by Helen Mary Marek on October 22, 2014

The preliminary schedule for the 10th Annual TFI Communications Technology Asset Valuation Conference is now posted! The conference is Wednesday-Thursday, January 28-29, 2015, at the Radisson Hotel in Downtown Austin, Texas. The Pre-Conference Seminar: TFI Technology Forecasting for Valuation is on Tuesday, January 27. 

The conference is geared to tax, depreciation, and valuation professionals, but should be attended by anyone with a strong policy or business interest in future of the communications network. The program includes featured outside speakers specializing in technology areas, TFI speakers reviewing their latest forecasts, and people from the consulting, industry and appraisal community sharing their knowledge in presentations and on panels.

Distinguished Keynotes are:

Dub Dublin
IoT Pioneer, Serial CTO and Entrepreneur
“The Internet of Things: Overview & Outlook ”

Iain Gillott
President and Founder, iGR (iGillottResearch, Inc.)
“Small Cells and Het-Nets, The Wave of the Future”

August (Augie) Grant
Professor, School of Journalism and Mass Communications, University of South Carolina; Co-Editor, Communications Technology Update & Fundamentals
“Future of Television and Video”

Lawrence K. Vanston, Ph.D. is Conference Director and also leads the Pre-Conference Seminar: TFI Technology Forecasting for Valuation. 

 

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Further information: Please see links above or contact Helen Mary Marek at (512) 258-8898(512) 258-8898 or info@tfi.com.

After our “busy season” of producing custom studies and tax tables (and my personal agony converting from XP to Windows 8), I finally came up for air to take a look at the videos from the January conference. What a great conference it was! What well-spoken speakers! What great information! To see the videos (along with the slides and bios) just click on the link 2014 TFI Conference Slides, Videos & Bios (in the main menu of http://www.tfi-ctfg.com in case you’re not there already). The videos are arranged by panel and speaker. We have more work to do updating the site and integrating the conference material (and maybe making a highlight video), but I wanted to make this available without further delay. If anyone sees anything that needs changing or has any suggestions please let us know.

Let me also take another opportunity to thank our speakers, panelists and everyone who attended, not to mention our sponsors, AUS, CostQuest and Deloitte.

Larry

P.S. The 2015 conference dates will be January 28 and 29th (Weds & Thurs) at the Radisson Downtown Austin. The pre-conference seminar will be Tues, Jan 27th. You heard it here first!

We are thrilled to announce that Robert Harris is joining the TFI team as a Senior Consultant. Bob was Vice President, Network Planning and Architecture at Time Warner Cable from 1999 to 2012. You may recall that he spoke at TFI’s Communications Technology Asset Valuation Conference in January 2012.  Later that year he retired from TWC and became an independent consultant.

Bob has always had a strong interest in technology forecasting, strategy and scenarios. That combined with his knowledge of fiber optic networks (he was with ADC, Nortel and C-COR, before TWC) and communications in general made him a great match for TFI.

Initially he will work with Ray Hodges on TFI’s custom depreciation studies, teach at TFI’s Technology Forecasting Seminar, and provide analysis and advice on the transition to fiber communications networks.

Like Ray, Bob is based in the Tampa area. He can be reached at 203-918-2074 or rharris@tfi.com.
Welcome aboard, Bob!

Still more great news! Jack Pouchet will highlight the data center part of TFI’s Communications Technology Asset Valuation Conference in Austin, Jan 29-30, 2014. Jack is a Vice President, Business Development and Energy Initiatives, Hyperscale Solutions, Emerson Network Power. In that capacity he works with major server manufacturers, large data center users, and leading engineering firms. He is also Board Member and Vice-President, The Green Grid, an industry consortium to improve the resource efficiency of information technology and data centers throughout the world.

Energy efficiency in the servers, power supply, and physical plant is a huge determinant of costs, technology substitution, and obsolescence in data centers. Also, there’s a lot going on in the U.S. and globally, both near and long-term, with lots of moving parts (figuratively speaking). Thus, we were looking for a speaker familiar with the big, industry-wide picture and technologically savvy as well. We are indeed lucky to find a person who fits the bill so perfectly. I’m looking forward to Jack kicking off a really interesting discussion!

More Great news! Dr. William Lehr, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, will kickoff the broadband session of TFI’s Communications Technology Asset Valuation Conference in Austin, Jan 29-30, 2014. An economist, his current position is Research Scientist in the Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory (CSAIL) at MIT and currently works with the Communications Futures Program ( http://cfp.mit.edu ). The working title of his talk is: “Gigabit Access, Transmission, Online Video, Big Data, Cloud Computing, Traffic Symmetry – How it Fits Together”. Blame the title on me, but we were looking for a speaker that could give us the big picture, and, after hearing Dr. Lehr speak several times at Columbia’s CITI conference in New York, I knew he was the right person.

Dr. Lehr has also been the Associate Director of MIT Research Program on Internet & Telecoms Convergence. His current research is on the convergence of the Internet and telecommunication services and the implications for corporate strategy and public policy.  I am really looking forward to what he has to say!

Larry Vanston

Great news! Professor Jeffrey Andrews, Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at the University of Texas at Austin, will return as our wireless keynote speaker at TFI’s Asset Valuation Conference in Austin, Jan 29-30, 2014. His topic will be “5G Cellular: How and Why will it Differ from 4G”. No rest for the wireless industry…the wheel keeps turning! Dr. Andrews spoke to us several years ago when we were on the verge of 4G and regular attendees have been asking for a return engagement. Since then he has been elevated to IEEE Fellow, awarded the Cullen Trust for Higher Education Endowed Professorship in Engineering, and appointed “Editor-in-Chief” of the IEEE Transactions on Wireless Communications (as of 1/1/14). Congrats and welcome back, Professor Andrews!

Larry Vanston

Welcome to Communication Assets Outlook documenting  important  trends and developments that impact the technology assets of the communications industry.  We would appreciation any comments, suggestions and corrections you may have. We are really looking forward to making this a tool everyone can use and to which everyone contributes!
Larry Vanston, Editor and President, TFI
512-415-5965, lvanston@tfi.com

Welcome to Communication Assets Outlook documenting  important  trends and developments that impact the technology assets of the communications industry. It is produced by Technology Futures, Inc. (TFI)  and, in part, sponsored by the Communications Technology Forecasting Group (CTFG) and the TFI Communications Technology Asset Valuation Conference held every January in Austin.

We are still under construction and would appreciation any comments, suggestions and corrections you may have. Leave comments here, call us 512-258-8898 (or 512-415-5965 for me directly) or email at lvanston@tfi.com. We are really looking forward to making this a tool everyone can use and to which everyone contributes!

Larry Vanston,
President, TFI
Editor