H.D. Mustafa has graduated Summa Cum Laude (University Gold Medal) in 2001, from TU, New Orleans, USA with a Double Major in Computer Science and Computer Engineering and a PhD in Electrical Engineering. He is the first recipient of the prestigious Chancellor Fellowship in 1998 for pursuing Undergraduate Education. He is awarded the Honoris Causa, Doctor of Engineering Sciences in May 2015. Currently, he is the President R&D of Transocean Inc. and RIG Ltd. He is a fellow of the ACS and ICCA. He has published over 40 journal papers including publications in reputed international journals. He was the Associate Editor of Hydrocarbon Processing Journal from 2007 to 2009.
He is a Radical and dynamic multidisciplinary scientist and executive, leading interdisciplinary multibillion dollar R&D and Industrial projects. A multidisciplinary researcher his interest is not bound to any specific field but spans all domains of engineering and science. He is a strategic visionary and team leader amalgamating institutional and industrial research and a skilled expert in observing and translating concepts into reality, with operational excellence in diverse environments.
H.D. Mustafa is the Chief Inventor of the Crude Oil Quality Improvement (COQI(R)) technology and concept, which has market capitalization of US$ 2.5 Billion as of 2014. He was awarded the Merit Recognition Award by NASA, USA in 2005 and the President of India EMPI Award in 2006 by Government of India for his contributions to Research and Development. He was nominated and shortlisted for the prestigious Global Innovator of the Year Award for 2013. In July 2013, H.D. Mustafa achieved a World Record in India for the deepest oil exploration using the COQI(R) process.
Dr. Sunil Karamchandani obtained his doctorate degree from Department of Electrical Engineering at IIT Bombay in the area of Wireless Body Area Networks (WBAN). His contributions are recognized in Nature India, Proceedings of IEEE and generated extensive news coverage with leading tabloids namely The Financial Express, Hindustan Times and Lokmat. He was a technical consultant for Blue Star InfoTech providing interactive solutions for segmentation of abdominal aortic aneurysms in collaboration with BARCO, U.K. He is twice the recipient of Microsoft Travel Award in 2010 and 2012. Currently he is associated with Department of Electronics and Telecommunication, D. J. Sanghvi college of Engineering, University of Mumbai and is the IDC coordinator responsible for development of innovative ideas in association with Department of Science & Technology (DST) and National Entrepreneurship Network (NEN). He has over fifty prominent publications in journals and conferences of repute and authored two books on Applied Mathematics over a teaching carrier spanning more than ten years. He is an avid international traveler, more recently having delivered a talk on "Promising textiles, celebrating the Silicon of the Future" at "Aurel Vlaicu", University of Arad, Romania.
Shabbir N Merchant received his B. Tech, M. Tech, and PhD degrees all from Department of Electrical Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology Bombay, India. Currently he is a Professor in Department of Electrical Engineering at IIT Bombay. He has more than 30 years of experience in teaching and research. Dr. Merchant has made significant contributions in the field of signal processing and its applications. His noteworthy contributions have been in solving state of the art signal and image processing problems faced by Indian defence. His broad area of research interests are wireless communications, wireless sensor networks, signal processing, multimedia communication, and image processing and has published extensively in these areas. He is a co-author with his students who have won Best Paper Awards. He has been a chief investigator for a number of sponsored and consultancy projects. He has served as a consultant to both private industries and defence organizations. He is a Fellow of IETE. He is a recipient of 10th IETE Prof. S. V. C. Aiya Memorial Award for his contribution in the field of detection and tracking. He is also a recipient of 9th IETE SVC Aiya Memorial Award for ’Excellence in Telecom Education’. He is a winner of the 2013 VASVIK Award in the category of Electrical & Electronic Sciences & Technology.
Uday B. Desai received the B. Tech. degree from Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur, India, in 1974, the M.S. degree from the State University of New York, Buffalo, in 1976, and the Ph.D. degree from The Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, U.S.A., in 1979, all in Electrical Engineering. Since June 2009 he is the Director of IIT Hyderabad. From 1979 to 1987 he was with the Electrical Engineering Dept. at Washington State University, Pullman, WA, U.S.A. From 1987 to May 2009 he was a Professor in the Electrical Engineering. Department at the Indian Institute of Technology - Bombay. He has held Visiting Associate Professor’s position at Arizona State University, Purdue University, and Stanford University. He was a visiting Professor at EPFL, Lausanne during the summer of 2002. From July 2002 to June 2004 he was the Director of HP-IITM R and D Lab. at IIT-Madras.
His research interests are in wireless communication, IoT and statistical signal processing. He is the Editor of the book "Modeling and Applications of Stochastic Processes" (Kluwer Academic Press, Boston, U.S.A. 1986). He is also a co-author of 4 books dealing with signal processing and wireless communication.
Dr. Desai is a senior member of IEEE, a Fellow of INSA (Indian National Science Academy), Fellow of Indian National Academy of Engineering (INAE). He is on the board of Tata Communications Limited. He was also on the Visitation Panel for University of Ghana.