Region 6 2023 Spring Meeting & EXPO

Alex Porter graduated with a BS in Electrical Engineering and a BS in computer Engineering from Missouri University of Science and Technology in 2016. Alex has grown his career in fiber optic networks including design, implementation, and maintenance. Alex has also been involved in large-scale privatization of a wide area network and the retirement of leased copper circuits. Alex is currently a Senior Network Engineer at Ameren and is passionate about GIS and innovative technology.

Bill Clay is a Cisco Technical Security Architect focused on cybersecurity consulting for over 12 years in various technical roles. Bill is seen as a cybersecurity design thought leader within Cisco due to his passion and success in helping organizations utilize risk analysis techniques for security design justification. He currently resides in Denver, CO with his wife Adriana and four cats. When he isn’t helping thwart attackers he enjoys golf, hiking, camping, skiing, and PC gaming.

Lon Renner is a licensed professional engineer at Nebraska Public Power District specializing in microwave and two-way radio. He has participated in UTC at the regional and national levels and has served as Region 6 chairman in the past.  He currently serves in the System Administrative Group for the Nebraska Statewide Radio System.

As head of the technology enterprise, Senad is responsible for the strategy and technical evolution of Nokia’s enterprise presales organization, solution architecture, and sales engineering teams.  As part of his role, Senad is directly engaged with the customer base spanning from Fortune 500, large and small enterprises all the way to public and private utilities and energy companies.  Senad’s technical involvement with Nokia’s enterprise customer base spans the entire Nokia ION wireline and wireless portfolio.  His current focus is on data center technologies and ongoing DC evolution.  Prior to this role, Senad led a sales engineering organization focusing on SDN and SDWAN technologies as part of Nuage Networks BU.  Before Nuage, Senad worked as Consulting Engineer within Nokia’s RBC ION organization focusing on the service provider market.  And before joining Nokia, Senad spent ten years with Juniper Networks in various customer-facing engineering roles.  Senad holds a BS Degree in Telecommunications from Weber State University and has over 20 years of experience in networking and the telecom industry, is a co-author of JUNOS High Availability Book, and numerous IETF RFC Standards in the area of IP/MPLS Control Plane signaling.

24 years of telecommunications experience at LES, 1.5 years as a telecommunications crew leader 22.5 years as a telecommunications specialist.  3 years of RF engineering experience at Transcrypt International.  Associate of Electronic engineering Southeast Community College Milford Campus.

Matt has been with Nebraska Public Power District for 12 years.  He has been the Telecommunications Manager since April 2020.  Prior to that role, Matt was a Telecommunications Engineer specializing in phone systems and carrier ethernet.  Matt is also a licensed Professional Engineer in Nebraska.

Mat is a Technical Consultant with Burns & McDonnell and provides consulting to help utilities investigate and define their future wireless network strategy. Mat has 30+ years of experience representing a blend of wireless carrier experience and network strategy and planning experience at a large U.S. investor-owned utility where he championed the spectrum investigation and planning effort that resulted in the initial private LTE deployment. Mat is active in the Utility Broadband Alliance and led the first two “Plugfest” events, using live private LTE networks to demonstrate composite utility workloads, LMR-LTE push-to-talk interoperability, and modem failover behavior. He is also a vice-chair for the UBBA Technology & Cyber working group.

Daniel Allnutt is an electrical engineer at Burns & McDonnell. He builds and maintains a portfolio of devices that can support various wireless technologies, electrical utility requirements and unique radio frequency spectrum requirements. He has more than 10 years of experience in the engineering field focusing on security, product deployments, software development, electrical design, testing and verification, and LTE device integrations.

Guilhermme Lisboa is an Electrical Engineer, born and raised in Brazil. He obtained his bachelor’s degree in Electrical Engineering from UFPR in 2007, and currently is pursuing his master’s degree at the same University. He has been working with Protection and Control Systems for 15 years as a system integrator, from solution design until commissioning for Transmission and Distribution Utilities, as well as other large industries and subway systems.

Dewey is a Principal Operational Technology Architect at Pacific Gas and Electric company. He has 28 years of experience designing fiber optic, microwave, and radio communications systems supporting utility needs through the 79,000 square mile PG&E service territory. He served for 15 years on the WECC telecommunications workgroup before joining UTCs leadership team. He served UTC for 4 years as chair of the Public Policy Division prior to being elected to the executive committee. Dewey has a Bachelor’s Degree in electrical engineering from  California State University Fresno.

As Legal Counsel for Certes Networks, Simon assists with regulatory and compliance issues, contract drafting and negotiations, disputes, intellectual property and general legal matters.  Simon has extensive international experience in the technology sector and his combination of both legal and technical skills enables him to translate complex legal regulations and mandates into clear and definitive technical requirements for IT and Engineering teams.

Simon is a regular speaker on data protecting and cyber security regulations including GDPR, HIPAA, NIST Frameworks and PCI DSS. Simon resides in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

David Hattey is a seasoned strategic leader with thirty-plus years of successful executive assignments across IT, telecom, wireless, cloud services, and networking companies serving the Utility, Public Service, and Enterprise spaces. He is currently a consultant providing technology and strategy support through Lockard & White. David has held contributing and leadership positions in every area of business while working for companies ranging from start-ups to Fortune 100. He was awarded BS Electrical Engineering and BS Computer Engineering degrees from the University of Michigan, both Magna Cum Laude, as well as an MBA from Duke’s Fuqua School of Business where he was named a Fuqua Scholar. David is a named inventor on 11 US patents.

Dan Weis graduated with a BS EET from the Milwaukee School of Engineering in 1989.  Dan has worked in the communication industry for 33 plus years.  Dan’s experience includes LMR, fiber and microwave system design, engineering, and deployment.  Dan also has man-years of LMR in-building RF coverage system design, engineering and deployment experience.  Dan has served as a consultant, pre-sales engineer, post-sales engineer, project manager, and project engineer in the communications industry.  Dan is currently the Sr. RF Engineer at Omaha Public Power District.  Dan has been with OPPD since 2018.

Brett Kilbourne is the Utilities Technology Council’s General Counsel and Vice President of Policy, the Washington-based association representing vital energy and water utilities on their mission-critical technologies by driving innovation, fostering collaboration, and influencing public policy.

In this role, Mr. Kilbourne provides legal guidance to utilities on telecommunications issues both pending before federal and state agencies and being considered in Congress.

He received his Juris Doctor degree from Catholic University and his Bachelor of Arts degree from the University of the South. Mr. Kilbourne is licensed to practice law in the state of Maryland and is a member of the American Bar Association and the Federal Communications Bar Association.