Abstract: As we transition from 5G to 6G, the fusion of Augmented Intelligence (AI) and Wireless Communication is set to redefine connectivity, network intelligence, and user experience. 6G will not just be faster—it will be cognitive, self-optimizing, and deeply integrated with AI-driven automation. This talk explores the key enablers of 6G, including AI-native network architectures, reconfigurable intelligent surfaces (RIS), terahertz (THz) spectrum, digital twins, machine-to-machine communications and more. We will highlight how AI will drive intelligent resource allocation, ultra-low latency edge computing, and predictive maintenance of networks, ensuring autonomous and resilient connectivity. By bridging theory with real-world applications, this session provides a comprehensive outlook on prospective 6G as the AI-powered cyber-physical systems backbone of the future. 

Bio: Dr. Aloknath De is Founder and CEO of TechCrafter.cps. He has been Corporate Vice-President of Samsung Electronics, S.Korea and Chief Technology Officer of Samsung India. Dr. De has thirty six years of industry and research experience including BEL, Nortel, Hughes, ST-Ericsson and Samsung. In last 20 years, he has also been Adjunct or Visiting Professor with IISc, and IITs in Jodhpur, Delhi and Roorkee. He holds Ph.D. from McGill University, Montreal; M.E. from IISc-Bangalore; and B.Tech and Distinguished Alumnus of IIT, Kharagpur.

Dr. De is Chairman for Ministry of Electronics and IT (MeitY)’s National AgriTech program. He is a recipient of ‘Alexander Graham Bell Prize’ in Canada. He has received ‘IETE Memorial Awards’, IDC Insights Award for ‘Telecom Innovation’, Zinnov Award for ‘Intrapreneurship’, Assocham Award for ‘Çorporate Tech Leadership’, Nasscom ‘AI Gamechanger’, IEEE ‘MGA Innovation’ and India Council ‘2024 Technologist of the Year’ Awards among others. He is Fellow of IETE, IEI and Chairman of NDRF. He is also Fellow and GC member of INAE.

He has 50+ patents under filed/grant and with his leadership, Samsung India touched 7500+ patents cumulatively by its silver jubilee year; and receiving National IP award multiple times. Through Samsung Ventures and as Angel Investor, he has invested in three dozen startups in India. Recently, he has co-edited a book on ‘6G Mobile Wireless Networks’ with Springer and has delivered ‘IEEE Sir JC Bose Milestone Commemorative Lecture 2024’. He was cited in World’s Top50 CTOs. 

Abstract: We consider a multi-armed bandit setting with finitely many arms, in which each arm yields an M-dimensional vector reward upon selection. We assume that the reward of each dimension (a.k.a. objective) is generated independently of the others. The best arm of any given objective is the arm with the largest component of mean corresponding to the objective. The end goal is to identify the best arm of every objective in the shortest (expected) time subject to an upper bound on the probability of error (i.e., fixed-confidence regime). We establish a problem-dependent lower bound on the limiting growth rate of the expected stopping time, in the limit of vanishing error probabilities. This lower bound, we show, is characterised by a max-min optimisation problem that is computationally expensive to solve at each time step. We propose an algorithm that uses the novel idea of surrogate proportions to sample the arms at each time step, eliminating the need to solve the max-min optimisation problem at each step. We demonstrate theoretically that our algorithm is asymptotically optimal. We provide extensive empirical studies to substantiate the efficiency of our algorithm. Finally, applications of best arm identification to the problem of fast beam alignment in wireless communications will be discussed. 

This is joint work with Zhirui Chen (National University of Singapore), P. N. Karthik (IIT Hyderabad), Yeow Meng Chee (National University of Singapore), Yi Wei (Zhejiang University) and Zixin Zhong (Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, Guangzhou). 

Bio: Vincent Y. F. Tan received the B.A. and M.Eng. degrees in electrical and information science from Cambridge University in 2005, and the Ph.D. degree in electrical engineering and computer science (EECS) from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in 2011. He is currently a Professor with the Department of Mathematics and the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE), National University of Singapore (NUS). His research interests include information theory, machine learning, and statistical signal processing.

Abstract: Internet service is provided by two complementary networks---access provider (AP) networks and content provider (CP) networks; without one, the other is significantly less valuable. Despite the complementarity of the two services, contrary to conventional wisdom of classical economic theory, CPs have been more effective in monetizing their resources than the APs. Studies show that the share of the Internet Value Chain pie for the APs has been decreasing steadily.  However, content creation and rendering have made steady technology advances and the burden of delivering these advances is on the APs ; they have to make heavy investments while the CPs reap a larger share of the economic surplus that will result from this investment.

There have been several attempts by the APs to monetize better through schemes like (1) two-sided pricing, (2) graded QoS to content providers, (3) sponsored content service, and (4) strategic interconnections. They also face a variety of regulatory constraints. In this talk, I will trace the history of these schemes and their game theoretic analyses. I will conclude with a hypothetical, a thought-experiment, in which the CPs make a `voluntary’ payment to the APs, and examine its impact and feasibility. 

Bio: D. Manjunath received his BE from Mysore University, MS from Indian Institute  of Technology, Madras and PhD from Rensselaer Polytechnic Inst, Troy NY in  1986, 1989  and 1993 respectively. He has worked in the  Corporate R & D center  of General Electric in  Scehenctady NY during the summer of 1990. He was a  Visiting Faculty in the Comuter and Information Sciences Dept of the University of Delaware and a Post Doctoral  Fellow in the Computer Science  Dept of the University of  Toronto. He was on the Electrical Engineering  faculty of the Indian Inst of Technology, Kanpur during December  1994 - July 1998.  He has been with the Deptt of Electrical Engineering of IIT, Bombay since July 1998.  

Abstract: The basic information-bearing carrier in Zak-OTFS is a pulse in the DD domain which is a quasi-periodic localized function. The Zak-OTFS performance is influenced by how well these pulses are localized in the DD domain. A DD filter matched to the transmit filter is used at the receiver. The 'effective' channel in Zak-OTFS includes the cascade of the transmit DD filter, the physical channel, and the receive DD filter. Consequently, the choice of the pulse shaping filter influences the DD spread of the effective channel. Estimating the DD domain input-output (I/O) relation in Zak-OTFS amounts to estimating the coefficients of the effective channel. The estimated I/O relation is used for subsequent equalization/detection in the DD domain. Therefore, the pulse shape influences the performance of the two important receiver functions, namely, I/O relation estimation and equalization/detection. The pulse shape also influences the localization performance in radar sensing using Zak-OTFS. This talk will focus on the choice of the pulse shaping filter and its effect on the I/O relation estimation and equalization performance in Zak-OTFS.

Bio: A. Chockalingam is a professor in the department of ECE, Indian Institute of Science (IISc), Bangalore. He obtained the Ph.D. degree from the same department in 1993. He was a postdoctoral fellow and an assistant project scientist in the department of ECE, UC San Diego from 1993 to 1996. He was with Qualcomm, San Diego, as a Staff Engineer/Manager from 1996 to 1998. Since 1998 he has been a faculty at IISc, Bangalore. He has served as an editor/associate editor of IEEE Trans. on Wireless Communications, IEEE Trans. Vehicular Technology, IEEE JSAC, and IEEE JSTSP. He is an author of the book on “Large MIMO Systems” published by Cambridge University Press in 2014. He is also an author of the recent book on “OTFS Modulation – Theory and Applications” published by IEEE-Wiley in December 2024.