Dr. Julio Romero Agüero is Vice President, Strategy and Business Innovation at Quanta Technology. He has 20 years of industry experience and specializes in grid modernization, technology strategy, smart grid, planning, reliability, operations, and analysis of power distribution systems, and integration of distributed energy resources and emerging technologies. He has developed solutions in these areas for utilities in the USA, Canada, Latin America, the Caribbean and Asia. He is a Senior Member of the IEEE, Chair of the IEEE Distribution Subcommittee, Chair of the IEEE Working Group on Distributed Resources Integration, Editor of IEEE Transactions on Smart Grid, Editor of IEEE Transactions on Power Delivery, and member of the Advisory Committee of DistribuTECH.

Dr. Alexander Apostolov received MS degree in Electrical Engineering, MS in Applied Mathematics and Ph.D. from the Technical University in Sofia, Bulgaria. He has 40 years’ experience in power systems protection, automation, control and communications.

He is presently Principal Engineer for OMICRON electronics in Los Angeles, CA.

He is IEEE Fellow and Member of the Power Systems Relaying Committee and Substations C0 Subcommittee. He is past Chairman of the Relay Communications Subcommittee, serves on many IEEE PES Working Groups and is Chairman of Working Groups C2 “Role of Protective Relaying in Smart Grid”.

He is member of IEC TC57 working groups 10, 17, 18 and 19.

He is Distinguished Member of CIGRE and Convenor of CIGRE WG B5.53 ”Test Strategy for Protection, Automation and Control (PAC) functions in a full digital substation based on IEC 61850 applications” and member of several other CIGRE B5 working groups.

He holds four patents and has authored and presented more than 480 technical papers.

He is IEEE Distinguished Lecturer and Adjunct Professor at the Department of Electrical Engineering, Cape Peninsula University of Technology, Cape Town, South Africa.

He is Editor-in-Chief of PAC World.

Don Bowman was literally born and raised within the rural electric cooperative family. His grandfather, uncle and father each held General Manager positions at electric cooperatives. After receiving an engineering degree from the University of Virginia, Don earned his MBA at American University. In 1998, Don began working at NRTC, the National Rural Telecommunications Cooperative, where he held the position of Vice President of Utility Solutions. At NRTC, Don worked with over 120 different utilities with their development of AMI and telecommunications strategies, assisting them in the improvement of operating efficiencies. In March of 2010, Don joined Wake EMC as the Manager of Engineering to develop, implement and maintain the technology roadmap.

Kate Cummings is a product manager in the Distribution Automation group responsible for switchgear automation and has been with G&W Electric for 7.5 years. She was previously the supervisor of the production electronics engineering group which supports sales orders from quote stage to aftermarket. Kate received a BSEE from the University of Illinois at Chicago in December of 2000.

Stephan Geiger graduated from the Technical College of Bregenz (Austria) with a focus on Electrical Engineering in 2007. He joined OMICRON electronics GmbH in Austria in 2008 as an Application Engineer for protective relay applications, where he worked on application notes and custom applications, provided training and later took over project management responsibilities.

In 2012 he became Product Manager with responsibility for OMICRON's recloser control testing solutions.

Greg Hataway received his B.S. in Electrical Engineering from the University of Alabama in 1991. He has broad experience in the field of power system operations and protection. Upon graduating, he served nearly 12 years at Alabama Electric Cooperative, now PowerSouth Energy Cooperative, where he worked in distribution, transmission, and substation protection before assuming the role of Superintendent of Technical Services at the cooperative. In this position he coordinated the utility’s efforts in protection and power quality. He joined Schweitzer Engineering Laboratories, Inc. in 2002 as a Field Application Engineer in the Southeast Region. He returned to PowerSouth for a 3 year stint in 2009 with the position of Division Engineer in Power Delivery.  He returned to SEL in 2012 and now holds the title of Senior Application Engineer. Greg is an IEEE member and is a registered Professional Engineer in the State of Alabama.

Jeff Hauber, PE, is a Senior Engineer in the Distribution Automation/Technologies group at Westar Energy. He received a BSEE from the University of Kansas in 2005. He started at Westar Energy as a Distribution Engineer with responsibilities including planning, coordination, design, power quality, and reliability. He began working in the Distribution Automation group in 2013. He is a professional engineer in Kansas and a member of IEEE.

Dr. Hamid Jaffari is the Director of Engineering & Operations for Reading Municipal Utility. He has over thirty two years of experience in power system engineering with concentration in Distribution, Substation Design, Operation, and Reliability. He has over twenty years of teaching experience as a lecturer and adjunct faculty at Northeastern University, UMASS, and several universities abroad. Performing part-time consulting and expert testimony, Dr. Jaffari has also provided assistance to several legal firms, engineering firms, as well as providing technical analysis and planning for other utilities in upgrading their systems and reliability indices.

Dr. Jaffari earned his BS (1983), MS (1985), and EED (1990) from Northeastern University in Electrical Engineering and Doctor of Business Administration (DBA) from Argosy University in 2006. His areas of interest are Smart Grid, Distribution Automation, System Coordination and Protection, AMI/DMS/SCADA data integration, ESB/SOA Data Integration technology, and Engineering Analysis Software, Outage Management, and Smart Grid Management Technology.

Robert Loveless has 22 years of experience in the electrical trade that includes construction, testing, and education. As a journeyman electrician he has a background in both commercial and industrial installations. After ten years in the construction field he helped start a testing and maintenance division. He worked as both a salesman and a sales manager growing the new business to record levels for this division. As an instructor he has taught both journeyman prep, electrical level IV and continuing education classes for the Construction Education Foundation. He joined Shermco Industries as an Account Manager in the Engineering Service Division. He is currently the Regional Sales Manager for Shermco Engineering Service Division.

Mike Meisinger joined S&C Electric Co. in 1996, and after spending 5-1/2 years abroad supporting S&C’s businesses in Europe, the Middle East, and Africa, is currently an Application Director for S&C’s Grid Control and Connectivity group based in Chicago. His 43 years of experience have primarily focused on protective relaying application, design, and testing, spanning protection requirements for nuclear power plants to distribution substations and feeders.

As the emphasis on improving medium-voltage distribution system reliability continues to heighten, Mike presently draws upon his knowledge of transmission network reliability requirements to help generate creative solutions of varying levels of performance. This is evidenced by his architecting of North America’s first medium-voltage, underground, no-outage installation on International Drive in Orlando, FL in 1999.

Mike is a Senior Member of the IEEE, a Main Committee member of the Power System Relaying Committee, and has been actively involved with the Power System Relaying Committee since 1982. He holds several patents, has authored numerous technical papers, and is a guest lecturer at several Universities in the United Kingdom.

Marina Mondello is a senior engineer in Reliability Programs and has been with ComEd for 16 years. She was previously in the Distribution Automation Group which monitors and troubleshoots the Distribution Automation system at ComEd, along with developing settings for DA equipment. Prior to the DA Group she was in the Distribution Testing and New Business Departments. Marina received a BSEE from Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology in 2000.

Christopher Pritchard was born in 1982 in Dortmund / Germany. He received his diploma in Electrical Engineering at the University of Applied Science in Dortmund in 2006. He joined OMICRON electronics in 2006 where he worked in application software development in the field of testing solutions for protection and measurement systems and is now the responsible Product Manager for simulation based testing solutions.

Peter Selejan graduated with a BSEE degree from the University of Florida in 1992. Having been with ABB for over 20 years, he worked as R&D Engineer on ABB relays, and more recently Recloser Product Manager and Application Engineer. He was awarded two patents in the area of relay phase selection.

Andre Smit graduated from the Vaal Triangle University in South Africa in 1988. He joined Siemens in 1989 has been working in the field of protective relaying for the past 26 years. He specialized in protection systems for base load generators. From 2004 to 2008 he managed and directed the USA Siemens Protective relay business unit. His current position is Product Development & Engineering Manager of Distribution Feeder Automation products and systems. He has 4 patents and patents pending on new methods to protect and automate distribution feeders. He is a member of the IEEE.

Craig Thompson received his B.S. in mechanical engineering in 1985 and his M.S. in mechanical engineering in 1987, both from Kansas State University. He held engineering and engineering management roles in a number of industries including aeronautics, avionics, medical devices, wireless communications, and computing before joining Schweitzer Engineering Laboratories, Inc. (SEL) in 2002. He brought this wide range of experience to several positions at SEL and is currently the Senior Product Manager for distribution products including relays, recloser controls, and voltage regulator controls, as well as the SEL DNA^™ (Distribution Network Automation) solutions.

Billy Walker is the Manager of Technical Services at Wake Electric Membership Corporation where he is currently focused on the utility’s SCADA and Distribution Automation efforts. He has worked in the electrical utility industry for over 25 years, and some of his previous experience includes substation maintenance, control installations, relay testing, generation plant maintenance, and mobile substation transformers. He became certified in Electrical Installation and Maintenance in 1993, holds a North Carolina Electrical Contractor License, and currently serves on the North Carolina Cooperative’s Technologies Conference Planning Committee.

Chris Wright is the System Engineer with Wake Electric Membership Corporation. He is responsible for the coordination and protection of the distribution system along with system planning. He received his B.S. in Electrical Engineering from West Virginia University in 2001. He has spent the last 10 years in the utility industry in distribution and transmission engineering.