Amazon Web Services (AWS), Austin Texas. June 2018 - Present
Principal Data Architect

Focused on helping customers build solutions using Amazon Neptune, a fully managed graph database service, and many other AWS services.  Working closely with customers and technical peers to evolve both end-to-end solutions and the underpinning technologies.

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IBM Corporation, Analytics Group, Austin Texas.  Aug 2015 – May 2018.
CTO Emerging Analytics Technology, Distinguished Engineer

Driving the adoption of emerging analytics and cognitive technology through partnerships between IBM customers (via leading edge pilot projects) and IBM technologists. Key focus on open source technology and open communities and rapidly driving technical innovation and creating new opportunities.

I created and lead a team of highly skilled technologists focused on driving progress by using innovation to solve real customer problems. We pride ourselves in being able to both innovate and learn new technology rapidly and to then assess the possible application of the technology using hands on experiments both in our own labs and with our client partners.

What I loved about this role was getting to be hands on with leading edge technology while working with great people inside and outside the company at both the business and technical level.

Another key focus for me included all aspects of Graph Database technology from back end stores all the way to user interfaces and graphical representations of graphs and networks. Working closely with industry partners in the open source community as well as IBM product teams. Related to this I have also had a focus on emerging Deep Learning and other Cognitive technologies.

I drove the overall Graph DB strategy for IBM which has resulted in the development and release of a cloud hosted Graph Service (IBM Graph) and also many other solutions that are building upon graph technology. Graph DB technology now plays a key role in many IBM products and services.

This role demanded deep technical, executive, organizational, inter-personal and project management skills which made it a lot of fun!

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IBM Corporation, Cloud Division, Austin Texas. Sep 2012 – Aug 2015
CTO Open Technology, Distinguished Engineer

Working closely with the Open Source community and IBM product teams to both increase the adoption of and give back to open source projects in areas such as Big Data, Graph DB, Kafka, Social computing as well as user interface design and user experience.

I drove the creation and execution of first of a kind projects to explore the "art of the possible" using open source technology to jump start new approaches to solving problems. I was both the leader of the projects and a hands on team member.

During this time I became convinced that Graph Database technology would play a big role in many areas needing fresh approaches to a solution. I formulated a strategy for how we could start to use graph technology within the company and took that vision to senior executives and technical leaders across the company to get their buy-in. This was the very beginning of a whole series of projects that we would go on to do that built upon the Graph DB foundation (see sections above this one for more details).

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IBM Corporation, Software Group, Austin Texas. Aug 2003 – Aug 2012
CTO Emerging Internet Software & Standards, Distinguished Engineer

I was focused on a large number of differing projects related to open source, open standards and emerging internet technology. During this time I was responsible for driving a number of initiatives inside and outside of the company with an overall goal of increasing our usage of and give back to, open source technology. Our work during this time was instrumental in radically changing the way that open source was used and perceived inside of IBM.

I worked on a number of key initiatives during this time that include Web Services and Web security. I co-chaired two of the committees at OASIS that created technologies such as WS-Trust that defined how, in a web context, a trust broker should work and WS-Security/WS-Secure Exchange that defined how messages over the internet between services should be secured.

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IBM Corporation, Austin Texas. Aug 1999 – Aug 2003
CTO XML Technology, Distinguished Engineer

I was responsible for driving the adoption of XML within the company and for driving much of our open standards and open source participation within the industry and with other vendors and customers around XML and many related technologies. This was a large and complex job that involved bringing a consistent strategy and set of implementations to bear across the entire software portfolio within the company. This was at a time when technologies like XML and XSLT were very new and part of my job was also to work on the strategy and vision for how we would use XML. To this day, much of the work I did during this time period remains heavily in use in many areas. During this time I drove XML support into products ranging from operating systems to databases to user interfaces.

During this time I was also very active in the creation of Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG) technology. I am one of the original authors and creators of the SVG specification at W3C and I was also an early implementer. As far as I know I wrote the first ever implementation of an SVG rendering engine, in Java using the new (at the time) Java 2D API. SVG is now supported by every major web browser and enjoys broad adoption. Leading up to the creation of the SVG Working Group at W3C, along with people from Adobe, I drove the submission of a core proposal and a demo of some running code to W3C that would help to seed the SVG work. 

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IBM Corporation, Network Computing Software Division, Austin Texas. Jan 1996 – Jun 1999
Senior Technical Staff Member - Java Technology

In December 1995 I relocated from Boca Raton in Florida to Austin in Texas. This was at a time when we had been talking to people at Sun Microsystems about collaborating around Java. I moved from the core OS/2 development team and took a new role leading a technical team focused on Java technology. One thing we focused on was porting key parts of Java to OS/2 and other IBM platforms and we also drove other innovations related to Java technology. I worked on a number of first of a kind projects to show the potential of Java to both technical peers and to customers. I was especially focused on the graphics and user interface areas including the Java 2D API and the Java Foundation Classes (JFC).

I enjoyed this work a lot as I was able to take many of the computer graphics and operating system skills that I had developed working on OS/2 and bring them to bear in the context of Java. It was also during this time that my involvement with SVG began.

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IBM Corporation.  Personal Software Products, Boca Raton FL. USA. Apr1993 – Dec 1995
OS/2 Development Team - Senior Programmer

I Continued to work on the development of OS/2. I led the teams that worked on the OS/2 Presentation Manager and the OS/2 Graphics Engine. One of our major work efforts, which I led,  was the rewrite of the entire OS2/2 Graphics and UI subsystems from 16-bit assembler code to 32-bit C. This was not just a port but a complete rewrite to exploit the 32-bit architecture and to vastly improve rendering and other algorithms. We also introduced  brand new device driver models for video and printers. Subsequently  I also was overall technical lead for several OS/2 releases on both the Intel and Power PC platforms.

While OS/2 ultimately did not become the success we all felt it should have been I have no doubt that the team I was part of was a once in a lifetime experience. An incredible mix of talent and dedication as well as a sense of family. During this time I was able to gain deep technical knowledge of many different areas as well as grow my leadership skills. I was working with everyone from junior programmers to senior executives during this time.

This was a very special time for me. We worked insane hours but we worked as a team towards a common goal and we built up an incredible set of skills based on experience of what worked and what did not.

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IBM UK Labs. Ltd, Hursley Park UK.  Aug 1986 – Apr 1993
Worked in both the Hursley Park Laboratory UK and IBM Boca Raton Development Lab, FL. USA
OS/2 Development Team - Advisory Programmer and other roles

I joined IBM in the UK in August 1986 working at the Hursley Park Laboratory and was immediately made part of the still forming IBM development team that was working on what would become OS/2 1.1 (the first release to have a graphical user interface). I worked as a programmer in the Graphical Programming Interface (GPI) area.

In 1988 I began an assignment to Boca Raton in Florida. This was part of an effort to bring the whole IBM OS/2 core team to a single location. We also had folks from Microsoft working alongside us. After OS/2 1.1 was delivered I stayed on in Florida to help train the customer support team. Over the next few years I commuted the Atlantic between the UK and Florida before eventually moving there permanently in 1993. These were formative years for me and I learned an incredible amount during this time about how to manage and be part of a huge project as well as being able to develop an incredible array of technical skills

Computer Graphics and user interfaces, from the front of screen experience all the way down to the level of device drivers and graphics algorithms was always a major interest for me and became a defining part of my early career. I continue to use the experience gained in those areas to this day.

Formal Education

B.Sc. (with honors) Computer Science
University of Brighton, United Kingdom, 1986

Miscellaneous Information

• Dual nationality: United Kingdom and United States.
  
• 86 issued patents in various countries.
• Speaker at conferences all over the world (keynotes and more intimate settings).
• Published author (Book "Practical Gremlin", blogs and magazine articles).
  
• Experienced at working with Analysts and Press.
• IBM Master Inventor
• IBM Corporate Award recipient (highest technical award in IBM)  - twice.
• Member of the IBM Academy of Technology
• Have chaired/participated in multiple standards efforts including:
• Chair of the Web Services Secure Exchange Technical Committee at OASIS
• Chair of the Web Services Security Technical Committee at OASIS
• Member of the original SVG Working Group at W3C
• Member of the XML Binary Working Group at W3C