

Umar Kabir

Director Product Management

Session(s):

» Deployment Considerations - Cloud, On-premises or Hybrid

» Managing a Skype for Business solution end to end.

Stein Technology Consulting

David Stein

Principal

Mr. Stein, a principal with Stein Consulting Group, has more than 30 years of consulting, information systems and telecommunications experience, with a primary emphasis on IP communications and technology infrastructure projects. He is a designated UC Expert as a member of UC Strategies.

His expertise includes the entire technology lifecycle including needs assessment, process evaluation, operations impact, systems design, procurement and implementation project management for IP Telephony/Unified Communications, wireless, data center, cabling, facilities, LAN, WAN, network management, data security systems, telecommunications, technology relocation and construction projects. He is an excellent communicator and is skilled in dealing with management, facilities and technical personnel within IT and user communities. Mr. Stein has provided consulting services for assessing the effectiveness of IT organizations and developing governance models.

Mr. Stein’s expertise includes technology planning and business case development for many significant technology infrastructure projects for both public and private sector clients. Previous engagements have included consulting for professional services firms (i.e. legal, financial), state and local governments, education (university and K-12), high tech, healthcare and entertainment. He is very effective in working with all levels of an organization.

Mr. Stein is a member of the SCTC. He holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Computer Science from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and has completed the ‘Leadership and Management for Technology Professionals’ program at University of California, Irvine. He speaks regularly at Enterprise Connect and other conferences on a variety of topics and is a frequent contributor to nojitter.com and UC Strategies.

Mr. Stein can be reached at dave@steintechconsult.com.

Session(s):

» What We Can Learn From the Largest VoIP Rollout In History

Switch Communications

Vincent Paquet

Vice President Product Management

Vincent Paquet is Vice President Product Management at Switch Communications, the cloud business phone system designed for the way you work.

Prior to this, Vincent was Group Product Manager for Google Voice, which he helped launch. He joined Google with the acquisition of GrandCentral, acquired by Google in 2007.

Vincent was co-founder and COO of GrandCentral. Prior to co-founding GrandCentral, Vincent was Director of Business Development at Yahoo! in the voice communications group. He joined Yahoo! when it acquired Dialpad Communications, one of the world’s largest VoIP providers. At Dialpad, Vincent was VP of Business Development and Marketing, where he oversaw all revenue-generating activities. He helped lead the reorganization and turn-around of the company, until its successful acquisition by Yahoo! in 2005.

Prior to Dialpad, Vincent was a Vice President at Los Angeles-based IFA, the French foreign investment agency. Prior to joining IFA, Vincent built and managed a European distribution network for France-based Microspire, a telecom component manufacturer.

Vincent received his bachelor’s degree from Middlesex Business School in the UK, and graduated from the Reims Management School in France.

Session(s):

SwitchRay

Colin Ayer

CTO

Dr. Ayer serves as SwitchRay’s CTO and VP of Engineering & Product Management and is responsible for driving product development innovation and efficiency in pursuit of the company’s overall vision and strategy. Colin oversees the strategic development, R&D, test and deployment of our Class 4 and Class 5 VoIP Softswitch and related products. With his successful track record of product delivery, Colin brings more than 25 years of development and leadership experience in systems and software engineering and product development in the related fields of speech recognition, cordless telephony, Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, VoIP and LBS/Navigation.

In his prior role as a Senior Engineering Director at TeleCommunication Systems, he was responsible for systems engineering and mobile application delivery on iOS, Android and Windows Phone 8 platforms of an off-board navigation and LBS solution for GPS-enabled mobile phones. Prior to TCS, Colin was an Engineering Director in the semiconductor industry at Conexant Systems developing systems and software solutions for VoIP, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth and spread-spectrum Cordless Telephony. These roles involved technical and program management across multiple sites and countries using both traditional and agile development approaches.

Colin is a Chartered Engineer (MIET) and received his Doctor of Philosophy degree in Speech Recognition from Imperial College, London and his Bachelor of Science degree in Electrical & Electronic Engineering from The University of Newcastle upon Tyne.

Session(s):

» Protecting Carrier Revenue Loss Due to IP PBX Fraud

Taqua

Frederick Reynolds

VP, Reynolds

Frederick Reynolds is responsible for Taqua’s corporate communications and marketing activities. He joined Taqua in 2002 from Genband, where he was VP of Marketing and a part of the original management team that started the company in 1999. Before joining Genband, Frederick was the Vice President and Director of Ketchum Public Relations’ Southern California Technology Practice, where he led a group of marketing and public relations counselors. Frederick has over 25 years of technology marketing experience, including leading the pre-and post-IPO marketing, investor relations, and corporate communications. Frederick holds a Bachelor’s degree in business administration and marketing from the University of North Texas.

Session(s):

» Effective Delivery of Next-Generation Services and Apps with SDN and NFV

TelNG LLC

David Knell

CEO

David is the founder and CEO of TelNG, a decade-old business established to develop next generation telecoms products. TelNG developed Contrex, a converged IP Centrex platform built around SER and Asterisk, which was sold to a listed UK company in 2007. Later developments include a softswitch and high-density IVR platform built on top of FreeSWITCH, and FaxJack, a fax-over-IP solution using Linux-based CPE with FreeSWITCH at the server end.

Prior to founding TelNG, he developed Dialogic and Aculab-based IVRs, which were installed on six continents, and founded a UK telecoms carrier, which he sold at the end of 2006. He holds a degree in Computer Science from Cambridge University. His other interests include alternative energy and, most recently, virtual reality.

Session(s):

» Asterisk: The Multiplier Effect!

Teridion

Elad Rave

Founder and CEO

Elad Rave, a proven industry visionary, architect, and R&D manager with extensive experience in the technology sector, is CEO and co-founder of Teridion. He specializes in video related applications and is experienced in leading enterprise-wide scalable N-tier architectures and Web applications. Rave is recognized as an architectural expert and for multiplatform integration design and implementation. His established leadership qualities and teaming skills have lead to Teridion’s early successes.

Session(s):

TransNexus

Jim Dalton

CEO

Jim Dalton began his telecom career at BellSouth in 1988 in roles that included financial analysis and market planning for their GSM wireless and mobile data businesses. Recognizing the promise of Voice over IP, Jim founded TransNexus in 1997 to develop software solutions for VoIP carriers. Over the following years, TransNexus has developed applications for Least Cost Routing, billing support, quality of service monitoring, analytics, and prevention of telecom fraud and unwanted robocalls. During this time, TransNexus has obtained 27 patents for various software innovations. Recent innovations include the development of software that uses the SHAKEN/STIR framework to authenticate, sign and validate caller ID information for prevention of unwanted robocalls, which often use caller ID spoofing to lure subscribers into answering robocalls.

Session(s):

» Protecting Carrier Revenue Loss Due to IP PBX Fraud

TriCore Solutions

Mark O'Connor

General Manager

As General Manager – East Sales, Mark O’Connor is responsible for Sales and Account Management, covering the eastern US and Canada. This includes managing a team of Regional Sales Directors and Account Managers who are responsible for closing millions of dollars in annual revenue, overall management of the entire East Coast sales operations, and ensuring TriCore meets set sales targets within the enterprise customer and prospect base.

Mark has deep knowledge of complex application, hosting, security, infrastructure and network solutions as well as the IT sales life cycle. He has 20+ years of experience delivering solutions to organizations that help to transform their IT environments leading to increased ROI. Prior to joining TriCore in August, 2015 he spent seven years with NaviSite in Andover, MA as General Manager – Northeast Sales. Prior to NaviSite, he held sales leadership roles at AT&T in Boston and Mirror Image Internet in San Francisco. Leading up to his time in California, Mark worked in Cambridge, MA for BBN Planet providing intricate application hosting, security and network solutions to end customers.

Session(s):

» Choosing the Right Vendors for Your Managed Services Offering

Unify

Frank Fender

UC Product Management, Director

Frank Fender is a Unified Communications Product Manager and Architect at Unify. Frank has been specifically focused on UC deliverables since 2003. In those days the technology was known as Real-Time Collaboration (RTC). He was instrumental in assisting Siemens with first-to-market delivery of a SOA-based rich telephony presence aggregation system with their award-winning OpenScape UC system.

Frank has an MBA, a BS in Computer Science, and 20 years of voice, data, and development experience as a Unified Communications Architect, Integrated Communications Consultant, Client/Server and Web Services Software Developer. Frank has worked in various capacities as Manager, Director, Board Member, CFO, and Chairman of a number of companies that he has founded, co-founded, managed or developed. He has design, analysis, development and project management experience in telecommunications, convergence and data processing systems in the private and public sectors including detailed software design, and structured development methodologies. His UC knowledge has been applied to the design and development of call routing servers, voicemail systems, and complex call centers utilizing CTI, UC, IVRs, and telephony systems in the US, England, Germany, and New Zealand, at Fortune 500 companies including Siemens, IBM, Intel, Lockheed Martin, Sears, Shimano, SBC, Office Depot, Dow Corning, LightBridge and DoubleClick.

Session(s):

» Unified Communications to Support "Conferencing in Motion"

Vertical Communications

Bobby Mohanty

Senior Vice President and General Manager, Products

Bobby Mohanty oversees Verticals product strategy, development activities and engineering operations. Bobby recently returned to Vertical after a two year stint as Avayas senior director of product management for its unified communications applications solutions.

Prior to Avaya, he served as Verticals vice president of product management and engineering. During his seven year tenure at Vertical, he was instrumental in designing and delivering many of the companys leading edge solutions, including its flagship Wave IP Communications Platform; the companys award-winning ViewPoint unified communications application; as well as its vast portfolio of innovative contact center, market-specific solutions and mobility tools.

Session(s):

» What's Next in Mobile UC and VoIP

Vertical Communications

Peter Bailey

President & Chief Executive Officer

As a co-founder of Vertical Communications in 2004 (along with Mr. Tauscher), Peter Bailey has led a talented team to the Companys current incarnation as a market and thought leader in the enterprise communications technology sector. With over 20 years of experience in technology, operations, finance and executive management, Peter is responsible for Verticals overall strategic direction, and is intimately involved in its day-to-day operations. Prior to his current role as President and CEO, he served as President and COO with responsibility for the Companys sales, marketing and operations organizations. In 2011, Peter was appointed CEO and joined the Board of Directors for Vertical. Since that time he has led the company through a period of significant growth and market share expansion. He credits Verticals talented, dedicated and extremely stubborn staff for all the Companys ongoing success, noting, Business is the ultimate team sport, and we have a fantastic team. Peter started his career with Salomon Brothers, Inc. in New York, and holds a B.A. from Princeton University.

Session(s):

» Keynote Luncheon featuring Vertical Communications

Vitelity

Chris Brown

Session(s):

» Mastering the Omni-Channel Customer Experience

Voice4Net

Rick McFarland

President and CEO

Rick McFarland is president and chief executive officer of Dallas-based Voice4Net, a leading provider of customer interaction and voice communications solutions for businesses. Rick is responsible for the strategic direction, growth and overall success of the company. Prior to founding Voice4Net in 1996, he helped to pioneer one of the first IVR banking application solutions in the market. As an entrepreneur, Rick applied his extensive background in telecommunications and software development to form several enterprise-focused businesses. He also sold one of these businesses to a large public company where he served as chief information officer.

Session(s):

» Protecting Carrier Revenue Loss Due to IP PBX Fraud

VoIP Logic

Micah Singer

CEO

Session(s):

VoltDelta

Craig DiAngelo

Vice President of Technical Sales

Craig DiAngelo has been providing product, service and sales leadership at VoltDelta for over 15 years. As Vice President within the cloud contact center solutions business unit, he is responsible for customer solutions engineering, training and is a product liaison for the Americas. Craig also manages a team of sales engineers dedicated to identifying customer requirements for improving telephony-based customer care while reducing costs. Prior to VoltDelta, Craig directed data center services for Maintech. Craig holds a BS degree in Political Science from the University of San Diego. He is certified by the Project Management Institute and holds Cisco network certifications.

Session(s):

» Pitfalls to Avoid when Choosing and Deploying a Mobility Solution

Vonage Business

Skylar Stewart

Vice President

Skyler Stewart joined Vonage in 2014 as a part the Company’s acquisition of Telesphere. As the Vice President of Channel Partner Sales, he oversees Indirect Channel Sales for the Mountain Region of the United States, which includes AZ, WY, TX, NE, ND, SD and ID.

Skyler has been instrumental in the expansion of the Indirect Channel into new markets for Vonage Business, while skillfully maintaining outstanding customer service to existing channel partners and customers. He utilizes strong analytical and planning skills in leading the efforts of his team to achieve the Company’s goals, focusing on managing relationships with National Master Agents, VARs, Inter-connects, Telecom consultants and others. Skyler’s responsibilities include mentoring Indirect Channel Managers, developing processes and quarterly promotions, and recruiting and training new partners.

Prior to Vonage, Sklyer joined Telesphere in 2008 as an Indirect Channel manager, and was quickly promoted to Senior Indirect Channel Manager and was Vice President, Channel Partner Sales, at the time Telesphere was acquired by Vonage With more than 11 years of experience in both wireline and wireless business communications solutions, Skyler has an extensive and proven track record in sales and relationship management from notable telecom companies including Eschelon Telecom/Integra Telecom and Mountain Telecom Inc. (MTI).

Skyler specializes in customizing solutions for large enterprise customers seeking a superior communication solution, ranging from UCaaS, Private MPLS & WAN Management, Hosted VOIP, Mobility and Managed Services to SIP, Ethernet and Data Center services. He has been the recipient of numerous sales and performance awards throughout his career.

While away from the office, Skyler enjoys spending time with his wife and two boys while seeking ways to fulfill his need for speed. Before starting his career in cloud communications, Skyler raced motocross professionally around the globe.

Session(s):

Voxvalley

Mike Storella

Director USA Sales

With more than 30 years of experience in the global technology sector, Mike Storella has used his expertise in business development, channel operations, customer service, and strategic planning to assist a number of companies introduce and grow their product presence in North America.

As the Director of Sales for Voxvalley, Storella is building and expanding the existing sales and support channels for Voxvalley’s family of VoIP telephony solutions and Mobile Voice Applications in the United States, Canada, and Mexico. Storella has held executive posts at RNK Telecom, Pingtel Corporation, Priority Call Management, IBM/Rolm Corp., Lightstream Corp, and Cisco Systems. His duties have ranged from C-level P & L management and rapid market development, strategic business development, customer care and systems installation to OEM support, quality metrics, training and tactical Sales planning.

Session(s):

» Increasing Profits as a VoIP Provider

XO Communications

Chris Ancell

CEO

Chris Ancell is chief executive officer for XO. In this role, he has responsibility for the companys operations, strategy and transformation into a nationwide provider of advanced IP communications, intelligent networking and cloud computing services with a superior customer experience for business, large enterprise and wholesale customers.

Ancell joins XO Communications after a career encompassing nearly 30 years of operational and sales leadership in the communications and technology services industries. Most recently, he served as senior vice president of sales and sales engineering for CoreSite Realty Corporation. Prior to CoreSite, Ancell spent 12 years in a variety of leadership roles at both CenturyLink and Qwest, including president of CenturyLinks business markets organization and executive vice president of Qwests business markets organization.

Ancell has also held management positions at PricewaterhouseCoopers and with Oracles Telecommunications Consulting Practice. He earned his Bachelor of Science degree in economics from the University of Denver.

Session(s):

» Keynote Presentation by XO Communications
The Meaning of Network Virtualization

XO Communications

Matt Bateman

Sr. Network Architect

Matt Bateman is a Senior Network Architect at XO Communications. With a Masters in Electrical Engineering from Stanford and more than 25 years of experience in IT, Engineering, and Networking, Matt is uniquely positioned to lead cross-functional teams to develop road maps for new technologies.In his current role, Matt is the team lead for technical architecture in the areas of NFV, SDN and Cloud. As an early champion for this new technology, Matt has used his diverse background to reach across traditional organizational boundaries to foster the cooperation and knowledge sharing that will be critical in the coming convergence of IT and Networking.

Session(s):

» Become a Highly Profitable Hosted VoIP Provider

Xpedeus

Dan Williams

CEO

Daniel has a 27 year career of being a technology and process change evangelist. Starting at General Motors on the advanced IT staff in 1988, Daniel learned that true productivity gains from technology use comes through the refinement of business processes that use the technology. In 2001, Daniel founded Xpedeus Inc., a Microsoft Certified IT consulting firm. In late 2004 Xpedeus started developing and implementing a VoIP strategy to market to its IT consulting clients. From 2005 until 2010, Business VoIP was a sideline to provide a bit of additional recurring revenue. In 2010 Xpedeus transitioned from an IT firm that provides VoIP to a VoIP provider that does IT. Over the past 10 years Daniel has had experience with various business models for offering VoIP services to customers. These business models include:

•Partnering with existing VoIP providers such as Packet 8 or Speakeasy
•Sales and installation of local VoIP equipment such as Microsoft ResponsePoint and Cisco UC Series PBX
•Sales and connection of SIP Trunks through a trunking partner
•Sales of hosted PBX solutions + PSTN connectivity through a hosting platform partner such as pbx-change.com
•Development of a complete Hosted VoIP provider infrastructure using open source software

In 2015 Xpedeus and 4 other companies founded the RTC Alliance. An alliance devoted to helping IT Firms and local/regional phone system companies transition into the hosted VoIP space to become full ITTSP’s.

Session(s):

Yorktel

Vishal Brown

Vice President, professional services

With nearly 20 years of experience helping large enterprises adopt next-generation unified communication and collaboration (UC&C) solutions, Vishal Brown is charged with leading Yorktel’s Professional Services Division, the company’s strategic consulting practice that provides expertise, thought leadership, strategy, and tactical guidance on video communications to its Federal, Public Sector & Fortune 500 clientele. He joined Yorktel in September of 2011 as the Vice President of Professional Services, where he is responsible for delivering high-level advisory services that guide businesses and government agencies develop, implement and managed effective video communications. Prior to joining Yorktel, Vishal directed a team within McKinsey & Company from April 2008 – October 2011 that developed global UC strategy for its clients, consultants and corporate executives. Under his governance as McKinsey’s lead developer for unified communications, VoIP and HDVC integration, Vishal’s team excelled at taking innovations from concept to implementation. From May 2006 – April 2008, as Senior Audio and Video Engineer for IAC/InterActiveCorp, Vishal created industry-leading interactive business solutions and steered evaluation and implementation of conference room management applications for more than 20 rooms and meeting spaces within the company. Vishal is recognized worldwide as an expert in utilizing advanced technologies, including enterprise UC, voice and video telephony, corporate AV and consumer video, which improve the way people communicate, collaborate, and connect. As a highly sough after thought leader, Vishal has accepted number speaking invitations to present executive industry forums, such as the WebRTC EXPO, ITEXPO, and Frost & Sullivan. In addition, Vishal has published several whitepapers and extensive articles examining best practices and advancements in video communications, which have appeared in Wired, No Jitter, Homeland Security Today, IMCCA, Smart Business and other leadership journals.

Session(s):

» Telepresence Options

» How to Make Your UC Investment Pay Off

Zcorum

Scott Helms

CTO

Scott Helms has been with ZCorum for more than eighteen years and currently serves as ZCorum’s Vice President of Technology. Scott leads the engineering and development teams in managing ZCorum’s Affiliate networks and developing software applications.

Scott Helms is a quoted, sought-after leader on the needs of broadband providers. At ZCorum he’s guided the development of such products as TruVizion, the diagnostics software for cable, DSL and Fiber operators, a DOCSIS PNM tool, Pre-Equalization Analyzer, and many others.

Scott’s an active member in the Society of Cable Telecommunications Engineers (SCTE) and CableLabs InGeNeOs group which develops DOCSIS standards for Proactive Network Maintenance (PNM) tools. Scott believes in freely sharing his knowledge with others. As he’s says, “Many engineers seem to fear sharing “their” part of the operation but I was taught early on that if you don’t teach people how to do what you do, then you won’t progress.”

Prior to joining ZCorum, Scott was a technology consultant to small- and medium-sized businesses in a range of industries, including the medical and automotive fields. He specialized in network design, billing system implementation, integration projects, data conversion, and auditing of existing networks. He also managed multi-channel communications equipment in the Signal Corp and served as an officer in Field Artillery for the United States Army.

Session(s):

» Future of Voice - Evolution Options in the NFV Era

Moderator List

Doug Mohney (Moderator)

Cidera Analytics

Editor-in-Chief

A principal at Cidera Analytics, Doug has been working and writing about IT and satellite industries for over 20 years. His real world experience including stints at two start-ups, a commercial internet service provider that went public in 1997 for $150 million and a satellite internet broadband company.

Session(s):

» Scaling SDN & NFV

» Right-sizing Your Cloud UC for Any Business

Ronald Gruia (Moderator)

Frost & Sullivan

Principal Analyst

Ronald is the principal analyst and program leader in emerging telecoms at Frost & Sullivan, covering topics such as NGN, 4G/LTE migration, VoIP, Telco 2.0, video conferencing, SDN and value-added services. He has spoken at conferences such as Mobile World Congress, SUPERCOMM, VON, CTIA, Futurecom, and the VMA, among others. Ronald also is a columnist for TheStreet.com, has made TV appearances on BNN and CNBC, and is often quoted in the news media. He is an MIT graduate in Electrical Engineering, has over 16 years of experience in the telecom industry, and earned a U.S. patent while working at Nortel Networks.

Session(s):

» Agile Service Delivery in an IMS Network with NFV

Frank Stinson (Moderator)

IntelliCom Analytics

Partner

Frank Stinson is a Partner and Senior Analyst with IntelliCom Analytics and leads the firms IntelliCom Market Dashboard and Market Performance Dashboard programs. In this role, Stinson provides clients with strategic analysis of Business Communications provider market positioning, business model, technology approach, applications enablement, and market performance.

Mr. Stinsons research and analysis focuses particularly on technology and business model transformation and its impact on both individual provider positioning and broader industry evolution. Key areas of emphasis within that include software transformation of communication architectures, cloud-based and hybrid delivery alternatives, and the impact of disruptive end user technologies and applications.

Prior to joining IntelliCom Analytics, Mr. Stinson was a Vice President at InfoTech Consulting where he was instrumental in the development and growth of the InfoTrack brand of market intelligence services.Mr. Stinson earned his Bachelor’s degree in Economics from Rutgers College, and an MBA in Marketing from the Rutgers Graduate School of Management.

Session(s):

» Deployment Considerations - Cloud, On-premises or Hybrid

» Common Questions Answered about Skype for Business

Mark Ricca (Moderator)

IntelliCom Analytics

Partner

Mark Ricca is a founding Partner of IntelliCom Analytics, a boutique Market Research and Professional Services firm established in August 2005. IntelliCom Analytics is focused on assisting suppliers in the Information Technology (IT) industry, and end users seeking cost-effective IT solutions. The Firm provides a range of consulting services to end user clients in the enterprise and mid-market segments, IT equipment manufacturers / software application developers, wireline / wireless network service providers, and distribution channels.

Session(s):

» Pitfalls to Avoid when Choosing and Deploying a Mobility Solution

» Future of Voice - Evolution Options in the NFV Era

Angela Leavitt (Moderator)

Mojo Marketing

Chief Mojo-Making Officer

Angela Leavitt is the founder of Mojo Marketing, a full-service marketing agency that has served more than 150 tech companies. With 15 years of experience in sales and marketing, Leavitt creates targeted and effective marketing strategies for companies of all sizes in telecom, IT, and cloud. She has been a regular presenter at ITExpo, COMPTEL, Channel Partners, and Cloud Partners conferences, as well as numerous corporate meetings and events. She is a champion for small business, and a consistent supporter of women in business and technology through organizing and participating in Women in the Channel industry events. Leavitt was a top three finalist for the Tempe Chamber’s Business Woman of the Year Award in 2009, and was named to the San Diego Business Journals Most Admired CEO list in 2016 and 2017.

Session(s):

» The Modern Meeting: Collaboration Trends and How to Keep Up

Phil Edholm (Moderator)

PKE Consulting LLC & UC Strategies.com

President and Principal

Phil Edholm is the President and Principal of PKE Consulting. PKE consults to end users and vendors in the communications and networking markets. PKE works with our clients to deliver the value of the integration of information and interaction. Whether with Unified Communications or integration of communications and business processes, PKE has the experience and knowledge to transform your organization. Phil is also the organizer of WebRTC World Expo and Conference, the global eco-system event for WebRTC, the next major transformation in technology.Phil Edholm has over 30 years experience in creating innovation and transformation in networking and communications. Prior to founding PKE , he was Vice President of Technology Strategy and Innovation for Avaya. In this role, he was responsible for defining vision and strategic technology and the integration of the Nortel product portfolio into Avaya. He was responsible for portfolio architecture, standards activities, and User Experience. Prior to Avaya, he was CTO/CSO for the Nortel Enterprise business for 9 years. At Nortel, he led the development of VoIP solutions and multimedia communications as well as IP transport technology. His background includes extensive LAN and data communications experience, including 13 years with Silicon Valley start-ups.Phil is recognized as an industry leader and visionary. In 2007, he was recognized by Frost and Sullivan with a Lifetime Achievement Award for Growth, Innovation and Leadership in Telecommunications. Phil is a widely sought speaker and has been in the VoiceCon/Enterprise Connect Great Debate three times. He has been recognized by the IEEE as the originator of “Edholm’s Law of Bandwidth” as published in July 2004 IEEE Spectrum magazine and as one of the “Top 100 Voices of IP Communications by Internet Telephony magazine. Phil was a member of the IEEE 802.3 standards committee, developed the first multi-protocol network interfaces, and was a founder of the Frame Relay Forum. Phil has 16 patents and holds a BSME/EE from Kettering University.

Session(s):

» Telepresence Options

» How to Make Your UC Investment Pay Off

Peter Radizeski (Moderator)

RAD-INFO, Inc.

President

Peter Radizeski is an accomplished blogger, author, agent and consultant in the telecom industry. He has helped many telecommunications companies with sales training, marketing, channel development and business strategy. He is a trusted source of knowledge about the telecom sector.

Session(s):

» Open Source vs. Commercial Softswitches

» Increasing Profits as a VoIP Provider

Erik Linask (Moderator)

TMC

Group Editorial Director

Erik Linask is Group Editorial Director of TMC. During his tenure at TMC, he has supported the production and development of TMCs print publications and, most recently, managed the day-to-day operations of the industry’s leading Web site, TMCnet, which currently serves more than 1 million unique monthly visitors. Currently, he oversees TMC’s four print publications as well as TMCnet, and covers a wide range of topics in the IP Communications and Information Technology arenas, including his blog, Convergence Corner, on TMCnet. Erik also develops to conference programming for ITEXPO, and TMCs other communications and technology events, including Software Telco Congress. Prior to joining TMC, Erik was Managing Editor at Global Custodian, an international securities services publication, where he also managed the magazine’s survey research. Erik began his professional career at management consulting firm Leadership Research Institute.

Session(s):

» Unified Communications to Support "Conferencing in Motion"

Paula Bernier (Moderator)

TMC

Executive Editor

Paula Bernier is Executive Editor at TMC where she writes, edits and manages editorial content for INTERNET TELEPHONY, CUSTOMER, Cloud Computing, and IoT Evolution magazine. Shes also a regular contributor to Content Boost, and TMCnet and its various channels and communities. And she speaks and moderates TMC webinars. Bernier was formerly editor in chief of xchange magazine, where she worked for more than 11 years. She’s also acted as a senior writer for Inter@ctive Week. Bernier got her start in telecom at Telephony magazine, where she spent nearly five years, leaving as the news director. Bernier also has been on the reporting staffs of various mainstream daily and weekly newspapers in Iowa, Minnesota and South Carolina.

Session(s):

» Effective Delivery of Next-Generation Services and Apps with SDN and NFV