Colin is currently chairman of the board of the 6G Smart Networks and Services Industry Association (6G-IA), the vice-chairman of the board of the European Smart Networks and Services Joint undertaking (SNS-JU) and vice-chairman of the European Telecommunications Standards Institute (ETSI) board. He has detailed knowledge and experience of the telecommunications industry having worked directly or indirectly with many of the major players over a 30-year period.

Christina Gessner is Executive Vice President of the Test & Measurement Division at Rohde & Schwarz and member of the company’s Corporate Management team.

Christina’s journey with Rohde & Schwarz began in 2004 as a technology manager. By 2011, she was leading Product Management for Spectrum and Network Analyzers and took over the role of Vice President of Spectrum & Network Analyzers, EMC and Antenna Test Equipment in 2018. In 2023, she moved to her current role.

Christina started her career at Siemens mobile communications, representing the company as a delegate to the 3GPP standardization process for UMTS and GSM/EDGE from 1998 to 2004.

She holds a degree in RF engineering from the University of Hannover, Germany.

Jean Schwoerer holds a PhD in electronics and communication systems from the Institut National des Sciences Appliquées de Rennes (France) since 2006. Subsequently, his research work focused on IoT connectivity and mobile networks. He was also deeply involved in standardization for the Orange group, for which he was delegated to ETSI, IEEE802, and 3GPP RAN1&2, where he contributed to various IoT standard and to the standardization of 5G.
As Network and Infrastructure Research Operation Manager, and Orange Senior Expert, Jean is now mainly involved in the preparation of 6G within Orange Research, is a co-editor of NGMN 6G white paper and as a member of the 6G-IA governing board.

Dr. Magnus Frodigh is Vice President and Head of Ericsson Research.  In this role he leads Ericsson’s long-term technology research organization, its close collaboration with academia and industry, and its contributions to the Ericsson business and product development.

He holds a Master of Science degree from Linköping University of Technology, Sweden, and a Ph.D. in Radio Communication Systems from the Royal Institute of Technology, where he is also adjunct Professor in Wireless Infrastructures. He is a Fellow of the Royal Swedish Academy of Engineering Sciences (IVA)

Frodigh joined Ericsson in 1994 and has over the past three decades held various key senior positions within Research & Development and Product Management, throughout the generations of mobile technology, from 2G all the way to current research on 6G technologies. He holds 29 patents. 

Dr. Hideyuki Tokuda received his Ph.D. in Computer Science from the University of Waterloo after earning his B.Eng. and M.Eng. from Keio University. He has held positions at Carnegie Mellon University and Keio University, is currently a professor emeritus at Keio university and serves as a member of the Science Council of Japan and a special advisor to the XGMF, Japan.

Cayetano Carbajo Martín. Telecom Engineer by Universidad Politécnica de Madrid. 30 years of career in Telefónica where he has had several roles in different countries: CTO in Germany (2014-2019), in México (2003- 2006) and Morocco (1999-2000). Also different corporate positions:  Radio technology director (2001-2003), Tecnology Director (2006-2014). Cayetano now is leading Core, transport and Ecosystem leading innovation in network, standards activities and transversal projecs (like edge, slicing or Open Gateway) in Telefónica group. Cayetano was awarded with Spanish Telecom of the year in 2015.

Ari Pouttu

Professor, Dependable Wireless

Vice-Director of 6G Flagship (www.6gflagship.com) Vice-Director 6G-ESS Program

Centre for Wireless Communications

University of Oulu

Experienced strategist, strategic program manager and speaker with the ability to lead from complex decision making on boardroom level upto execution. Experienced in leading diverse ecosystem development in tenders, proof of concepts, market introduction.

Jos has 16 years of mobile operator experience. Within KPN he was overall responsible for the 5G launch in the business market. Led operations for customer & vendors tenders, customer trials, standardization and multi-billion spectrum auctions & leases. Recently he started supporting the NGO SmartParks.

Akihiro Nakao received his B.S. (1991) in Physics, M.E. (1994) in Information Engineering from the University of Tokyo. After working at the IBM Austin Research Laboratory in Texas and the IBM Tokyo Research Laboratory, he earned both his M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in Computer Science from Princeton University. In 2005, he was appointed as Associate Professor, and in February 2014, as Professor in Applied Computer Science, at Interfaculty Initiative in Information Studies, Graduate School of Interdisciplinary Information Studies, the University of Tokyo. Since 2020, he has been a special adviser to the President of the University of Tokyo (-present). In April 2021, he has moved to School of Engineering, the University of Tokyo (-present), and since then he has been serving as Director, Collaborative Research Institute for NGCI,（Next-Generation Cyber Infrastructure）, the University of Tokyo (-present). In 2024, he was appointed Co-Chair of XGMF (XG Mobile Promotion Forum) (-present). His research interests lie in information science and information and communication.

Thomas Caspers is Vice President of the Federal Office for Information Security (BSI) in Bonn, Germany. Before he took office in 2025, he was Director-General Technology Strategy at BSI since 2019. His teams were responsible for BSI’s work on IT systems, cloud computing and artificial intelligence and also ensured the digitalization of the Federal Office.

As Chairman elected by the NATO member states, Thomas Caspers chaired the Alliance’s

Capability Panel Information Assurance and Cyber Defence in Brussels from 2018 to 2021 inBrussels. Since 2021, he has represented Germany on the Governing Board of the ELI’s European Cybersecurity Competence Centre (ECCC) in Bucharest, and in 2023 he was appointed to the Supervisory Board of the CISPA Helmholtz Centre for Information Security in Saarbrücken.

In his previous position from 2015 to 2019 as Head of Evaluation and Operation of Cryptographic Systems at BSI, he created the operational basis for the national and international processing and transmission of classified information through the technical evaluation of information security systems for the German Federal Administration, EU and NATO.

In other positions since 2003, he also headed BSI’s activities in the areas of operating system security, trusted computing and secure platforms, having previously worked in various companies covering scientific analytical solutions and health care technology.

Thomas Caspers studied physics and astronomy at the University of Bonn and holds a degree in physics.

Cayetano Carbajo Martín. Telecom Engineer by Universidad Politécnica de Madrid. 30 years of career in Telefónica where he has had several roles in different countries: CTO in Germany (2014-2019), in México (2003- 2006) and Morocco (1999-2000). Also different corporate positions:  Radio technology director (2001-2003), Tecnology Director (2006-2014). Cayetano now is leading Core, transport and Ecosystem leading innovation in network, standards activities and transversal projecs (like edge, slicing or Open Gateway) in Telefónica group. Cayetano was awarded with Spanish Telecom of the year in 2015.

Rui L. Aguiar is currently a Full Professor at the University of Aveiro, responsible by the area of Networks and Systems. He has been previously an adjunct professor at the INI, Carnegie Mellon University, a Visiting Research Scholar at Universidade Federal de Uberlândia, Brazil and an advisor for the Portuguese Government under the Secretaria de Estado das Comunicações. He is currently co-coordinating a research line in Instituto de Telecomunicações, on the area of Networks and Services. He is also the current Steering Board Chair of Networld Europe. He has been an IEEE Distinguished Lecturer for topics associated with novel communication systems.  He has more than 500 papers published in journals and conferences across different scientific domains. He was involved in multiple groups of R&D and in the evaluation of networks and computation programmes in multiple countries. He has participated in more than two dozens of R&D european projects, in the areas of networks and distributed computing.

Joyce Mwangama is an Associate Professor in Electrical Engineering at the University of Cape Town, specialising in 5G/6G networks, Open RAN, and digital infrastructure for underserved regions. She leads several research and innovation projects focused on broadband connectivity, smart health, and sustainable network technologies in Africa.

Tony Quek received the B.E. and M.E. degrees in Electrical and Electronics Engineering from Tokyo Institute of Technology, respectively. At MIT, he earned the Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science. Currently, he is the Associate Provost (AI & Digital Innovation) with Singapore University of Technology and Design (SUTD). He also serves as the Director of the Future Communications R&D Programme, and the ST Engineering Distinguished Professor. He is an IEEE Fellow, a WWRF Fellow, and a Fellow of the Academy of Engineering Singapore.

Antonio Krüger ist CEO und wissenschaftlicher Direktor des Deutschen Forschungszentrums für Künstliche Intelligenz GmbH (DFKI) sowie wissenschaftlicher Direktor des Forschungsbereichs „Kognitive Assistenzsysteme“ am DFKI. Seit 2009 ist er Inhaber der Globus-Stiftungsprofessur für Informatik an der Universität des Saarlandes, Leiter des Ubiquitous Media Technology Lab sowie wissenschaftlicher Leiter des Innovative Retail Laboratory (IRL) am DFKI. Prof. Krüger ist ein international angesehener Experte der Mensch-Maschine-Interaktion und Künstlichen Intelligenz. Seine Forschungsschwerpunkte sind Mobile und Ubiquitous Spatial Assistance
Systems, die die Forschungsgebiete Intelligent User Interfaces, User Modeling, Cognitive Sciences und Ubiquitous Computing kombinieren. Er hat den Studiengang Medieninformatik an der Universität des Saarlandes 2010 etabliert und ist bis heute für diesen verantwortlich. Er ist Mitgründer der Saarbrücker Technologie-Firma Eyeled GmbH, die sich auf die Entwicklung mobiler und ubiquitärer Informationssysteme spezialisiert hat. Von 2004 bis 2009 war er als Professor für Informatik und Geoinformatik an der Universität Münster und als geschäftsführender Direktor des Instituts für Geoinformatik tätig. Er hat an der Universität des Saarlandes Informatik und Wirtschaftswissenschaften studiert und im Rahmen des Graduiertenkollegs „Kognitionswissenschaft“ 1999 seine Promotion in Informatik abgeschlossen.

Christoph Schmelz is a Principal Research Lead at Nokia. He received his Dipl.-Ing. degree from Technical University Munich in 2000 and held various R&D positions at Siemens and Nokia. His key work areas are Network and Service Automation and Sustainability in the context of 6G research. Christoph contributed in multiple EU funded research initiatives and is Coordinator of the European Sustainability Lighthouse project SUSTAIN-6G that has started in 2025.Christoph Schmelz is a Principal Research Lead at Nokia. He received his Dipl.-Ing. degree from Technical University Munich in 2000 and held various R&D positions at Siemens and Nokia. His key work areas are Network and Service Automation and Sustainability in the context of 6G research. Christoph contributed in multiple EU funded research initiatives and is Coordinator of the European Sustainability Lighthouse project SUSTAIN-6G that has started in 2025.