Founder & CEO, Bits on Disk

Alex holds a Ph.D. in Computer Science and Engineering from UC San Diego, and has spent over a decade building high-performance, robust data management and processing systems. As an early member of a couple fast-growing startups, he’s had the opportunity to wear a lot of different hats, serving at various times as an individual contributor, tech lead, manager, and executive. He was also previously a Cloud Economist with the Duckbill Group, helping AWS customers save money on their AWS bills. He's currently a freelance data engineering consultant, helping his clients build, manage, and maintain their data infrastructure. He lives in Los Angeles, CA.

CTO & CISO, Fintech

Cho-Nan Tsai is a seasoned technology entrepreneur in Fintech. He is an expert in online lending, payment, credit card issuance and blockchain. Earlier in his career, he managed tech projects at Fortune 500 companies across verticals such as Social Media, Mobile Advertising, and Digital Entertainment. More recently, he has bootstrapped and raised millions of dollars for a number of startups, growing these businesses quickly using technology and multiplying their revenues exponentially year over year. Currently, he is the Chief Technology Officer at a fintech company looking to disrupt the hard money lender space in real estate. Prior to this, he was the Chief Technology Officer at Camino Financial where he was responsible for data, technology infrastructure and information security at this online lending company. He graduated with a B.S. degree in Computer Engineering from Columbia University and a M.S. degree in Computer Science from UCLA.

CTO, MatchCraft

Alex is Chief Technology Officer at MatchCraft, an ad tech company. At heart, he is a businessman with software engineering skills. He builds organizations that turn product concepts into complete, fully supported products. Alex joined MatchCraft in 2008 and built the technology organization from ground up including the product management and software engineering departments and a machine learning practice. His team, which lives in seven countries, operates a scalable SaaS technology platform for automating buying of ads on Google, Bing, Facebook and Yelp. Prior to joining MatchCraft, he led the product development teams at LRN (compliance and eLearning), The Retail Equation (merchandise return fraud and abuse detection) and HNC Software (machine learning in insurance). Alex builds teams with high employee retention, with talented engineers and product managers who are focused on solving client’s challenges. Alex personally engages with clients & prospects to translate their needs into product solutions. He has a BS and MS in computer engineering from UCLA. Specialties: SaaS, scalable systems, machine learning, Search Engine Marketing, automated pay per click bidding, eLearning, agile development processes, offshore development, product management, team building

CTO, Scrum.org

Ryan is a technologist with 20+ years of experience leading successful teams, developing quality software, and managing cloud and/or traditional network infrastructure. Ryan started his career in 1999 as a network engineer, and shortly after found an interest in software development where he has been involved in many successful projects, varying in size and complexity. In 2007 Ryan started Mantra Technology, a technology consulting company, where he helped companies like Intel improve their E-Commerce offerings. Ryan began working as a consultant (contracted CTO) with Scrum.org in 2014 and in 2018 joined the company full time as Chief Technology Officer. As CTO of Scrum.org, Ryan is responsible for driving change when looking at ways to improve the use of technology in support of operations, customers, and trainers. Ryan has also been closely involved in his local development community where he has organized, volunteered, and/or spoken at events.