Speakers

Alessandro Bulletti, NOKIA

Consulting Engineer with 25+ experience in Vendors and System Integrators in IP/Security, covering the Mediterranean region 

Arnold Nipper, PeeringDB

Arnold Nipper, born in 1958, has an M.Sc. in Mathematics and
is one of the founders of DE-CIX. He served as CTO and COO, leading
operations and technical development from 2000 to 2015. Since 2016, he
has worked as Chief Technology Evangelist. Arnold has also been a board
member at Euro-IX, the main association for Internet Exchanges in the
RIPE region. From February 2022 until recently, he was a Board Member of
APIX. He represented Euro-IX and APIX as a liaison for IX-F, the
Federation of Internet Exchange Associations. Arnold is also a board
member of PeeringDB, where he has been active since 2008 and currently
serves on the Outreach and Product Committee.

Flavio Luciani, NAMEX

Flavio Luciani was born in Rome in 1981 and graduated in Computer Engineering from the University of Roma Tre in 2005. Since 2008 he has been part of the team at Namex, the Internet eXchange Point in Rome, initially as a member of the technical staff and, since 2020, as Chief Technology Officer. Over the years, he has been actively involved in several initiatives within the Internet community. He collaborates with the RIPE NCC organisation and with the association of European eXchange Points EURO-IX. He previously served on the Steering Committee of the Mutually Agreed Norms for Routing Security (MANRS) initiative under the Global Cyber Alliance. Through workshops, training courses, and in-depth articles, he promotes greater awareness and attention to routing security. He is also co-author of the book “BGP: From Theory to Practice”, a technical publication dedicated to the Border Gateway Protocol and its real-world operational aspects.

Gerhard Stein, Flexoptix

Dr. Gerhard Stein is Lead Research Engineer at FLEXOPTIX, in charge of ensuring that innovative and amazing prototypes can make it into the market.

Back in the 1990s he wrote small programs and assembled computers and network systems for customers. After his arrival in Germany, he began studying mechanical and process engineering at the TU Darmstadt, continued this at the Ruhr University Bochum, specialising computational engineering and received his doctorate in the field of simulation technology.

He also develops open source software such as the Commander Genius game engine.

Jac Kloots, Kentik

Jac has 20+ years of experience split between Engineering, Operations and Product Management roles. He's been involved in architecting and operating Service Provider networks as well as performance Hosting networks. He's with the Network Intelligence company Kentik to support the company’s service provider users to design, operate, and protect their infrastructure at scale.

Janos Angeli, BIX

Janos Gergely, BIX

Janos is the Peering Manager of BIX – Budapest Internet Exchange. He has more than 20+ years of work experience in Telecommunications at various international Tier1 IP and infrastructure providers.

Since 2022 his main role is to increase the total peering traffic of BIX (AS5507) and to maintain members satisfaction by launching new services with attractive pricing models.

He is an enthusiastic member of the Peering Days organizers team, and a happy workforce of ISZT (Council of Hungarian Internet Providers): the owner of Budapest Internet Exchange and the founder of HUNOG conferences.

Marcin Bala, Salumanus

Marcin Bała is a technology and business leader with a strong background in networking and wavelength division multiplexing (WDM) technologies. With over 15 years of experience at Salumanus, Marcin has climbed the ranks, starting as a technical support engineer and eventually becoming the company's CEO in January 2021.

Passionate about WDM technologies such as CWDM, DWDM, coherent technology, and alien wavelength, Marcin drives innovation and continuous improvement at Salumanus. Known for his determination, energy, and love for challenges, he thrives on solving complex problems and connecting the dots to understand the future of the industry.

As a visionary evangelist of xWDM, Marcin is dedicated to understanding customer needs and delivering tailored solutions that address their unique challenges. By leveraging the power of data and his deep expertise in networking technologies, he ensures that Salumanus consistently provides clients with cutting-edge, customized solutions.

Marian Rychtecky, NIX.CZ

Marian Rychtecký is a network architect and infrastructure engineer at NIX.CZ, the neutral Czech Internet Exchange and one of the largest IXPs in Central Europe. He focuses on the design and operation of high-availability L2/L3 fabrics, routing security, large-scale automation, and peering ecosystems.

He has been deeply involved in the evolution of NIX.CZ’s routing, security and validation stack, including RPKI, ASPA, IRR hygiene, EVPN/VXLAN architectures, and the FENIX initiative for DDoS-resilient interconnection.

Marian works closely with operators, content networks, and vendors across Europe on routing-security best practices, and contributes to community efforts such as Euro-IX, the RS Large Communities standardization, and industry knowledge-sharing around modern IXP operations. His current focus lies in sustainable IXP architecture, peering policy design,

and maintaining neutrality in a rapidly changing interconnection landscape.

Massimiliano Stucchi

Monika Schneider, VIX

Monika joined Vienna University Computer Center (VUCC) in 2000. In 2010 she changed into the apartment running the Austrian Academic Computer Network “ACOnet” and the Vienna Internet eXchange “VIX” and has been working in their networking team ever since.

Tony O'Sullivan, RETN

Tony is the Chief Executive Officer at RETN. Aside from leading the whole team, he is instrumental in the company’s pricing, interconnection and network strategy and he likes to take a very active involvement in all other aspects of the business to truly understand any pressures and issues within the company. Tony is an F.C.C.A accountant. He joined RETN in 2007 and was initially tasked with establishing RETN’s market presence in Western Europe. Tony took a leading role in expanding RETN from a multinational carrier selling in 2 countries to a Pan-European player. In 2016 he took on the Chief Operating Officer position, transforming the company’s supply chain, pricing and operational strategy, moving to Hong Kong in 2017 to successfully establish the company’s Asian operations, turning it into the Eurasian network it is today. He took full responsibility as CEO at the beginning of 2021.

Patrick Prangl, Arista Networks

Patrick is working as a Systems Engineer for Arista Networks. He is based in Austria and is passionate about networking and automation. He has more than 14 years of experience in the networking industry mostly working at or with various Service Providers.

Siarhei Matashuk, Genie Networks

With over 20 years of technical experience in the telecom industry, Siarhei has strong expertise in networking and communication. He is an active Cisco Certified Internetwork Expert (CCIE) #27430 in Enterprise Infrastructure and Service Provider tracks. As a Technical Consultant at Genie Networks, he supports European clients, conducts Proof of Concepts (PoCs), and provides expert consultation in anti-DDoS and Traffic Analysis. He is passionate about collaborating with his team and industry experts and is always eager to learn and adopt new technologies and best practices.

Simone Morandini, MIX-IT

I studied Computer Engineering at the University of Padova, working at the VISIONS European Project.

After graduating in 2004, I started cooperating with MIX for the development of a traffic analysis software, and I eventually joined the company in 2005. My activities are mainly focused on network traffic analysis, device configuration, peering LAN monitoring and software development. Since 2010 I give classes on how an IXP operates to the many students that visit MIX every year.In the past I served as a Forum Programme Committee member for the Euro-IX association and I am currently a member of the PC for ITNOG.

Maurizio Goretti, NAMEX

Maurizio Goretti is Director General of Namex, one of the largest Internet Exchange Points in Italy. Former “magnetic monopole hunter”, he later moved into Internet infrastructure in the late 1990s, contributing to the early development of the Rome IXP. Over the years, he has supported Namex’s growth from a small academic initiative into a major neutral interconnection hub. His work focuses on regional interconnection ecosystems across Italy and the Mediterranean, the development of data center and colocation infrastructures, and digital infrastructure policy. He is also involved in policy discussions on digital infrastructure and interconnection at national and European level.