Cathy Mulligan

Abstract: The transition towards 6G and future networks will contain a number of difficult issues for the telecommunications industry to contemplate – the balance between enabling so-called “extreme edge” cases and also the issue of developing appropriate solutions for swarm networking while ensuring the cost-effectiveness of network delivery while driving down the energy and material consumption of the networks to achieve sustainability guidelines is a key area for the networks to solve. This work illustrates a ‘blockchain-enabled' method to assist network operators to deliver this new type of infrastructure in a cost-effective and sustainable manner.

Biography: Cathy Mulligan is the European Research Area Chair in Blockchain at Instituto Superior Técnico, where she leads a Lab dedicated to research in Blockchain for Social Good and Sustainability.  Cathy is an interdisciplinary researcher focusing on Digital technologies and Digital transformation from the perspectives of Engineering and Economics.  Her technical research focuses on the new architectural / protocol paradigms for telecommunications networks due to emerging digital technologies and changing economic structures.  She has written 7 books on telecommunications engineering.  Cathy received her PhD (Econ) and her MPhil in Engineering for which she received letters of distinction from the University of Cambridge.

In addition to her academic career, Cathy is a Fellow of the World Economic Forum for Cryptocurrency and was a member of the United Nations Secretary General’s High-Level Panel on Digital Cooperation during 2019.  Cathy has advised multiple governments, companies, and NGOs on Digital Transformation & Cryptocurrency / Blockchain.  She is a Visiting Lecturer at Imperial College London, where she teaches “Digital Transformation: Leading Real-World Change” and co-founded the Imperial College Centre for Cryptocurrency Research and Engineering – the world’s first academic centre on cryptocurrency and blockchain in 2013.  She has also had numerous senior corporate positions including CTO for a consulting company leading a technical team of 14,000 staff over North and West Europe.