VP, OneNote at Microsoft

Laura Butler is the first female Technical Fellow at Microsoft, the one and only Star Treknical Goddess, and currently the Vice President of OneNote.  She specializes in debugging problems of all kinds, from crashing code to team morale to cookies that don’t brown properly.  She’s sorry that you’re still using code she wrote 20+ years ago.

Laura is equal parts Military Commander, Mary Poppins, Sherlock Holmes, and Teacher.

Principal Engineering Mgr, New Experiences Incubation at Microsoft 

Janet is a software architect with over 20 years of experience in developing solutions for systems architecture, sensor drivers, application development, storage, and security. She has extensive knowledge of embedded development, custom silicon, motion and imaging sensors, Windows internals, driver technologies (UMDF and KMDF), storage architectures, and security devices.

To date, Janet counts 13 patents to her name.  

Scientist, Microsoft

Sophie is a passionate UX Scientist working at Microsoft at the cutting edge of interaction design and technologies blending virtual and physical realities in products such as Microsoft HoloLens. With her PhD from the Technical University of Dresden, Germany, and a strong research background in Human-Computer Interaction, she bridges the gap between Software and Hardware Development to innovative User Interface and Multimodal Interaction Design.

SVP, People & Culture at Apptio

Britt is responsible for leading the Human Resources function, coaching executives and managers to become more effective leaders, and fostering Apptio’s high performing culture.

Prior to joining Apptio, Britt held progressive HR leadership positions at fast-paced tech companies including Avanade, Real Networks, and Microsoft. She has over 15 years of experience leading HR teams in all aspects of the function, across a number of business sectors. 

CTO, Atigeo 

David is the CTO of Atigeo, building a software platform that applies 'big data' and 'data science' to healthcare, energy and cyber security. He is also a computer scientist and always interested in joint research or teaching on large scale distributed systems, machine learning, data mining, parallel systems and agile methods.

To date, David has 9 patents to his name in healthcare, data science and software engineering. 

IT Faculty, Green River College

Krish obtained his Masters in Electrical Engineering from Wayne State University. He spent 13 years of his career working for Ford motor company building patented solutions for power-train systems. He later moved to WA to explore his career and passion for teaching.

Currently he is a faculty at Green River Community College, Bellevue College, and Kal Academy.

Solutions Architect, Amazon Alexa

Liz Myers, Solutions Architect at Amazon Alexa, is a UX designer and front-end developer, specializing in product development for blue chip companies such as VISA, Vodafone, and Microsoft. She is a passionate designer with a secret super power in linguistics– Liz speaks 5 languages and has a good ear for natural VUI interactions. After living & working in London for nearly a decade, Liz is currently happy to be working at Amazon in Seattle, teaching developers how to build skills for Alexa and the next generation of voice experiences.