Neal S Bergano Neal received the B.S. degree in electrical engineering from the Polytechnic Institute of New York, New York, and the M.S. degree in electrical engineering and computer science from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, in 1981 and 1983. In 1981, he joined the technical staff of Bell Labs’ undersea systems division. In 1992, he was named a Distinguished Member of the Technical Staff of AT&T Bell Labs, where he became an AT&T Technology Consultant in 1996 and AT&T Technology Leader in 1997. From 1998 to 2014 he was the Managing Director of the System Research and Network Development at TE SubCom. He recently retired from his position as Chief Technology Officer and VP of Research and Development at TE SubCom. He holds 31 U.S. patents in the area of optical fiber transmission systems.

Bergano is a Fellow of the IEEE, the OSA, AT&T, and TE Connectivity and a member of the National Academy of Engineering. He served on the Board of Directors for the OSA from 2009 to 2011, and served on the Board of Governors for the IEEE Lasers and Electro-Optics Society from 1999 to 2001. He is a long-time volunteer and supporter of the OFC/NFOEC meeting, which includes General Chair and Technical Chair in 1999 and 1997, Chair of the steering committee from 2000 to 2002, and Chair of OFC/NFOEC’s long-range planning committee from 2003 to 2017. He is the recipient of the 2002 John Tyndall Award “for outstanding technical contributions to and technical leadership in the advancement of global undersea fiber-optic communication systems.”