Signal Processing - July 2017 - 11

process that took them from ideation to results shows that careers are a journey
indeed. In short, a successful career is
a hodgepodge of experiences, growth
through overcoming challenges, project
successes, and willingness to embrace
new ways of using signal processing training in different engineering problems.

Author

CharlesCasimiroCavalcante(charles@
gtel.ufc.br) received a Ph.D. degree
from the University of Campinas. He
is an associate professor at the Universidade Federal do Ceará, Brazil, and
holds the Statistical Signal Processing
Chair. He has been a visiting assistant
professor in the Department of Computer Science and Electrical Engineering at the University of Maryland,
Baltimore County. He is a Senior Member of the IEEE and of the Brazilian
Telecommunications Society.

Khaled El-Maleh
I have witnessed the
great impact of signal processing in our
lives! With signal processing training spanning three degrees
(my B.Eng., M.Eng.,
and Ph.D. degrees) followed by more
than 17 years of industry experience, I
have been fortunate to have a successful
and rich signal processing career. I think
the main reasons for this success have
been realizing the great value of continuing my relationship with academic institutions (both students and professors),
with the IEEE Signal Processing Society, as well as working on developing
multimedia consumer products using
signal processing algorithms. Examples
of such products are smartphones with
wide-band telephony, advanced camera
and video telephony, and streaming.
In addition, I have recently expanded
my signal processing knowledge in
emerging areas like the Internet of
Things, automotive, mobile health care,
and smart cities.

Author

Khaled El-Maleh (kelmaleh@qualcomm
.com) received his Ph.D. degree in

electrical and computer engineering
from McGill University, Canada. He
is a senior director of technology in the
Intellectual Property (IP) Department
of Qualcomm leading the Sensor and
Display IP Portfolio Team, Multimedia Technology Team, and related IP
Strategy areas. He is a technologist
and strategist with focus on entrepreneurship and innovation, as well as an
accomplished inventor with more than
200 U.S. and international patents. He
was awarded the Qualcomm Career
Thought Leadership Award in 2009
and the IP Department 2013 Distinguished Contributor Award.

Gene A. Frantz
I first will start with
an equation, which
is the basis for my
answer: DSP + Divide
= Math.
When we began
the drive into digital
signal proessing (DSP), both in theory
and hardware, we avoided the divide
operator, as hardware didn't do the
divide operation well. In spite of that,
DSP technology advanced in both theory and hardware, finding new uses and
new users. These new uses demanded
high-performance math engines. Lately, new terms such as cloud computing, the Internet of Things, big data,
smart sensors, etc. are driving us even
harder than those initial drivers of DSP
(speech, modems, hard disk drives,
and three-dimensional graphics). Now,
with this as a background, I can answer
the question of what does a successful
career look like? It is a career where the
technology I helped to create became
a societal necessity within the span
of my career. For many of us, this has
happened multiple times. It will continue to happen. All we need to do is to
continue to look for those new uses and
new users and then make it happen.

Shan He
A successful career
with signal processing training is one
where you can utilize
your analytical skill
obtained during the
t ra i n i ng to eit her
directly solve a technical problem, such
as working as an engineer, or assist others to clarify their solution and to obtain
rights associated with solution, for
example, working in the patent law area.
I am currently practicing patent law,
and I found my signal processing background bring me tremendous advantage
over other patent practitioners. This
is because my strong technical background enables me to understand the
invention quicker and deeper, which
allows me to assist inventors to achieve
the broadest possible legal protection for
their invention.

Author

Shan He (shanhe@gmail.com) received
her Ph.D. degree in 2007 from the University of Maryland, majoring in communications and signal processing. She
worked as a research scientist in the
research lab of Thomson Multimedia
for three years. She then switched her
career path in 2010 to become a patent
agent with Lee & Hayes, PLLC, serving
clients including the world's most valuable technology companies. She expects
to obtain her law degree in December 2017.

Hing Cheung So

Author

Gene A. Frantz (Gene.Frantz@octa
vosystems.com) is an engineering manager/professor in practice at Rice University, Houston, Texas. He took this
position after 39 years at Texas InIEEE SIGNAL PROCESSING MAGAZINE

struments (TI), where he retired as
TI's Principal Fellow. He is a recognized leader in DSP technology both
within TI and throughout the industry. He holds 48 patents in the area of
memories, speech, consumer products,
and DSP. He has written more than
100 papers and articles and continually
presents at universities and conferences
worldwide. He is an IEEE Fellow.

July 2017

From my point of view, a successful
engineer is an excellent problem solver.
To solve a problem, the first step is to
identify it and investigate if it is worth
tackling. The second step is to formulate
11

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Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Signal Processing - July 2017