Engineering Spotlight Spotlight

"Engineering is one of the few disciplines where you learn to think about problems, and that's useful in a wide range of situations."

-Jamie W. Flinchbaugh '94

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Janet Davidson ‘78

2005 – Appointed Lucent Technology’s Chief Strategy Officer and President of Network Operations Software

Janet G. Davidson was named by Fortune 500 Magazine in October, 2001 as one of the top fifty Most Powerful Women in Business. She is currently Chief Strategy Officer of Lucent Technologies, the communications technology giant that employs 150,000 people.

Davidson is a New Jersey native and was born in 1957. She received her B.A. in physics from Lehigh in 1978, then spent one year at Georgia Tech to complete her M.S. in electrical engineering. She joined the technical staff in Bell Labs following college, and earned a masters degree in Computer Science through their program.

In more than twenty years of work with software design and production, Davidson has climbed her way through Lucent’s ranks to become one of their top executives. She carries with her extensive experience in global product strategy, marketing, and product management. As Lucent’s Broadband Access Program Management Vice President, she ran California’s broadband network construction. For several years she was in control of Lucent’s sales to Sprint, MCI WorldCom, and several other major communication service providers while holding the title of Vice President, North America in Lucent’s Service Provider Networks organization.

With her promotion to President of the Access Networks division of InterNetworking Systems, Davidson was given the responsibility to tackle the remote access and Voice-over-IP networking markets. Thanks in part to her leadership, Lucent dominates these industries and maintains a good portion of the DSL market.

From 2000 to 2005, Davidson was President, Integrated Network Solutions, a division of Lucent in charge of designing wireline networks for almost every major communications service provider in the world. Davidson’s current position as Chief Strategy Officer requires her to act as the company’s visionary. Her biography on Lucent’s website describes her as “responsible for evolving Lucent’s strategy and vision for next-generation networks.” She also oversees the company’s intellectual property, new ventures activities, and work with standards organizations.

Davidson has received several awards for her accomplishments. In 1999, she was inducted into the Academy of Women Achievers of the YWCA of New York City. In 2001, she received one of the first Woman Enabling Science and Technology awards given by the Working Woman Foundation. She has also received a Distinguished Alumna Award from Georgia Tech and a Tribute to Women and Industry (TWIN) award. She is on the Board of Directors of Jersey City’s Liberty Science Center and serves on Lehigh’s Rossin College of Engineering and Applied Science Advisory Board.