Historical Moment: First Female CTO At FCC Appointed

Indian-American Monisha Ghosh is all set to create history by becoming the first woman Chief Technology Officer at FCC, starting her tenure from Jan. 13.

FREMONT, CA: An IIT alumna and a rotating Program Director at the National Science Foundation and a Research Professor at University of Chicago, Monisha Ghosh has been selected as the Chief Technology Officer (CTO) at the Federal Communications Commission (FCC). She will create history by becoming the first woman to hold this position at this agency. She will start working from Jan. 13, taking over from Eric Burger, who has been serving since October.

FCC chairman Ajit Pai announced her appointment on Dec. 20 and said as the FCC moves enthusiastically to advance American leadership in 5G; the in-depth technical knowledge of Dr. Ghosh will be invaluable

The expertise of Dr. Ghosh is also broad, ranging from the Internet of Things, medical telemetry, and broadcast standards, and she has also conducted and overseen research into cutting-edge wireless issues in academia and industry. This is a historical appointment as Dr. Ghosh will be the FCC’s first female CTO.

FCC is an independent U.S. government agency overseen by the U.S. Congress; it regulates interstate and international communications by radio, television, wire, satellite, and cable in all 50 states. FCC is also responsible for implementing and enforcing the country’s communications law and regulations.

Ghosh pursued B.Tech from the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Kharagpur, in 1986, majoring in Electronics and Electrical Communications Engineering. After that she came to the U.S., to pursue her post-graduation. In 1991 received her Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering from the University of Southern California.

Later, in 1991, she joined the Philips Research as a Senior Member of Research Staff and was also a member of the team that developed the first digital broadcast HDTV system.

Ghosh was a Member of Technical Staff at Bell Laboratories, Murray Hill, where she worked on (Orthogonal Frequency Division Multi-User Access (OFDMA) for cellular systems, a precursor to 4G LTE in 1998-1999. In 2011, she initiated research in the use of probabilistic methods for health analytics in collaboration with the Mayo Clinic.

Ghosh has written more than 50 scientific papers and holds over 40 patents. In 2008 she received the Distinguished Engineer Award in Philips and is a Fellow of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE).