Frédéric Chapron, Service Management Project Leader, Industrial Controls & Safety Systems Group, Beams Department, CERN, Switzerland

After first experiences in data network design and implementation, successively at Alcatel-Lucent (Paris, France) and Hewlett-Packard (Grenoble, France), Frédéric Chapron started its international carrier at the International Telecommunication Union, located in Geneva, Switzerland, where he was in charge of developing and coordinating the implementation of innovative ICT projects at ITU Telecom events, organised all around the World. In 2002, he joined CERN, the European Organisation for Nuclear Research, as a telecom engineer, and successfully led several large projects in traditional telephony, VoIP networks, and private GSM networks. In 2010, he was appointed, deputy group leader, of the CERN Communications Systems Group, in charge of the CERN data networks (50 000 active devices), fixed telephone network (12 000 users), the CERN private GSM network (6000 users), and the TETRA networks. In 2012, he supervised the implementation of TETRA radio network which aims at providing critical communication services for the CERN fire brigade and workers. An indoor localisation system was developed to address the issue of lone worker protection in the CERN underground infrastructure, which comprises more than 50 km of galleries. The innovative approach of this project was recognised by the industry through the award of two prices at the International TETRA Awards in 2014. In 2017, he joined the CERN Beams Department as Service Management Project Leader for the Industrial Controls & Safety Systems Group.

Prof. Athanasios Kanatas, University of Piraeus, Greece

Athanasios G. Kanatas received the Diploma in Electrical Engineering from the National Technical University of Athens (NTUA), Greece, in 1991, the M.Sc. degree in Satellite Communication Engineering from the University of Surrey, Surrey, UK in 1992, and the Ph.D. degree in Mobile Satellite Communications from NTUA, in February 1997. From 1993 to 1994 he was with National Documentation Center of National Research Institute. In 1995 he joined SPACETEC Ltd. In 1996 he joined the Mobile Radio-Communications Laboratory as a research associate. From 1999 to 2002 he was with the Institute of Communication & Computer Systems. In 2000 he became a member of the Board of Directors of OTESAT S.A. In 2002 he joined the University of Piraeus where he is an Professor in the Department of Digital Systems. His current research interests include the development of new digital techniques for wireless and satellite communications systems, channel characterization, simulation, and modeling for future wireless communication systems, RF preprocessing techniques, new transmission schemes for MIMO systems, and energy efficient techniques for Wireless Sensor Networks. He has been a Senior Member of IEEE since 2002. From 1999 to 2009 he chaired the IEEE ComSoc Chapter of the Greek Section.

Prof. George Karagiannidis, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Greece

George K. Karagiannidis was born in Pithagorion Town, Samos island, Greece. He received his university degree in 1987 and his PhD degree in 1998, both in Electrical Engineering, from the University of Patras, Patras, Greece. From 2001 to 2004 he was Researcher at the Institute for Space Applications and Remote Sensing, National Observatory of Athens, Greece. In June 2004, he joined the Electrical & Computer Engineering Dept. of Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Greece where he is currently Professor of Digital Communications Systems and Director of the Telecommunications Systems and Networks Lab. His research interests are in the broad area of Digital Communications Systems with emphasis on Communications Theory, MIMO and Cooperative Communications, Optical Wireless Communications, Hardware-constrained Communications, Molecular Communications and Wireless Security. He has published and presented more than 400 technical papers in scientific journals and international conferences. His work has received more than 8800 citations, with h-index=51. Dr. Karagiannidis was a Distinguished Lecturer of the IEEE Vehicular Technology Society (VTS), from July 1, 2011 to June 31, 2015 and he is a Fellow IEEE. He is being recognized for his “Contributions to the performance analysis of wireless communication systems”. From January 2012 to December 2015, he was the Editor-in-Chief of IEEE Communications Letters. He is one of the most highly-cited authors across all areas of Electrical Engineering, recognized as 2015 and 2016 Thomson Reuters highly-cited researcher.

Dr. Spyridon Louvros, 5G System Architect Engineer, Mobile Cloud & Network Services (MCNS), Cyprus

Spiros Louvros holds PhD on mobile networks, Master of Science with distinction in RF Engineering with an award for two years full scholarship from Alexandros Onassis Foundation and a Bachelor on Physics. Dr. Louvros holds the position of senior certified system architect consultant & trainer for 3G/LTE/5G RAN technologies in Ericsson networks. He has extensive experience on technical consultancy related to LTE/LTE-A and 5G technologies as well as technical seminars, technical 3G/LTE network feature implementation and solution manual preparation. He has participated into 3GPP technical reports authorship and he follows 3GPP, 5GPPP and ITU-R specifications. Lately he participates on 5G technology projects as system architect and implementation consultant, with emphasis on M2M and IoT services over small cells & HetNets technologies, Cloud RAN solutions and wireless optical communications (LiFi for indoor IoT applications). He has worked in Cosmote S.A. and held also an Assistant professorship in Computer & Informatics Engineering Department, School of Technology & Applications, Supreme Technological Educational Institution of Western Greece - CIED Department. His research interests focus onto wireless/mobile network modeling & performance optimization, Radio Access Network Capacity Planning and Dimentioning (WCDMA,HSPA+ & LTE/LTE-A), Wireless Optical technologies as LiFi (VLC) applications for LTE/5G indoor, Stochastic modeling and stochastic network optimizaqtion based on Statistical Physics models for complexity telecom network analysis, 5G HetNet technologies with small cell deployment and Cloud computing Radio Access Network technologies and architectures (C-RAN).

Prof. Lambros Sarakis, Technological Educational Institute of Sterea Ellada, Greece

Lambros Sarakis received the Diploma in Electrical & Computer Engineering from the National Technical University of Athens (NTUA) in 1996, the M.Sc. in Communications & Signal Processing from Imperial College, University of London, in 1997, and the Ph.D. in Computer Engineering from NTUA in 2002. Currently, he is a Lecturer at the Electrical Engineering Department at the Technological Educational Institute (TEI) of Sterea Ellada (former TEI of Chalkida). Prior to joining TEI of Sterea Ellada, he was an Associate Researcher (2008-2010) and a Research Associate (2004-2008) at the Institute of Informatics and Telecommunications at the National Centre for Scientific Research “Demokritos”, Greece, and a Research Associate at the School of Electrical and Computer Engineering at NTUA (1998-2003). Dr. Sarakis' research interests include performance of sensor, mobile ad-hoc, vehicular and composite wireless networks, resource virtualization, mobility management in heterogeneous access networks, QoS support in packet-switched networks, traffic characterization and analysis, and hardware/software co-design for embedded systems.

Prof. Stavros Stavrou, Open University of Cyrpus, Cyrpus

Stavros Stavrou holds an Electrical and Electronics diploma from HTI (CY), a BEng Degree in Computers and Communications from the University of Essex (U.K.), and a PhD degree in Electronic Engineering from the University of Surrey (U.K). His PhD studies were sponsored through a scholarship from the University of Surrey. Between 1997 - 2009 he was a faculty member of the University of Surrey at the Centre for Communication Systems Research (CCSR), where he lead with his research team the Centre’s wireless planning and telecommunication system design activities.

Dr. Christos Tranoris, Postodoctoral Research Fellow, University of Patras, Greece

Christos Tranoris is currently a research fellow of the Network Architectures and Management Group of the Electrical and Computer Engineering Department of University of Patras, which carries out research in the areas of Future Internet, Peer-to-Peer and Network Management while it is currently participating in related EU projects. He holds a diploma since 1999 from the Electrical and Computer Engineering Department at the University of Patras and a phd since 2006 from the same department. His phd was in the area of software processes on modeling and design of industrial applications with the title: A software development process for Industrial applications supported by a CASE tool.