Ekaterina Balandina received her Dipl.-Ing. (2011) and M.Sc. (2013) degrees in Mathematical Provision and Administration of Information Systems. In 2010 Ekaterina won personal Presidential scholar for studies abroad and started her PhD studies at University of Oulu. Later she moved to the Tampere University of Technology, where she is currently finalizing the dissertation. Her research interests include intelligent networks, smart spaces, Internet of Things, location-aware solutions, and protocol design. She is an author of over 25 research publications.