Network & Communication Management & Services Master's Program

This course deals with the basic problems of managing a project, defined as a temporary organization built for the purpose of achieving a specific objective. Both operational and conceptual issues will be considered. Operational issues include definition, planning, implementation, control, and evaluation of the project. Conceptual issues include project management vs. hierarchical management, matrix organization, project authority, motivation, and morale. Cases will be used to illustrate problems in project management and how to resolve them.

Corporate financial management requires the ability to understand the past performance of the firm in accounting terms; while also being able to project the future economic consequences of the firm in financial terms. This course provides the requisite survey of accounting and finance methods and principles to allow technical executives to make effective decisions that maximize shareholder value.

This course exposes students to the macro and micro aspects of organizational behavior and theory that are essential to technology management. The macro aspects will focus on structural contingency theory as an approach to effective organizational design. The micro aspects will focus on leadership, teams, and individual behavior (e.g., motivation, job attitudes). Specific issues and problems which are covered include: the relationship of the organization with the external environment, the influence of the organization's strategies, culture, size, and production technology on the organization's design, and strategies for managing organizational processes such as teams, conflict, power/politics and organizational change. Current topics, that are key to technology management (e.g., virtual teams), will be stressed.

This comprehensive course introduces networking. The course begins with an overview of sample wide-area and local-area network architectures and provides an introductory discussion on the role and importance of the TCP/IP protocol architecture. The relationship between bandwidth, passband, signaling rate, and data rate is then presented and examined. Numerous examples are used to calculate the signaling rate and maximum theoretical data rate of a communications channel based upon the channel bandwidth and signal to noise ratio. Different signaling techniques are compared, the operations of selected digital modulation techniques are examined, and PCM and related techniques to digitally encode analog information are studied. We discuss synchronous (frame) communication and describe the operation of cyclic redundancy check codes in error detection. We also define and discuss the importance of channel coding rate and coding gain in system operation. The function and service of data link protocols in network architecture is examined and we discuss the HDLC frame format, typical frame exchange scenarios, error and flow control, and the role of the HDLC timers in error recovery. Both frequency and time division multiplexing are described, their operation is compared. Specific multiplexing architectures are identified and discussed. Packet switching is also examined, the course concludes with a study of mobile wireless networks.

This course will cover fundamentals of Probability and Stochastic Processes as well as their applications in solving real world telecommunication networks problems including network design, network operations and management. The course will concentrate on demonstrating how probability and stochastic techniques are used for an end-to-end network management. Theoretical and practical aspects of probability and stochastic processes will be covered. Major topics include: introduction to set theory, probability measures, axioms of probability, random variables, discrete and continuous random variables, probability mass functions, probability density functions, probability distributions, expectations, central limit theorem, estimation and statistical inference, Markov chains and Poisson processes. Practical examples, case studies, and real-world applications will be presented throughout the course.

This comprehensive course examines LANs (both ethernet and wireless), TCP/IP, routing protocols, congestion control techniques, internetwork operation and internet applications (including VoIP). Emphasis is placed on protocol and network architecture, protocol operation, advantages and disadvantages of each approach, and applications. Specific topics include: LAN architecture and protocols (with emphasis given to high-speed ethernet and IEEE 802.11 WLANs), IP protocol architecture and IP addressing, protocol operation and internet routing (operation and example protocols). Flow and congestion control, multicasting, mobile IP, DHCP, and an introduction to SDN internet applications (email, DNS, http) and VoIP are also studied.

This course surveys the basic principles underpinning U.S. and international telecommunications policies, regulations and laws. In particular, we will examine the legal and regulatory treatment of a number of related technologies — from telephony to cable to the Internet — whose convergence will continue to challenge established principles. The course will focus most intently on administrative policies as well as statutory and regulatory laws, paying special attention to the design and implementation of the Telecommunications Act of 1996. In addition, the course will address the role played by antitrust, intellectual property and constitutional law in shaping our nation’s telecommunications landscape. Finally, the course will consider the important role played by state and federal agencies — antitrust enforcers, state public utility commissions and the Federal Communications Commission — in developing and administering our nation’s telecommunications laws, regulations and policies.

This course provides a broad and comprehensive perspective of mobile wireless networks. Topics covered include fundamentals of mobile wireless networking; radio architecture; and the multiple access techniques of TDMA, CDMA and OFDMA. The principle 4G standard, LTE, is also studied. The LTE access and core networks are examined and the important functional network elements are identified and distinguished. Key enabling technologies for 5G wireless networks are also identified and discussed. Emphasis is given to the role of software-defined networks and network function virtualization in 5G (and 4G) networks. To assist in this discussion, an introduction to both SDN and NFV is provided. 5G mobile wireless networks are introduced and the architecture and challenges of emerging 5G networks are examined. The impact of the Cloud (or Centralized) RAN (C-RAN) in 4G and 5G networks is also studied.