Broadband Forum’s annual awards and elections announced, along with new project for home network performance

Chicago, USA, 28 March 2017: Two Distinguished Fellow Awards, which recognize individuals who have significantly contributed to the direction and success of broadband development and to the delivery of Broadband 20/20, were among the accolades presented during the Broadband Forum quarterly meeting in Chicago.

The first went to Barbara Stark, of AT&T – the first woman to receive the award – who has been instrumental in much of the Forum’s work on Broadband User Services for many years. Michael Shaffer, of Nokia, was also presented with the award for his leadership on the Forum’s fiber networks activities, including the widely-adopted G-PON ONU Certification program (BBF.247).

Recognized for their exceptional contributions to the Broadband Forum through the Circle of Excellence Awards were Joey Boyd, of ADTRAN, and David Minodier, of Orange. Boyd was presented the award for his involvement in the delivery of the first YANG models at the Forum (particularly TR-355, which was developed for fiber networks management). Meanwhile, Minodier was honored for his role as the driving force behind TR-317, a landmark specification for Enhanced Residential Gateways that took the Forum into the world of Software Defined Networking (SDN) and Network Functions Virtualization (NFV).

“In our current telecoms industry, knowing what you want to achieve is not enough – you have to be able to deliver on it quickly and efficiently and that is exactly what these individuals have helped the Broadband Forum to achieve,” said Kevin Foster, Chairman of the Broadband Forum. “The Forum is the product of its members and I am proud of how quickly all the companies involved in our work have been able to advance the Broadband 20/20 vision.”

There were also numerous recipients of the Outstanding Contributor Award, which is given to individuals who, during the previous year, went beyond the call of duty by making valuable contributions within the Forum’s Work Areas. The full list of recipients was:

  • Guiu Fabregas, of Nokia, for working on Fixed Mobile Convergence, 5G, NFV and SDN
  • Ron Insler, of RAD, with a focus on the Virtual Business Gateway specification
  • Denis Khotimsky, of Verizon, particularly for contributing to the ICTP specification that supports the NG-PON2 standard
  • Marcos Martinez, of Marvell, for working on the project for performance testing of powerline communications and the test plan for 1905.1/1a
  • Marta Seda, of Calix, who was also heavily involved in the ICTP and YANG specifications

The Chicago meeting also saw the Broadband User Services Work Area continue to explore the requirements and test metrics for defining “carrier grade” home Wi-Fi – a service which would provide reliable connectivity for the end-user who expects to get the most out of their broadband subscription through their in-home network.

The Forum is continuing with the creation of a standardized and testable code base for the 1905.1 unified MAC for in-home networking technologies and recently inherited the nVoy certification program from the HomePlug Alliance in relation to this activity.

The Broadband Forum’s annual elections also took place at the Chicago meeting, with Ken Ko, of ADTRAN, and Aleksandra Kozarev, of Intel, voted on to the board. Tom Starr, of AT&T, Les Brown, of Huawei, and Manuel Paul, of Deutsche Telekom, also continued with the board as directors.

“We are delighted to have ADTRAN and Intel represented on our board,” said Foster. “The appointments of Ken and Aleksandra come shortly after we have further strengthened our expertise and experience with the formation of the new Executive Advisory Council, which has been an important step forward for the Forum.”