Short Bio
Wael Abdullah Ahmad received the B.Sc. and M.Sc. degrees in electronics engineering and electrical communication from Ain Shams University, Cairo, Egypt, in 2007 and 2012, respectively. From 2008 to 2016, he worked in Egypt on the development of RF/microwave high-power amplifiers and microwave modules in sub-6 GHz and C-band. He has also been a consultant on RFIC designs. From 2016 to 2021, he joined the mmWave Wireless Group in IHP Microelectronics, Frankfurt, Germany, as a Radar Research Scientist and mmWave IC Designer where he pursued his Ph.D. degree in mmWave BiCMOS radar sensors and integrated antenna technologies in conjunction with the Technical University of Berlin. From late 2021, Wael joined Keysight Labs’ mmWave Subsystems Design Group as RF/Microwave Design Expert addressing 5G, 6G, Automotive Radar and Aero/Defense applications.
Wael A. Ahmad's current research interests include microwave/mmWave circuits and systems, radar and wireless sensing, MIMO and phased arrays, power amplifiers, interconnection and antenna technologies. He has authored or co-authored tens of publications in his areas of interests and his research work was acknowledged by several international awards. Furthermore, he serves as a reviewer for several journals and conferences and has been an affiliate member of the IEEE MTT-S Microwave/mmWave Radar, Sensing and Array Systems technical committee MTT-24 since 2021. Wael was awarded the IEEE Senior Membership since February 2022.
Experience
November 2021 - present, RF/Microwave Design Expert, Keysight Technologies
Joined the MMICs, Subsystems, Gateware & Processing organization, as part of Keysight Labs, in order to co-build RF/mmWave subsystems addressing 5G, 6G, Automotive Radar and Aero/Defense applications.
April 2016 - October 2021, mmWave Radar Research Scientist, IHP
Demonstrated radar applications up to 80 m range, 8 mm range resolution, 9 um ranging precision, 25° angular resolution & 0.06 Doppler resolution by designing & integrating 5 radar modules with ADS over 60, 80 & 160 GHz and developing calibration schemes & waveforms by MATLAB for CW, FMCW, PMCW & MIMO radar techniques.
Redesigned a multimode scalable D-band radar transceiver BiCMOS MMIC with vector modulator, 15 dBm EIRP & IQ receiver saving 35% of silicon area by replacing on-chip antennas & layout rearchitecting by Cadence & ADS.
Helped the circuit department to build mmWave & sub-THz sensing & phased array communication applications by equipping it with 7 PCB antenna arrays at 60, 80 & 120 GHz, 6 on-chip antennas at 140, 160, 240 & 285 GHz and 2 FOWLP antennas-in-package at 120 & 240 GHz utilizing ADS & EMPro with Python automation.
Developed mmWave interconnections including 4 PCB-to-Waveguide transitions up to 80 GHz, 3 chip-on-board bond wires networks up to 120 GHz, & WLP chip-to-interposer interfaces up to 240 GHz by ADS, HFSS & EMPro.
Run an anechoic chamber laboratory characterizing radiation patterns of antennas and evaluating the performance of mmWave radar sensors by controlling test equipment and the lab rotors with MATLAB scripts.
Extended PCB materials data specified by their vendors by characterizing the properties of PCB materials up to 120 GHz employing VNA measurements and de-embedding techniques with MATLAB.
September 2014 - February 2016, RF/Microwave Head of Department, Consultix
Founded a fabrication process for RF/Microwave power amplifiers by combining PCB & machining technologies.
Developed and ran a product design cycle delivering to clients 6 × 1-50 watts sub-6 GHz RF power amplifiers products out of 21 modules by leading a team of RF, mechanical, production, test and QA engineers.
February 2015 - May 2015, RFIC Design Consultant, Si-Vision
Debugged the signal integrity of a 2.4 GHz Bluetooth module by redefining a full EM physical verification flow to simulate and validate the chip bond wires assembly in a QFN package and the package-to-board interface.
December 2010 - September 2014, Sr. RF/Microwave Designer, Consultix
Eliminated importing high-power amplifiers from abroad by creating a wideband 0.5-1 GHz 200 watts GaN power amplifier system and 6 × 100 watts power amplifiers at UHF, L- and S-bands.
Prototyped a C-band 40 watts wireless transponder system by designing a RF transceiver board and performing EM validation, then integrating it with an antenna, microcontroller and power supply in a single hardware.
March 2008 - November 2010, RF/Microwave Designer, Consultix
Designed and built with an LPKF prototyping machine 5 × 5 watts sub-6 GHz LDMOS power amplifier modules.
Implemented +30 prototypes of sub-6 GHz distributed RF boards including filters, couplers, mixers & amplifiers.
Education
M.Sc. in Electronics and Communication Engineering, Ain Shams University, Cairo, Egypt, August 2012. Thesis: "Envelope Tracking Dynamic Supply RF Power Amplifier".
B.Sc. in Electronics and Communication Engineering, Ain Shams University, Cairo, Egypt, July 2007. Thesis: "Microwave Front-end for a UMTS Transceiver".
Awards
Received the 2023 IEEE Microwave Prize which recognizes, on an annual basis, the most significant contribution by a published paper to the field of interest of the IEEE Microwave Theory & Technology Society.
July 2019, "Honorable Mention" Award, Student Paper Competition, IEEE APS/URSI 2019, Atlanta, USA.
April 2013, Best Student Paper Award, NRSC 2013, Giza, Egypt.
October 2012, CMOS Fabrication Travel Grant, MCIT and CIME Nanotech Center, Grenoble, France.
January 2007, Young Innovators' Award Fund, Undergraduate Graduation Project, Cairo, Egypt.
December 2006, Engineering Innovations Award, Business Contest 2nd place, Ain Shams University, Egypt.