19 Mar 2026
14:30 - 15:30
Expo Theater III
The future of Passive Optical Networks (PON) is being shaped by two major forces: the convergence of access networks to serve residential, business, mobile, IoT, and smart city applications, and the rising demand for intelligent, service-aware infrastructure that ensures assured Quality of Experience (QoE). To address these shifts, PON must evolve beyond traditional residential connectivity into a unified, multi-access platform capable of supporting diverse services and dynamic use cases. This session explores the latest advancements in technology and standards that enable this transformation — from next-generation PON architectures to AI-driven network intelligence and open, interoperable frameworks — paving the way for flexible, scalable, and future-proof access networks.
Presented By:
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Moderator
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Bernd Hesse
CMO of the Board, Broadband Forum, United States
Bernd Hesse is an established expert in the international telecommunications market with over 30 years of experience in the optical carrier Ethernet and access markets.
Bernd serves on the BBF Board of Directors, which appointed him Chief Marketing Officer and Marketing Chair. In addition to instituting the Marketing Councils, he successfully established and chairs the BASe (Broadband Acceleration Seminar events) Program. He recently formed the EAB (Executive Advisory Board) with today’s Industry thought leaders, which he co-chairs.
He has founded and chaired several organizations, including NGPON2 Forum, WDM PON Forum, Cloud Access Forum (CAF), Virtual Access Forum (VAF), and G.FAST Forum, which he subsequently merged with BBF to form their Marketing Councils.
Panelists
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Andrew Bender
CTO, Head of Strategy, Fixed Networks, Nokia, United States
Andrew Bender is CTO and Head of Strategy for the Network Infrastructure – Fixed Networks business division of Nokia. He is responsible for the team of industry experts managing new technology initiatives, industry engagement, ecosystem strategy and the invention portfolio in the division. Working in partnership with Nokia Bell Labs, Nokia Fixed Networks innovations span the broadband, multigigabit PON, optical access, 5G and millimeter wave fixed wireless, Wi-Fi, SDN, network automation, and cloud software application domains. Andrew is an industry veteran with over 20 years of experience across the networking, hardware engineering, cloud computing, and software sectors. Andrew was previously CTO of DZS and has held a number of senior technical leadership positions at VMware, Hewlett Packard Enterprise and NEC Corporation of America.
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Frank Effenberger
Futurewei, United States
Dr. Frank Effenberger has worked in the optical access field at Bellcore, Quantum Bridge Communications (Motorola), and Futurewei Technologies, where he is now the Fellow for fixed access network technology. His team works on forward-looking fiber access technologies, with several “world’s first” prototypes and trials. Frank is the rapporteur for ITU-T Q2/15, and chair of IEEE 802.3cp, is a Fellow of the OSA and the IEEE, and holds 130 US patents.
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Guillaume Lavallée
Optical Solutions, Manager, EXFO, Canada
Guillaume Lavallee is a Solution Manager at EXFO, the communications industry’s test, monitoring and analytics experts. He oversees the broadband access market in the Network Deployment and Operations division. He has more than 18 years of experience in telecom test and measurement, related technologies, and best practices. Guillaume holds a bachelor’s degree in Physics Engineering, specialized in Optics, as well as an MBA from Canada’s University Laval.
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Matt Schmidt
Distinguished Technologist, CableLabs, United States