Keynote
Agentic AI in action: From Observability and Evaluation of multi-agent systems to Real-World application to Networking Operations
Giovanna Carofiglio – Cisco Outshift
Dr. Giovanna Carofiglio leads incubation and innovation at Cisco Outshift (Cisco’s incubation engine), where she is currently developing generative AI and agentic applications in networking to streamline network operations, such as network change validation and troubleshooting. Her recent work also addresses fundamental aspects of agent observability and evaluation, both within Cisco and the open-source community, contributing to initiatives like Agntcy.org (an Internet of Agents collective) created by Outshift by Cisco.
With Cisco Systems since 2015, as Distinguished Engineer and Senior Director in various cross-company innovation organizations, she has driven technology and product innovation projects in collaboration with product divisions, academic and business partners, and customers. Over the past year, she has focused on machine learning applications to real-time cyber threat detection for cloud applications and services. With more than 70 publications and 60 patents, her expertise spans content networking, network mobility, real-time communications, application quality of experience inference, cloud observability, and cybersecurity.
Previously, between 2008 and 2015, she was with Alcatel-Lucent Bell Labs as a research scientist and head of the research department on content networking, pioneering research work on Information-Centric Networking.
She received her MS in EE and CS from Politecnico di Torino, Italy, in 2004, and her PhD in 2008, jointly from Politecnico di Torino and Telecom ParisTech/INRIA/Ecole Normale Supérieure Ulm, Paris, France. Her graduate research focused on stochastic analysis of wired and wireless networks.
Previously, between 2008 and 2015, she was with Alcatel-Lucent Bell Labs as a research scientist and head of the research department on content networking, pioneering research work on Information-Centric Networking.
Status and (desired) evolution of Telecommunications Research in Italy
Nicola Blefari-Melazzi – University of Rome Tor Vergata
Nicola Blefari-Melazzi is a full Professor of Telecommunications at the University of Roma Tor Vergata, where he served as Chair of the PhD program in Telecommunications Engineering, Chair of the undergraduate and graduate programs in Telecommunications Engineering and Chair of the Department of Electronic Engineering. From January 2017 to January 2023 he has been the Director of CNIT (National Inter-University Consortium for Telecommunications), a non-profit Consortium made up of 41 Italian Universities. More than 1,300 people, belonging to the participating universities, collaborate with CNIT, while the number of own-employees is more than 100. Since January 2023 he is the president of CNIT.
His research projects have been funded by Italian Ministries, by the Italian National Research Council, by major companies (e.g., Ericsson, Telecom Italia), by the ESA and by the EU. He has participated in 33 EU projects, playing the role of project coordinator and PI for eight of them. He has been a member of the board of the 5G Infrastructure Association, the private side of the 5G Public Private Partnership, a joint initiative between the European ICT sector and the European Commission, which funded with a 1.4 Billion Euro budget the R&D on 5G. He is still a member of the 5G Infrastructure Association, now re-named 6G Infrastructure Association, that recently founded the Smart Networks and Services Joint Undertaking together with the European Commission, which is funding with 900 MEUR the research and development for 6G and related technologies. He has been appointed by the Ministry of University and Research as Italian representative in the Member States’ Representatives Group of such Smart Networks and Services Joint Undertaking.
Since September 2022, he is the President of the RESTART Foundation, established primarily for the implementation, coordination and management of the research program “Telecommunications of the Future”, funded by the Italian Ministry of University with 116 M€.
He evaluated many research proposals and projects in EU programs and served as TPC member, TPC Chair, General Chair and Steering Committee Chair for IEEE Conferences and guest editor for IEEE Journals. He has been an area editor for Elsevier’s Computer Networks. He is author/co-author of about 260 papers. His research interests lie in the performance evaluation, design and control of telecommunications networks.