Raimo Kantola in Memoriam

Emeritus Professor Raimo Kantola's journey in communications and network engineering started decades ago and many of us at Aalto University have lived this long journey with him.  

Kantola graduated as a Doctor of Technology in 1995 from the Helsinki University of Technology and became a professor at the Helsinki University of Technology (later Aalto University) in 1996. During his successful career as a teacher, he supervised over 350 theses. He directed Finland's first English-language Master's programme in technology at Helsinki University of Technology and was the first head of department at the Department of Communications and Networking at Aalto University.    

He will be remembered as an active social debater in his field. He gave several speeches on the smart, connected and cyber-secure digital society. In particular, his experience and knowledge of the Russian way of doing things brought perspectives on how Finns need to protect critical infrastructures. His most recent research projects before becoming Emeritus Professor focused on how cyber networks can distinguish between trusted and untrusted parties.    

Raimo Kantola was from the north of Finland, from the municipality of Ii. He studied basic electrical engineering in St. Petersburg, and graduated as an engineer in 1981. Before his university career, he worked for Nokia for a long time. He became known as the fault tolerance architect for Nokia's DX200 digital jewel centre. He also obtained his PhD in this field and was awarded several patents. His Nokia career took him on overseas assignments in England and the USA, which was the basis for his decision to move into research and academia.

We remember Raimo as a kind and considerate person who always had time to chat. It was clear from the discussions that he had thought long and hard about the subject and wanted to challenge his interlocutors to find any gaps in his reasoning.

We offer our sincere condolences to the loved ones and friends of Raimo Kantola.  

Remembering a colleague and friend   
Heikki Hämmäinen, Markus Peuhkuri, Jussi Ryynänen