Michael has been working on the Google Assistant for two years, and has worked on features ranging from Smart Home control, to Assistant Troubleshooters. He has a background in Linguistics and Neuroscience, and uses these skills to inform his designs.

Madelaine Plauché is a UX designer on the Google Assistant. She has worked in research in speech and language technologies on and off for almost 20 years, starting with a PhD in linguistics at University of California, Berkeley. She first learned to design conversations in Southern India and South Africa where multilingualism and low-literacy rates challenged traditional User Interaction models.

Jessica Outlaw is culture and behavior researcher in immersive tech. She uses behavioral science to help virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR) companies build and test experiences. Her areas of expertise are conducting research in digital worlds, app design, and giving trainings to new and experienced designers. She is a 2017 winner of Oculus Launch Pad and you can download her app with Clorama Dorvilias called Teacher's Len's from the Oculus Store. You can also read a sample of her virtual reality avatar analysis here. She has a bachelors degree from Scripps College and a masters from UC San Diego.

Upkar Lidder is a Full Stack Developer and Data Wrangler with strong experience in NodeJS and Python. His current passions include enjoying various kinds of cuisines, hiking, tennis and learning the magic behind ML. He is always up for a chat over good coffee.

Jessica Outlaw is culture and behavior researcher in immersive tech. She uses behavioral science to help virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR) companies build and test experiences. Her areas of expertise are conducting research in digital worlds, app design, and giving trainings to new and experienced designers. She is a 2017 winner of Oculus Launch Pad and you can download her app with Clorama Dorvilias called Teacher's Len's from the Oculus Store. You can also read a sample of her virtual reality avatar analysis here. She has a bachelors degree from Scripps College and a masters from UC San Diego.

Paul Bryan is a user experience strategist and researcher who started designing e-commerce web sites in 1995. He consults with large organizations on the strategy, direction, and design of their e-commerce web sites and mobile apps. Paul organizes UX STRAT Europe and USA conferences, and manages the UX Strategy and Planning group on LinkedIn. He teaches user experience to graduate business students at the University of Georgia.

Kharis is Senior Director of Product + UX at Meta, and has over 15 years of international experience in crafting thoughtful products and services. Previously he was Head of Product at Archiact in Vancouver - Canada’s largest VR/AR company, co-founded the influential immersive-tech studio - HUMAN, created SCALE - a smartphone powered MR headset, and worked at the award-winning Nokia Design studio in Berlin, Germany as Design Lead on a multitude of award-winning products.

Kharis gave the opening keynote at the 2014 Taiwan Design Week in Taipei, and recently released his book for O’Reilly Media called “Designing for Mixed Reality”

Daniel Padgett is a Design Lead for Google Search and Assist. He leads a group of interaction designers creating core features and connected user journeys for Assistant across surfaces. He's also on point for Google's Conversation Design discipline, spearheading internal and external programs geared toward establishing best practices, educating new practitioners, and coordinating outreach. Daniel has roughly twenty years of experience creating solutions that leverage language technologies, including speech recognition, natural language understanding, and speech synthesis. A recent transplant from Chicago, he lives in Menlo Park with his wife, 12 year old son, and their cat Juno.

Charles has over 15 years of experience implementing compelling digital experiences across a range of platforms at various scales, from mobile and web applications to spatial installations and AR/VR. At frog he conducts research, develops software in a range of languages, and builds innovative prototypes for Fortune 500 clients and startups with a focus in emerging technologies. He is also frog’s AR/VR technology capability lead and has worked on applications that have ranged from pain distraction for burn patients in VR to functional edge-computing prototypes in AR. Prior to frog he worked for two award-winning design consultancies in New York City building immersive and gestural interactive environments for leading museums and science centers throughout the United States.

Originally from Mexico, Alfredo Ruiz now lives in Austin, Texas where he is the Design Lead of Augmented Reality at IBM Analytics, mentoring and leading designers from IBM’s studios in Austin, California, and Stuttgart. His team works on creating the next generation of enterprise solutions, exploring the intersection of data analysis and cognitive technologies with Augmented Reality.

Alfredo’s work experience includes companies and consultancies such as IBM, Steelcase Inc. P&G, Boeing, Nike, Nokia, Cincinnati Children’s Hospital, United Healthcare, LiveWell Collaborative (to name a few).

Alfredo has a Masters of Design from University of (UANL) with a B.S. in Industrial Design.Cincinnati, and graduated from Autonomous University of Nuevo León

David Birnbaum, Director of User Experience at Immersion Corporation, has been creating haptic experiences for over 12 years, in which time he's been named as an inventor on over 70 patents in the fields of user experience, wearables, gaming, medical devices, mobile communication, and rich interactive media. A leading expert in haptic design, he leads a team responsible for developing the tactile aesthetics of emerging technologies. David is driven by a desire to tell stories with the sense of touch and to bring emotion and realism to digital experiences. He holds a B.S. in Music Industry from USC and a M.A. in Music Technology from McGill University.

Katie Hughes is a San Francisco-based UX & Product Designer specializing in virtual reality. She loves her job at Beast Pets, where she works on creating smart magical pets for VR (who wouldn’t love their job when they basically get to play with virtual puppies all day?)

Additionally, Katie is cofounder of the Room Scale Designers meetup group where she helps organize accessible VR workshops for local Bay Area designers. Katie has been a guest speaker for organizations such as Cascade SF, General Assembly, and the University of Buckingham, and is a total VR hackathon enthusiast. When not staring at a screen, you can find her 10 feet up off the ground honing her aerial gymnastics skills.

Andrew Leitch is an NY-based Experience Director and Filmmaker focused on Virtual and Augmented Reality. He teaches a series of master classes in the Narrative VR program at the New York Film Academy, and is a Lab Fellow at NYU's Media and Games Network VR Lab. He has also held Creative/UX leadership roles at agencies such as Razorfish and GREY, working with a blue-chip client list that includes Nike, Sony, NBCUniversal and Ford. Andrew directed the cinematic VR experience Now Then with Academy Award-winning producer Ryan Silbert. His creative work has appeared at Sundance and SxSW and has garnered four Webbys.

Laurie Kahn is the Principal Product Manager at realtor.com, where she manages the company's core Android app. A veteran in the technology industry, Kahn brings more than 15 years of experience integrating human-centered design in fast-paced, agile development environments and a decade of mobile app experience. Her work, which focuses on creating the right market strategy and developing products that delight users, has led to product features on The Today Show, New York Times and People Magazine. Prior to realtor.com, Kahn held leadership roles in product management at 23andMe, ShopWell (acquired by HarvestMark), TheFind, Inc. (acquired by Facebook) and Oodle, Inc. (acquired by QVC).

Andrew uses his diverse background to expand human capability. Right now, he’s exploring new immersive realities at Samsung Research America, though you can often find him at any intersection of design, technology, philosophy, and human augmentation. Previously, Andrew received his M.A. in HCI from Carnegie Mellon University, designed at an agency and as a freelancer, co-founded a curiosity-inspired conference, and wrote a children’s book, “The Book of What If…?“. His work has been featured in the Wall Street Journal and Silicon Prairie News. In his free time, Andrew hikes with his wife, plays with his cat-child, and tinkers on side projects.

Paul Bryan is a user experience strategist and researcher who started designing e-commerce web sites in 1995. He consults with large organizations on the strategy, direction, and design of their e-commerce web sites and mobile apps. Paul organizes UX STRAT Europe and USA conferences, and manages the UX Strategy and Planning group on LinkedIn. He teaches user experience to graduate business students at the University of Georgia.