Agenda

As Director of Broadcast Solutions at Harmonic, Jing Zhou leads the company's go-to-market strategy for playout, encoding, as well as distribution solutions.

Chris "Doc" Tarr CPBE, AMD, DRB, CBNE is the Group Director of Engineering for Magnum Media, a family-owned Wisconsin based radio group with 22 stations across 31 stations. He is also the chair of the FCC's State Emergency Communications Committee for Wisconsin. He's been a broadcaster for almost 40 years.

Karl Lahm's 55-year broadcast engineering career has included large broadcast group transmission systems management, high-power international broadcasting, consulting engineering, and equipment design. He actively supports broadcast technical education initiatives in his mostly-retired years.

Markus Schumann is a Senior Software Engineer at Telestream, where he develops advanced software tools for content creators. With over a decade of experience in cross-platform media processing, Markus plays a key role in building the core media libraries that power Telestream's innovative solutions. -- A member of IEEE and a trained Electrical Engineer, Markus brings deep technical expertise and a strong architectural vision to every project he leads. Prior to his work at Telestream, he served as the technical architect and lead developer at Sonic Foundry, where he was instrumental in developing a network video recorder and streaming appliance. He also spent more than six years at Sony, where he led development and engineering management for audio/video file formats. -- Markus is passionate about building high-performance, scalable software systems that enable seamless media creation and distribution.

Robin Hérin is a Director of Standardization within the CTO Office at Ateme, where he helps the Research & Innovation team develop future technologies for video processing and delivery, and drive partnership projects and standardization advances. Robin also co-chairs the Advanced Television Standards Committee (ATSC) Planning Team 9, studying Sustainability of Media and Data Distribution and presents at conferences frequently on behalf of ATEME. -- Now in his tenth year at Ateme, Robin has previously worked in both South and North America as a Solutions Architect before moving to New York. -- Robin holds a master's degree in mechanical engineering from the Université de Technologie de Compiègne (France) and plays for the New York City Team Handball Club.

Roger Strand's career in broadcasting began in 1969 at WHMC-FM in Rice Lake, Wisconsin, where, as a high school junior, he voiced station IDs and PSA announcements to fill commercial breaks during the Milwaukee Brewers' inaugural season. His early passion for communications and technology launched a diverse and accomplished career spanning broadcasting, electrical design, and technical management. -- Roger served as Regional Technical Manager for the Educational Communications Board (ECB) through 2009, playing a key role in maintaining and improving broadcast infrastructure across Wisconsin. He continued his technical leadership as a Project Manager with Pieper Electric through 2018 and currently applies his expertise as an Electrical Designer with Cooper Engineering and as a Consultant with the ECB. -- He holds an Associate Degree in Industrial Technology from the University of Wisconsin-Stout and maintains active professional credentials as a Wisconsin Master Electrician and Registered Electrical Designer. Roger is also licensed by the FCC as both a General Radiotelephone Operator and an Amateur Radio Technician. -- Roger is a member and past president of the Wisconsin Electrical Trades Council and is active in the International Association of Electrical Inspectors.

Rusty Mooney is a graduate of the University of Arkansas Little Rock and a retired Navy officer. His broadcasting career has spanned three decades. His career began at an independent television station in Little Rock, Arkansas and he has worked for companies including Clear Channel Television, Newport Television, and Screen Service America. He founded Baseline RF Telecom Service to provide a wide range of broadcast engineering services. He has also worked for two telephone companies, providing microwave and fiber optic transport engineering, and VoIP operations. He is currently the Director of Television Transmission Systems at Sinclair Broadcast Group where he developed a curriculum for teaching basic RF theory and transmitter maintenance and operation for SBG employees.

Sam Matheny is Chief Technology Officer and Executive Vice President at the National Association of Broadcasters. With more than 30 years of experience in the broadcast and data networking industries, including earning multiple patents for DTV technologies, Sam leads NAB's technology team in its efforts to promote innovation and propel broadcast technology into the future. He also provides overall leadership for PILOT as well as NAB's TV, Radio, and Digital Technology Committees. -- Matheny is a member of the Academy of Digital Television Pioneers. He serves on the board of the Ultra HD Forum, the board of governors for the National Wireless Safety Alliance, the board of visitors for East Carolina University, and the board of advisors for Telecommunications Against Trafficking and Exploitation. He has served as an advisor to numerous startup and technology companies including Reveal Mobile, a location-based advertising technology company, and Haystack TV, a personalized streaming news channel. He has previously served on the FCC Communications Security, Reliability and Interoperability Council (CSRIC), the Federal Emergency Management Agency's (FEMA) Integrated Public Alert Warning System Network Advisory Council (IPAWS NAC), and on the board of directors for the Advanced Television Systems Committee (ATSC), where he was Chairman of the specialist group on the next generation of digital television. -- Before joining NAB, Sam served as Vice President of Policy and Innovation for Capitol Broadcasting Company where he focused on strategic media applications, mobile wireless content delivery, smart TV, and helped secure multiple patents for broadcast Internet distribution. He has also held management positions with mobile development, satellite, digital television, web development, and interactive video companies. -- Sam holds a B.S. in Communications from East Carolina University, a M.S. in Technology Management from North Carolina State University, and a certificate for artificial intelligence and business strategy from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. In 2007, he was named an American Marshall Memorial Fellow and in 2021-2023 served as a non-resident fellow of the German Marshall Fund.

Mike Erickson has been a technical support engineer for Orban Labs since 2022. He helps customers one-on-one with their audio processing needs, be it from choosing the right processor to supporting devices in the field. Before Orban, Erickson worked in television for Newsnet, a 24 hour national news network. Erickson spent 15 years at CBS radio in New York, was the chief engineer for WCBS-FM, and before that a staff engineer for sports radio WFAN where he did remote coordination for sporting events and worked on Imus in the Morning. Erickson's interest in processing began when he was working at Wireless Media in the 1990s on Long Island, helping stations from Florida to Maine maximize their audio chains with equipment already on hand and teaching better standards in the broadcast environment to get the best out of their on air sound.

Nick has worked in multiple areas of ERI's broadcast transmission business including engineering and design of FM radio and television antenna systems and of channel combiners for FM and TV applications. He spent the peak years of the digital television transition, a period of high demand and urgent delivery requirements, working at ERI's Gray Maine manufacturing facility producing television filter and multiplexer systems. Nick currently leads the RF engineering group at Electronics Research, Inc. and has been instrumental in introducing new products such as ERI's Shared Aperture FM Antennas, low power FM and TV filters, and the FM All Pass Filter. Nick graduated from Purdue University in 2005 with a B.S. ECET and joined the company later that year. He is a member of IEEE and AFCCE.

John Taylor is the long-time ATSC Communications Chairman, returning to the ATSC Board of Directors for 2023-24 after previously serving two board terms in the 2010s. As Senior Vice President for LG Electronics USA, he is most senior U.S. government affairs, public relations, industry relations executive for LG and its U.S. and subsidiary Zenith. Among various digital television activities, Taylor co-founded and was a driving force behind the Digital TV Transition Coalition in the 2000s and was Public Affairs Chairman of the Digital HDTV Grand Alliance in the 1990s. He is a founding member of the Steering Committee and current Chairman of the AWARN Alliance, and he serves on boards of trustees of The Media Institute and the Library of American Broadcasting Foundation. Taylor is the longest-serving member and past two-time chairman of the Video Division of the Consumer Technology Association, where he also previously chaired the CTA Communications Committee, Video Promotion committee, 4K UHD Working Group and HDTV Promotion committee.

Fred Engel, CPBE, ATSC3, is a widely respected leader in the broadcast media industry. He has been recognized for work in developing creative broadcast applications for ATSC 3.0/NEXTGEN TV including Public Safety Communications efforts that won the 2017 National Association of Broadcasters (NAB) Pilot Innovation Grant Competition, best television paper at the 2022 NAB BEIT Conference, Best Paper at the 2022 IEEE BTS BMSB Conference and the NAB 2023 Technology Innovation Award. In 2020, Engel was elected to the ATSC Board of Directors and was recently re-elected for a second term.

Engel has held senior technology leadership roles at WTTW/Chicago (28 years), a systems integration firm in Chicago (3 years), Kentucky Educational Television (6 years), and PBS North Carolina (8 years). He retired from PBS North Carolina in August 2024 and began his consulting business, Fred Engel Technology Consulting, LLC.

Engel has been a speaker at the PBS TechCon, PBS Annual Meetings, America's Public Television Stations Summit, NAB conventions and many public safety communication conferences. He was the Raleigh/Durham SBE Chapter 93 Chair and holds CPBE and ATSC3 Specialist certifications.He had a six-year tenure on PBS ETAC and has been an active participant with AWARN and NVISA. He was the Television Chair of the North Carolina State Emergency Coordination Committee. In 2023, he became the PBS Station Representative on the NAB's Television Engineering Committee and served on the FCC/NAB "Future of Television" Initiative.

Jason Quinn is director of engineering at New Mexico PBS and is responsible for maintaining and developing 35 mountaintop translator sites and NMPBS facilities on Sandia Crest and in Albuquerque.

RJ Russell is a Regional Director of Engineering for the Sinclair Broadcast Group with more than 35 years of experience as a broadcast engineer. Before joining Sinclair, he operated Technical Broadcast Solutions, Inc. where he worked as the hands-on engineer for the National Association of Broadcaster's ATSC 3.0 lab. He is an SBE Fellow and is a Certified Professional Broadcast Engineer and ATSC 3 Specialist.