Dr. Hiroshi Nakamura completed the Master's course in Electrical Engineering at the Graduate School of Science and Engineering at Waseda University in March 1987 and joined the Communication Network No. 2 Research Institute of Nippon Telegraph and Telephone (NTT) Corporation in April of the same year. He was transferred simultaneously to NTT Mobile Communications Network, Inc. (currently NTT DOCOMO) upon its spin-off in 1992, became President of DOCOMO Europe S.A. in 2000, and obtained a Doctorate from Waseda University in 2008. He was appointed as General Manager of the Network Development Department of NTT DOCOMO in 2010, Executive Officer and General Manager of the R&D Strategy Department in 2014, and Director and Managing Executive Officer (CTO) and General Manager of the R&D Innovation Division in 2017. He moved to his current affiliation at DOCOMO Technology, Inc. in 2020, and was appointed President of DOCOMO Technology, Inc. and Chief Technology Architect of NTT DOCOMO in 2021.

Since joining NTT Corporation, Dr. Nakamura has been consistently engaged in research and development of mobile communications. With his outstanding technical and leadership skills, he has achieved research and development, international standardization, and practical application of mobile phone systems from the 2nd generation to the 5th generation.

One of Dr. Nakamura’s most significant achievements has been to take the leadership toward the realization of the 3rd generation mobile phone system, aiming to develop a new, globally standardized mobile communication system that enables one mobile terminal to be used anywhere in the world. He was among those who enabled the completion of the IMT-2000 (International Mobile Telecommunications 2000) standard by adding globally standardized functions of the 3rd generation mobile phone system based on the GSM/GPRS core network of the 2nd generation mobile phone system and by promoting the standardization of the ATM (AAL2) for mobile communications, which is applied as the basic technology of the IMT-2000 system.

Furthermore, Dr. Nakamura assumed an important role toward the realization of the 4th generation mobile phone system. Based on the Super3G concept (3.9G mobile phone system) aimed at further improving the capabilities of the 3G mobile phone system and at making a smooth transition to the 4th generation mobile phone system, he enabled the completion of LTE (Long Term Evolution) by designing SAE (System Architecture Evolution), a new core network standard, by proposing technical standards specifications, and by promoting the development and practical application of core network equipment for mobile communications. Toward the realization of the voice communication system VoLTE (Voice over LTE) in the LTE network, he successfully input the requirements of the Japanese market during the activity of formulating industry standard specifications. He also headed large-scale projects for the development of smartphones, radio access networks, and core networks, leading to the completion of VoLTE.

Toward the realization of the 5th generation mobile phone system, Dr. Nakamura has supervised development projects and promoted demonstration tests for developing use cases in partnership with various industries. He has been promoting a wide range of applications of the 5th generation mobile phone system by introducing experience-based realistic demonstrations in various forms both in Japan and overseas.

For the achievements mentioned above, Dr. Nakamura received many awards, including the Accomplishment Award of ITU Association of Japan (ITU-AJ) in 2010, Distinguished Service Award of the Telecommunication Technology Committee (TTC) in 2011, IEICE’s 49th Achievement Award in 2012, the 57th Maejima Hisoka Award of the Tsushinbunka Association in 2012, the Prize for Science and Technology in the Commendation for Science and Technology by the Minister of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology in 2014, the ICT Business Encouragement Award of the Telecommunications Association in 2015, the 66th Maejima Hisoka Award of the Tsushinbunka Association in 2021, and the Information and Communication Technology Award of the TTC by the Minister for Internal Affairs and Communications in 2021. These awards recognize his significant contributions to the mobile communication-related industry and academia.

In addition, at the IEICE, Dr. Nakamura was a member of the Technical Committee on Standardization & Innovation in ICT technologies (SIIT) from April 2010 to March 2012 and was awarded the title of Fellow in the Communications Society in 2017.

As mentioned above, Dr. Nakamura has made many world-class technological achievements through research and development, standardization, and practical application. His accomplishments are especially remarkable in the field of information and communication, including his contributions to demonstrating the technological advantages of new systems. We are confident that Dr. Nakamura is fully qualified to receive the Distinguished Achievement and Contributions Award from the IEICE.