Jonathan Ashdown was born in Niskayuna, NY, USA. He received the B.S., M.S., and Ph.D. degrees from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Troy, NY, USA, in 2006, 2008, and 2012, respectively, all in electrical engineering.  His Ph.D. dissertation was on a high-rate ultrasonic through-wall communication system using MIMO-OFDM in conjunction with interference mitigation techniques. In 2012, he was a recipient of the Best Unclassified Paper Award at the IEEE Military Communications Conference. From 2012 to 2015, he worked as an electronics engineer with the Department of Defense (DoD), Naval Information Warfare Center (NIWC) Atlantic, Charleston, SC, USA where he was involved in several basic and applied research projects for the U.S. Navy, mainly in the area of software defined radio. In 2015, he transferred within DoD.  He is currently a senior electronics engineer within the Information Directorate of the Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL), Rome, NY, USA, where he is involved in the research and development of advanced emerging communications and networking technologies for the U.S. Air Force including those enabling Dynamic Spectrum Management and Access. He currently serves as the Principal Investigator for the AFRL-led 5G Dynamic Spectrum Sharing (DSS) Program under OUSD(R&E)'s 5G-to-Next G Initiative.

Mr. Juan Ramírez is the Director of the 5G CrossFunctional Team (5G CFT) for C3 Infrastructure (C3I) Directorate of the Deputy Chief Information Officer for Command, Control, and Communications (C3), Office of the Secretary of Defense, Chief Information Officer (CIO). As Director of the 5G CFT, Mr. Ramírez provides technical and policy expertise, programmatic oversight, and broad guidance to synchronize and integrate 5G into defense-wide programs and achieve the DoD’s Digital Modernization Strategy initiatives. He represents DoD in interagency efforts defining and implementing U.S. Government policies and strategies for 5G-related critical infrastructure and supports international cooperation in 5G system design and prototyping. Mr. Ramírez leads the Executive Secretariat support to the DoD 5G Oversight Committee, an executive body that comprises 3- and 4-Starlevel senior leaders and stakeholders. Prior to joining the C3I Directorate in 2023, Mr. Ramírez served as Director of the Office of Planning and Programming for the Chief Financial Officer and Comptroller of the Defense Information Systems Agency (DISA). During his tenure, DISA became a premiere IT combat support agency and the trusted provider to connect and protect the warfighter in cyberspace. He streamlined the Cyber portfolio, successfully defended against DoD Appropriations Committee (Sustainment) proposed reductions (~+$1.5B) and secured additional funding for Cyber for ten consecutive years – resulting in a 45% cumulative increase in non-pay resources and a 20% increase in civilian full-time equivalents. From 2021 to 2022, Mr. Ramírez served as Deputy Director CIO_C3_C3I. A recipient of the Department of Defense’s Office of the Secretary of Defense Award for Excellence in July 2022, he was instrumental in improving C3’s enterprise planning and technological superiority posture. Mr. Ramírez also served in the Revolving Funds Directorate of the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense, Comptroller. While directing the Non-Appropriated Funds and Army Working Capital Fund (AWCF) accounts, he managed a total operating authority of over $13 billion for the AWCF. Mr. Ramírez is a Georgetown University McDonough School of Business graduate and earned his master’s degree in Public Policy from George Mason University.

Steve Lasko is an evangelist for the HPE Aruba Networking, Telco Solutions group and advises agencies and systems integrators on private cellular deployments that work alongside Wi-Fi to address a broad range of federal military and civilian use cases. These custom 4G/5G solutions are based on industry-leading private mobile core technology from Athonet, a Hewlett Packard Enterprise acquisition. 

Prior to his role at HPE, Steve spent 20 years at Amdocs working with communications service providers across the Americas to adopt leading core network signalling and back-office IT systems that powered the transition from 3G to 5G, circuit switched to IP networking, and eventually migrated into microservices-based cloud environments for continuous integration/continuous delivery organizations.