Alan Shimel
Founder, CEO & Editor-in-Chief
Techstrong Group

As founder, CEO, and editor-in-chief of Techstrong Group, Alan manages a broad array of businesses and brands including Techstrong Media, Techstrong Live, Techstrong Research, Devops.com, Security Boulevard, Techstrong TV, and Techstrong Learning. To do so and succeed, Alan has to be attuned to the world of technology, particularly DevOps, cybersecurity, cloud-native and digital transformation.

With almost 30 years of entrepreneurial experience, Alan has been instrumental in the success of several organizations.

Shimel is an often-cited personality in the security and technology community and is a sought-after speaker at conferences and events. In addition to his writing, his DevOps Chat podcast, TechStrong TV and Digital Anarchist audio and video appearances are widely followed.

Alan attributes his success to the combination of a strong business background and a deep knowledge of technology. His legal background, long experience in the field and New York street smarts combine to form a unique personality.

Mr. Shimel is a graduate of St. John's University with a Bachelor of Arts in Government and Politics, and holds a JD degree from NY Law School.

Bonnie Schneider
Sustainability, Climate Contributor & Author
Techstrong Group

Bonnie Schneider is a Sustainability and Climate Contributor for Techstrong.tv, Bonnie is the author of the new book, Taking the Heat: How Climate Change is Affecting Your Mind, Body & Spirit, and What You Can Do About It, (Simon & Schuster ) and Weather & Wellness©, successfully launching its original video content focusing on climate change and health. Bonnie has shared her insight and expertise on everything from hurricanes to snowstorms as an on-camera meteorologist for MSNBC, CNN, HLN, Bloomberg TV, and The Weather Channel. Bonnie has over 260k followers on her social platforms.

Michael Vizard
Chief Content Officer
Techstrong Group

Mike Vizard is a seasoned IT journalist with over 25 years of experience. He also contributed to IT Business Edge, Channel Insider, Baseline and a variety of other IT titles. Previously, Vizard was the editorial director at Ziff-Davis Enterprise as well as editor-in-chief at CRN and InfoWorld.

Najib Radzuan
Founder
DevOps4Me Global

Najib is the founder of DevOps4Me Global and is an expert in DevOps and DevSecOps adoption and pipeline life cycle practices. His focus is not only on technical methods but also applying human-centric approaches. He loves to share insights and expertise and educate people on adopting DevOps culture and methodologies.

Jose Manuel Ortega
Freelance Software Engineer

José Manuel Ortega is a software engineer who focuses on new technologies, open source, security, and testing. His career target from the beginning has been to specialize in DevOps and security testing projects. Currently, he is working as a security tester engineer and his functions in the project are analysis and testing the security of applications; both web and mobile environments.
He has taught at the university level and collaborated with the official school of computer engineers. Conferences and talks related to DevOps and security are available on his personal site: http://jmortega.github.io/.

This talk could complement the following books published by the author in 2020 and 2022:
"DevOps and Containers Security" - https://bpbonline.com/products/devops-and-containers-security-book-ebook
"Implementing DevSecOps with Docker and Kubernetes" - https://bpbonline.com/products/implementing-devsecops-with-docker-and-kubernetes

Trista Pan
Co-Founder & CTO
SphereEx

Trista Pan, an AWS Data Hero, is the CTO and co-founder of SphereEx, an open-source SaaS commercial startup backed by some of the world's top VCs. Previously a senior DBA at JD Technology, she was responsible for the design and development of JD Digital Science and Technology’s intelligent database platform.

Trista now focuses on distributed databases and middleware ecosystems and is strongly committed to open source. She serves as an Apache ShardingSphere project management committee member, as well as a mentor for various other Apache incubating projects.

Recipient of the 2020 and 2021 "China OSCAR Open Source Pioneer", she is frequently invited to speak at relevant conferences in the fields of database and database architecture - including AWS Summit Shanghai and AWS Dev Days.

She loves to encourage more women to pursue careers in technology and regularly shares her empowering journey from open-source contributor to CTO at events such as AWS. She is also praised by students for her mentorship efforts at initiatives such as Google Summer of Code or Anita B. Org's Grace Hopper Celebration.

Sameer Paradkar
Enterprise Architect
Eviden (An AtoS Business)

Sameer Paradkar is a software architect with more than 20 years of diversified experience in the ICT industry including systems integration, advisory and product development roles. He is an Open Group TOGAF, Oracle Master Java EA, TM Forum NGOSS, IBM SOA Solutions, IBM Cloud Solutions, ITIL Foundation V3, COBIT 5, AWS Solution Architect and Azure Cloud certified enterprise architect. He is a subject matter expert on large-scale complex architecture transformation and modernization domains. Sameer has worked on multiple architecture transformations and modernization opportunities that helped clients create a phased transformation roadmap that maximized business value while minimizing costs and risks.

Ben Nicholson
Global Practice Leader - Prisma Cloud
Palo Alto Networks

Ben Nicholson has worked at Palo Alto Networks for the past seven years. In that time he has worked as a professional services engineer, global solutions architect and is now a global practice leader for Prisma Cloud. He has deployed Prisma Cloud for a multitude of customers and has in-depth working knowledge of many security platforms.

Chris Bowen
CISO
ClearDATA

Chris is founder and chief information security officer at ClearDATA. He leads ClearDATA’s internal privacy, security and compliance strategies as well as advises on the security and privacy risks faced by customers, which include global health care organizations, health insurance companies, providers, life science companies and market-leading innovators from Asia Pacific, North America and Europe. Mr. Bowen also leads ClearDATA’s international security risk consulting practice and has provided counsel to some of the world’s largest health care organizations.

He is a Certified Information Privacy Professional (CIPP/US) and Certified Information Privacy Technologist (CIPT) from the International Association of Privacy Professionals (IAPP) and a Certified Information Systems Security Professional (CISSP) and Certified Cloud Security Professional from (ISC)2. As one of the leading experts on patient privacy and health data security, Chris has authored dozens of articles and is a frequent speaker at national health care industry events.

Eric D Schabell
Director Evangelism
Chronosphere.io

Eric is Chronosphere's Director of Evangelism. He's renowned in the development community as a speaker, lecturer, author and baseball expert. His current role allows him to help the world understand the challenges they are facing with cloud native observability. He brings a unique perspective to the stage with a professional life dedicated to sharing his deep expertise of open source technologies, organizations, and is a CNCF Ambassador. Follow on https://www.schabell.org.

Christopher Bergh
CEO, Head Chef
DataKitchen

Christopher Bergh is the CEO and Head Chef at DataKitchen. Chris has more than 30 years of research, software engineering, data analytics, and executive management experience. At various points in his career, he has been a COO, CTO, VP, and Director of engineering. Chris has an M.S. from Columbia University and a B.S. from the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

Chris is a recognized expert on DataOps. He is the co-author of the ‘DataOps Cookbook”, “DataOps Manifesto,” “Data Journey Manifesto” and a speaker on DataOps at many industry conferences. Chris began his career at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology's Lincoln Laboratory and NASA Ames Research Center. There he created software and algorithms that provided aircraft arrival optimization at several major airports in the United States. Chris served as a Peace Corps Volunteer Math Teacher in Botswana, Africa.

Prathamesh Sonpatki
Developer Evangelist
Last9

Prathamesh Sonpatki is building SRE tools at Last9.io, runs SRE Stories, a platform for SRE folks and builds the O11y—wiki - a glossary of observability terms.

Greg Rivera
VP of Product, CAST Highlight
CAST

As Vice President of Product for CAST Highlight, Greg Rivera leads strategy for the CAST SaaS product, helping clients and partners accelerate application modernization/cloud migration, control open source risks and make greener software. He has held technology leadership roles with Fortune 1000 companies such as Microsoft, IDG and Arrow Electronics for over 20 years. Greg has a B.S. in Electrical Engineering and an M.S. in Management of Technology and is passionate about applying technology to improve business and our everyday lives.

Johanna Kloot
CEO
GreenKPI Pty Ltd

Johanna Kloot is a systems thinker. She understands that everything is connected. Johanna sees problems looking for solutions by connecting the dots in effective, efficient and, at times, unique ways. With a resume of life adventures, Johanna has had plenty of opportunities to practice and develop problem-solving skills. Most importantly to Johanna, she is committed to ensuring future generations have a voice today.

Justin Bean
Sustainability Strategist and Bestselling Author
What Could Go Right

Justin Bean is an impact-focused tech executive who has worked with Fortune 500s, Silicon Valley startups and non-profit organizations to achieve triple-bottom-line (people, planet, profit) results as an intrapreneur and entrepreneur, consultant, mentor and thought leader. He is the author of What Could Go Right: Designing Our Ideal Future to Emerge From Continual Crises to a Thriving World. He has authored many syndicated articles and has been interviewed by the New York Times, Forbes, The Hill, Fast Company, Big Think, NBC, South China Morning Post and others on topics ranging from smart cities, sustainable technology, AI and IoT and industry solutions to combat the COVID-19 pandemic, climate change and social issues.

Simone Wren
Director, Business Operations + Environmental, Social, Governance Practice
New Relic, Inc.

Simone Wren is a director of business operations + environment, social, governance practice at New Relic. She has a passion for implementing systems, organizing chaos and building partnerships for a more liveable future.

Kevin Kline
Database Technology Evangelist
SolarWinds

Kevin Kline is a noted database expert and software industry veteran. A long-time Microsoft Data Platform MVP, AWS Data Community Hero and noted community leader in the database industry, Kevin is a founder and former president of the Professional Association for SQL Server, as well as the author of tech books like SQL in a Nutshell. Kevin is a top-rated speaker at industry trade shows worldwide and is active on social media on Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn at @kekline. Kevin serves as database technology evangelist at SolarWinds, a leading vendor of database and administration tools.

Richard Shan
Chief Practitioner
CTS

Richard Shan is a consultant and a thought leader in the field of emerging technologies, with extensive experience in enabling organizations to adopt and leverage cutting-edge solutions such as generative AI, edge computing, Dapps, composable and more. His hands-on expertise and forward-thinking vision help drive and empower businesses to incubate and harness the power of disruptive technologies for growth and acceleration. He is a regular speaker at international conferences and events, where he shares his insights and best practices on how to strategize and operationalize digital transformation and innovation.

Ken Nalbone
Principal Specialist Solutions Engineer
AHEAD

Ken joined the ranks of enterprise IT in the early 2000s and has been learning ever since. From an early career in systems administration and IT management, Ken transitioned to a presales engineer, focusing on designing technical solutions and consulting on IT strategy and vision.

Ken is a VMUG leader, a member of the vBrownBag podcast crew, and has been recognized for his efforts in the tech community with multiple awards such as vExpert, Nutanix Technology Champion, and Veeam Vanguard.

When he’s not geeking out about tech, Ken can be found watching the Indianapolis Colts, sipping on a bourbon, or smoking a brisket or ribs.

Scott Mallonee
Head of Business Development & Healthtech
LEAD Technologies, Inc.

Scott Mallonee is Head of Business Development & Healthtech at LEADTOOLS. He has over two decades of IT and infrastructural experience. Scott’s experience designing and building toolchains within the healthcare and dental industry demonstrates the need for security and operational improvements so healthcare professionals can better prioritize patient care and data.

Venkat Ramakrishnan
VP of Products and Engineering, Portworx
Pure Storage

Venkat Ramakrishnan is VP of Products and Engineering, Portworx, at Pure Storage. He joined Portworx in 2016 and since then he has helped the team create a new category of data management, protection and data services for Kubernetes and containers as a whole. Venkat has built, led and coached engineering, products, customer success and technical support teams at Pure that are building industry-leading products and helping customers address their most pressing challenges around container adoption. Prior to joining Portworx, Venkat gained extensive experience in the storage and software-defined data center space at Cisco, IBM, Fusion-IO, AMD and Western Digital.

Sharon Florentine
Managing Editor
Techstrong Media

Sharon is a veteran technology editor and former journalist with more than 20 years of experience writing and editing IT books and certification guides, print and digital magazines such as CRN, eWEEK, Computerworld and CIO.com, among others. She is passionate about diversity, equity, inclusion and social justice. She currently lives near Philadelphia, PA with her husband, son and a neurotic bulldog mix.

Alex Merced
Developer Advocate
Dremio

Alex Merced is a developer advocate for Dremio, a developer and a seasoned instructor with a rich professional background. He has worked with companies like GenEd Systems, Crossfield Digital, CampusGuard and General Assembly. Alex is a co-author of the O'Reilly Book "Apache Iceberg: The Definitive Guide." Alex has shared his insights as a speaker at events including Data Day Texas, OSA Con, P99Conf and Data Council. He is driven by a profound passion for technology, and has been instrumental in disseminating his knowledge through various platforms. His tech content can be found in blogs, videos and his podcasts, Datanation and Web Dev 101.
Moreover, Merced has made contributions to the JavaScript and Python communities by developing a range of libraries. Notable examples include SencilloDB, CoquitoJS and dremio-simple-query, among others.

Jennifer Glenski
Director of Product Management
BMC Software

As the director of product management for BMC Software’s Innovation Labs, Jennifer oversees the development and execution of product strategies to drive growth and solve real-world customer problems. With over a decade of experience, Jennifer is also an advisor to an AI startup in health care and part-time faculty at Georgia Tech in its graduate analytics program. Jennifer enjoys managing cross-functional teams to bring innovative solutions to market and is a recognized leader in the industry. She has recently been named a Gartner Ambassador in Product Management, and in 2022, she was honored with AFCEA’s 40 Under 40 Award for significant contributions in a technical field through innovation and the global Women Tech Network Community Award for her exceptional leadership skills. Jennifer holds a master’s degree in Analytics from Georgia Tech, and a bachelor’s degree in Mathematics from Minnesota State University Moorhead.

Gautam Kanaparthi
Head of Product
Normalyze

Gautam is a strategic product leader and is Head of Product at Normalyze. He is passionate about building and scaling market-changing cybersecurity products. Before Normalyze, at Netskope, Gautam built multiple products from the ground up to help the company address new customer problems, including Nextgen Secure Web Gateway, Advanced Analytics, and Malware Scanning. Before Netskope, he was the principal product manager for Symantec Endpoint Security.