Wireless Sensor Network - Technology, Applications and Business

Wireless sensor network is an emerging technology that is formed by small nodes - tiny, self-contained, battery-powered computers with radio links that can be self-organize into a network, communicate with each other and exchange data. Some refer this as Smart Dust, others simply called it wireless mesh network.

Regardless the name used, wireless sensor networks represent a new shift of computing model from the traditional interactive to a more proactive, communication-centric computational paradigm. The advent of new technologies in micro-sensors, wireless networking, and embedded processing, ad-hoc networks of sensors are becoming increasingly available for commercial and military applications. Remote distributive monitoring, environmental monitoring for natural phenomena, home automation, volcano exploration, logistics, and a range of medical applications, including patient monitoring, emergency care, and disaster responses, etc. are just some of the applications that can be enhanced using wireless sensor network.

This seminar will present concepts, technology, implementations, applications and marketing outlook of sensor network systems to explore this new industry. Please join us on this SVCWireless seminar to learn about current and emerging wireless sensor network industry, and the challenges on issues such as design, implementation, security, network integration etc.

Moderator:

Amy Wang, Ph.D.
VP of Technology
Mela Networks
Dr. Amy Wang has over 10 years of experience in wireless and computer networking technologies and over 7 years of industry experience in wireless LAN, mobile computing, security and biometrics, and real-time location technologies. She collaborated with engineers and researchers from industry and academia to develop products and solutions for Department of Defense and Department of Homeland Security.

Amy is a frequent presenter and guest lecturer at universities and technical conferences. She has over 12 technical publications in the open literature such as IEEE, SIGCOM and NFOCOM. Her work is frequently cited and used in university lectures. Amy is actively involved in community services. She served on the Long Island IEEE Executive Committee, as a panelist at Stony Brook WISE (Women in Science and Engineering) career panels, and as an e-mentor for MentorNet.net.

Prior to Mela Networks, Dr. Amy Wang worked in the Research and Development organization of Symbol Technologies, the Enterprise Mobility Company. Amy holds a doctoral in Electrical Engineering from Columbia University and BE from Tsinghua University, P.R. China. She is a recipient of Edwin Howard Armstrong Memorial Award from Columbia.

Speakers:

Girish Apte
Girish Apte has been involved with monitoring and control network technologies for 25 years. He is currently the Director of Product Marketing for Jennic Ltd., a leading supplier of 802.15.4 and ZigBee wireless microcontrollers. Girish operated an international consulting and training company for over ten years, advising clients on product strategy, specifications, development and marketing. Prior to that, Girish was the Director of Technical Training for Echelon, and was active in introducing LonWorks technology throughout the Asia-Pacific region.

Rick Enns
Dust Networks
Vice President, Standards and Technology
Rick Enns has over 26 years of experience in developing wireless and cable networking technologies and driving standards. Dust Networks provides hardware and software for wireless mesh networks used for sensor and control applications in industrial and building automation. Dust is the leading innovator of highly reliable, low power networks. Rick's work at Dust concentrates on the standardization of wireless sensor networks and the development of new networking technologies.

Prior to joining Dust Networks, Rick served as Vice President and Chief Technical Officer for Hybrid Networks where he led the hardware and software design efforts that pioneered cable and wireless modem systems.

Rick also directed the Hybrid Networks group that drove standards in IEEE 802.14 and 802.16. At Hughes LAN Systems, Rick served as Director of Hardware Development and held various engineering and management positions at Stratacom, Bell Northern Research, Siemens Corporation, and SRI International. Over the years he has authored 12 patents in the area of cable and wireless Internet access systems, ATM technology, and integrated voice and data systems. He has consulted for a range of wireless networking products from enterprise WiFi switches to WiMAX micro-base stations. Rick holds an MSEE from Stanford University, an MS in Physics from University of Washington, and a BS from UC San Diego.

Mike A. Horton
Crossbox Technology
President & CEO
Mike Horton co-founded Crossbow(r) Technology and has served as its President & CEO since inception. Horton has led Crossbow from its founding product line of digital MEMS accelerometers and tilt sensors to its current market leading inertial sensor and wireless sensor networking platforms. To this point in time, he has co-authored four patents. Under his leadership, the company's revenue has grown more than 50 fold and became net profitable in 2002. Horton has closed $13 Million in venture financing for the company, including from Intel Capital, its lead corporate investor. Horton was named one of the Top 100 Innovators in the MIT Technology Review and was named one of The Top 50 Movers and Shakers in high technology by Electronic Business Magazine. He graduated from UC Berkeley with a B.S. and M.S. in Electrical Engineering. He was nominated for the University Medal and won the Warren Y. Dere Design Award.

Tom Stroebel
Intel Corporation
Market Strategy and Business Development
Systems Technology/Health Platforms Laboratory
Tom Stroebel manages Market Strategy and Business Development within the Systems Technology/Health Platforms Lab at Intel. Previously, Tom was in a similar role within Intel Research's Sensor Network Operations (SNO). SNO was a Strategic Research Project targeted at innovating high-performance and energy-conserving wireless sensor networks and demonstrating their capability in a number of demanding industrial applications. This project has successfully led to a number of pilots which are now scaling to larger deployments. It also has resulted in the licensing of the technology to the commercial marketplace.

Jay Warrior, Ph.D.
Agilent Technologies
Crossing the Chasm - From Sensor Networks to the Intranet
The talk identifies some key technology and business issues necessary for the current generation of sensor networks to be ultimately successful in the marketplace.

Jay Warrior leads distributed systems research at Agilent Labs. He has over 15 years of experience creating new networking technology based business opportunities for Honeywell, Fisher Rosemount, and HP/Agilent. He has led multiple networking standards setting efforts and currently chairs the IEEE 1451.1 standard. At HP and Agilent labs, he led the team that developed an Internet-based distributed system technology that was incorporated into two cellular infrastructure monitoring product lines. He was a laboratory scientist and program manager in the Distributed Measurement & Control Program at Hewlett-Packard Laboratories. Dr. Warrior is the chair of the IEEE standards working group that developed IEEE 1451.1, a U.S. standard for network independent interfaces for smart sensors to enable easy support of multiple communication protocols within products. In 1999 he received the IEEE Standards Association Award for his efforts. Dr. Warrior recently co-founded SNAFUnet, a sensor networking applications and technology forum and established JDDAC, a joint effort between Agilent Labs and Sun Microsystems creating open source java technology for sensor networks.