As the grid continues to evolve and utilties find new ways to engage their consumers, communicating with those consumers and the devices and infrastructure that serves them may be the lynchpin to success. Whether implementing an AMI rollout that enables remote disconnect, a self healing grid that makes decisions near real-time, or implementing demand response to shape the utilities load profile, a communication link is critical. This panel will focus on trends in communication with respect to grid operations, market directions, implications of standards, and more. With the need and impact of communications across the grid from generation down to the consumer, it's a timely topic and sure to be the focus of many a utility's business plan.

 

Chairperson:

Wes Sylvester
Director, Operations, Distribution Solutions/Smart Grid
Siemens Energy, Inc.

Mr. Sylvester is Director, Distribution Solutions at Siemens Energy, Inc. In this role, he is responsible for solution vision, direction, strategy, definition, design, sales and marketing for distribution products and services, with an emphasis on Smart Grid solutions. Mr. Sylvester helps to lead the cross-divisional Smart Grid team within Siemens, and is a company representative on both GridWise^TM and EPRI's IntelligridSM, where he serves as chair of the Intelligrid Technology Transfer Committee. He is also member of IEEE PES. Mr. Sylvester comes to this role from the Distribution Products Division of Siemens Power Transmission & Distribution, Inc, where he held the role of Recloser Product Manager leading the local contribution for the development of the Siemens Distribution Recloser product and has been a key player in Siemens' developments in the medium voltage sector globally.

 

Kyle Jones
Principal
Greentech Capital Advisors

Ms. Jones has been an investment banker to the cleantech sector for several years, first at Morgan Stanley in their London office and now at Greentech Capital Advisors in New York. She has worked across cleantech sectors, but is now focused heavily on smart grid and other power infrastructure companies. Ms. Jones has worked on several fundraising and M&A mandates specific to grid communications companies over the past year. She holds a Master of Business Administration from the Yale School of Management and a Master of Environmental Management from the Yale School of Forestry & Environmental Studies. Prior to graduate school, Ms. Jones was an Analyst at ICF Consulting, an energy and environmental consulting group based in Washington, DC.

 

Jake Rasweiler
Vice President, IT, Engineering & Network Operations
Arcadian Networks

Mr. Rasweiler's expertise is drawn from more than twenty years in both business process and engineering specialties. His leadership in wireless network design, site development, field operations, and construction has made him a respected thought leader. In addition, his writings on urban network design, microcell technology, critical infrastructure communications and more have appeared in utility trade publications worldwide. Mr. Rasweiler's telecommunications career includes work at CellularOne, AT&T Wireless Services, and Sprint Nextel. He has served as Senior Director RF Engineering, Market Director, and more.

 

Bob Gohn
Senior Analyst
Pike Research

Mr. Gohn is a senior analyst contributing to Pike Research's smart grid advisory service, with a focus on smart meters and advanced metering infrastructure (AMI), smart grid networking and communications, home area networking (HAN), and energy management. Before joining Pike Research, Mr. Gohn was vice president of marketing for Ember Corporation, where he was responsible for strategic product planning, product management, corporate communications, market development, strategic partnerships, sales support, and customer application engineering / technical support. Prior to joining Ember, he served as Director, Strategy & Business Development at Freescale Semiconductor. His experience also includes senior marketing roles at Motorola Semiconductor, C-Port Corporation, 3Com, and Standard Microsystems Corporation.

 

Tracy Trent
Chief Executive Officer, Chairman & Co-Founder
Proximetry

As a co-founder of Proximetry in early 2005, Mr. Trent sought to introduce software techniques to make standards-based wireless networks vastly more predictable and robust. Mr. Trent brings more than eighteen years of senior technology experience to Proximetry, with the past ten years focused on wireless and other networking technologies.