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Andrei Herasimchuk
Special Abilities: System Engineering, Pixel Perfection, Rebellion Against Orthodoxy
An iconoclast who is infamous for publicly disagreeing with the interaction design establishment—only to later be vindicated as popular opinion caught up with his prophetic vision—Andrei dropped out of college to start a software company and has been a professional designer ever since.
He was the first designer hired at Adobe; he single-handedly designed the original Creative Suite, forged disparate design ideas into one vision, and built the company's design team. Andrei has also started successful software and design companies of his own and been a lead designer at Twitter and Yahoo.
Many of the top designers in Silicon Valley are from the Herasimchuk design tree.
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Luke Wroblewski
Special Abilities: System Engineering, Design + Business Product Strategy
A beloved personality in the interaction design community, Luke combines incredible design talent and insatiable curiosity about everything related to software with a natural generosity and desire to share his learning with others.
A designer by training, which includes a master's degree in interface design with coursework in computer science, Luke started his career at the National Center for Supercomputing Applications (NCSA). He became a lead designer at eBay, a VP at Yahoo, and an entrepreneur-in-residence at Benchmark Capital. He then founded his own consumer Internet start-up, Bagcheck, which was acquired by Twitter. Luke is one of the most prolific speakers and authors in the design industry.
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Juhan Sonin
Special Abilities: System Engineering, Future Thinking, Truth + Transparency
A cluster of contradictions, Juhan combines design skill and craft with teaching and mentoring that inspires loyalty from his team, with an eye on the future.
Trained as an artist and engineer, Juhan began his design career at Apple in 1994. He has owned his own software design companies and worked inside large corporations and organizations, including the National Center for Supercomputing Applications (NCSA) and the United States Department of Defense (DoD). Juhan is also a lecturer on design and engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) where he drills students to deliver working prototypes.
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Dirk Knemeyer
Special Abilities: System Engineering, Big Ideas, Risk Taking
Trained in the liberal arts with a master's degree in popular culture. Dirk has contributed to or provided the creative direction of award-winning design in every form of communication media. He instinctively understands how people respond and behave, and combines that with a razor-sharp eye to shepherd designs that are creatively inspired and strategically precise.
With turns as an academic, ad executive, management consultant, design executive, and entrepreneur, Dirk naturally rises to leadership positions and has published over 100 articles, given more than 50 conference speeches, and participated on 13 different boards for commercial and non-profit corporations.
