Qualcomm Inc., San Diego, Calif., announced today that Joan Waltman has been appointed president of the company’s Wireless Business Solutions, the division that provides mobile communications, tracking and business software for truck fleets.

Waltman replaces Chris Wolfe who is retiring. Wolfe and Waltman discussed the change in conference calls this morning.
Waltman said she is an electrical engineer by training and has been with Qualcomm for 15 years. Waltman began her Qualcomm career working on the company’s CDMA (Code Division Mutiple Access) wireless technology, now employed by Sprint PCS and Verizon in North America and other companies worldwide.
“I did system design and chip design before moving into program management,” she said.
Waltman said she got involved in Qualcomm’s satellite products when she managed the Las Vegas Network Operations Center backup hub. The Las Vegas facility provides redundancy for the center in San Diego that processes mobile communications for fleet customers.
Subsequently, Waltman oversaw development and deployment of GlobalTRACS equipment management solution, upgrades and new applications for the OmniTRACS mobile communications system and launch of the T2 Untethered TrailerTRACS asset management solution.
Truckinginfo.com asked Waltman about the future of satellite communications as ground-based networks continue to grow.
Waltman said she had asked that question five years ago of company founder, Irwin Jacobs.
“At the time, we had choices to make,” she recalled.
“Irwin said he was strongly supportive of satellite communications as essential for transportation and logistics applications well into the future because of its ubiquitious coverage.”
Waltman said she will be working on the next generation of Qualcomm’s flagship OmniTRACS system expected to be introduced next year.
Chris Wolfe said he will work with Waltman through August in a consulting capacity.