The Structure 08 Program Planning Committee is responsible for the topic area and speaker selection the conference. Their input ensures the best conference content is selected. We are pleased to present our distinguished group of industry thought leaders who will shape Structure 08.

Vice President of Strategic Solutions
AT&T

Joe Weinman leads Strategic Solution Sales for AT&T globally. A veteran of AT&T, the world’s largest telecommunications company, he has held a variety of positions including research and development at AT&T Bell Laboratories, marketing, sales, product management, engineering and operations, and corporate strategy and business development. He has a Bachelor of Science and Master of Science in Computer Science from Cornell University and the University of Wisconsin respectively, has completed Executive Education at the Institute for Management Development in Switzerland, and has been awarded 11 patents in the U.S. and internationally.

Partner
Mohr Davidow Ventures

Rohit Sharma joined MDV’s investment team in 2006 and focuses on companies utilizing cross disciplinary innovations and application of computing, storage, and networking technologies. In addition to the growing market for traditional IT systems and applications, Rohit is exploring new opportunities arising from application of productivity driving information technology to new markets including high-tech biology and life-sciences.

Rohit has been a successful entrepreneur in the MDV ecosystem, creating the technology that led to the founding of ONI Systems in 1998. He served as ONI Systems EVP and CTO overseeing all aspects of technology development and strategy at the time of its IPO. He then served as SVP & CTO of Metro Networking after ONI’s merger with Ciena in 2002. Previously, Rohit was with Telecom Research Labs in Canada. He holds seven US patents in the areas of computing, signal processing, and optical networking.

Senior Researcher
Institute for the Future

Mike Liebhold is a Senior Researcher focusing on the mobile and abundant computation, immersive media and geospatial web foundations for context-aware and ubiquitous computing. Previously, Mike was a Visiting Researcher, Intel Labs, working on a pattern language based on semantic web frameworks for ubiquitous computing. Before that, during the late 1990s Mike worked on startups building large scale international public IT services and IP networks for rural and remote regions, and for GPS enhanced precision agriculture, a complete IT architecture for schools in Shandong Province China, satellite networks in India, Europe, and Latin America, and was the Principal Investigator for a National Science Foundation project to bring Internet2 broadband IP networks to seventy rural low income communities in the United States.

In the 1990s, Mike was a senior consulting architect at Netscape Communications and a founding member of Netscape’s Strategic Investors board. Previously, Mike was Vice President, Chief Technology Officer for Times Mirror Publishing. For ten years prior, he was Senior Scientist for Apple Computer researching and developing media technologies, geospatial information systems, and high-speed communications. Mike served as principal technology policy adviser for Apple Chairman John Sculley and drafted core recommendations on the National Information Infrastructure which were later incorporated directly in the Clinton-Gore Technology Initiative.

Mike is the frequent speaker on the topic of the geospatial web and has authored several papers, including one published in a special edition of the IEEE Journal on Pervasive Computing, “Data Management in the World-Wide Sensor Web.”

Director of the Interdisciplinary Digital Tec University of Minnesota

Andrew Odlyzko is Director of the Interdisciplinary Digital Technology Center and Interim Director of the Minnesota Supercomputing Institute, both at the University of Minnesota. Prior to moving to Minnesota in 2001, he devoted 26 years to research and research management at Bell Labs and AT&T Labs. He has written over 150 technical papers and has three patents. He has managed projects in diverse areas, such as security, formal verification methods, parallel and distributed computation, and auction technology. In recent years he has also been working on electronic publishing, electronic commerce, and economics of data networks. He may be best known for his early debunking of the myth of Internet doubling every 100 days, and for the thesis that connectivity and not content is king. All his recent papers as well as further information can be found on his home page.

He holds PhD and MSc degrees in Electrical Engineering from University of Alberta, Edmonton, Canada, and a BSc degree in Electronics & Communications Engineering from NIT Kurukshetra, India.

Partner
Panarama Capital

Mr. Leinwand focuses on technology investments and joined the firm in 2004. From 2001 to 2004, he was President and Co-founder of Proficient Networks, Inc. From 2000 to 2001, he was Chief Technology Officer and Vice President of Engineering at Telegis Networks, Inc. In 1997 Mr. Leinwand joined Digital Island, Inc. (NASDAQ: ISLD) at inception and served as their Vice President of Engineering and Chief Technology Officer through the company’s IPO and secondary offering. From 1990 to 1997, Mr. Leinwand served as Manager of Consulting Engineering and Senior Software Engineer at Cisco Systems, Inc. helping to build and engineer service provider and enterprise networks worldwide. He co-authored “Cisco Router Configuration” and “Network Management: A Practical Perspective” and has been granted a patent in the field of data routing. He currently is an Adjunct Professor at the University of California, Berkeley where he teaches the subjects of computer networks, network management, and network design. Mr. Leinwand holds a B.S. in Computer Science from the University of Colorado at Boulder. He presently serves on the board of directors of GridNetworks and Vyatta, Inc. He is also a board observer to Belair Networks, Cedar Point Communications and Sylantro Systems.

Editor
DSLPrime