By Esther Ling.

On May 24th, about 60 Young Professionals convened for the IEEE Young Professionals Reception and Panel Discussion, held in conjunction with IEEE International Conference on Communications (ICC) 2016 at Kuala Lumpur Convention Centre. This event was organized by IEEE Communication Society Young Professionals (COMSOC) and IEEE Region 10 Young Professionals, with local support from IEEE Young Professionals Malaysia Chapter.

At the reception, IEEE Young Professionals delegates at ICC 2016 had the opportunity to network with Young Professionals from Malaysia and nearby sections. This happened over light refreshments served in the foyer of the conference venue.

After the networking reception, Dr Anang Hudaya (IEEE Young Professionals Malaysia Chair) officiated the event with opening remarks to welcome participants to the event. This was followed by an overview of Region 10 Young Professional activities by Esther Ling (South-East Asia Young Professionals Coordinator). Then, Dr Imran Shafique Ansari (COMSOC Young Professionals) presented global CoMSoC Young Professionals initiatives.

Following this, the panel discussion began. Themed “Trends in Communications,” it consisted of Dr Gopi Kurup (CEO of Telekom R&D and GM of Product Management TM VADs), Dr Dilip Krishnaswamy (Senior Research Scientist at IBM Research India), Dr Nordin Ramli (Staff Researcher MIMOS Berhad) and Dr Norliza Mohd Noor (Associate Professor, UTM Razak). It was moderated by Dr Imran (also Postdoctoral Research Associate (PRA), Texas A&M University at Qatar).

Each speaker in the panel shared insightful stories of how they entered the engineering discipline and their career trajectories till today. Then, the audience had a chance to ask questions to the panel. Considering that a majority of IEEE members in Region 10 come from academia rather than the industry, one question aptly put forward was “what benefits did the panelists from industry see from being an IEEE member?” It was remarked that technology and ideas are growing very fast today and IEEE provides access to peer discussions that keeps an industry professional current. Staying updated, keeps an industry on its toes and prevents losing technological ground.

Another question posed was on specific trends in communications that people should look out for, and the appropriate response to these trends. It was mentioned that developing effective security protocols is important to keep up with the increasing number of devices connected to the internet and the Internet of Things (IoT) movement. For graduate students, taking two or more Computer Science related courses, such as Cloud Computing, would give them an edge.

The event wrapped up with closing remarks by Dr Norliza. In conclusion, it was a fruitful event with experts ranging from industry, academia and research disciplines sharing their viewpoints on emerging technologies and their patterns in the field of communications.

Region 10 Young Professionals would like to thank IEEE COMSOC Young Professionals for collaborating in the organization of the event, with particular mention to the following people: Dr. Lola Awoniyi-Oteri (Qualcomm Research), Gayle Weisman (IEEE COMSOC Program Manager) and Dr. Imran Shafique Ansari. In addition, Region 10 Young Professionals thank Dr Anang Hudaya and Hussain Mahdi for local support.

Esther Ling
South-East Asia Young Professionals Coordinator