Keynote Speaker
Sandra K. Johnson is the Founder and CEO of SKJ Visioneering, LLC, a global technology development, consulting and services company. A “hidden figure”, she is formerly the Chief Technology Officer (CTO), IBM Central, East and West Africa, and was based in Nairobi, Kenya. She has conducted research in a number of computer related areas and was part of the design team that developed the prototype for the IBM Scalable Parallel Processor (SP2), the base machine for “Deep Blue”, IBM’s world famous chess machine.
Dr. Johnson has received several patent, publication and technical awards. She is recognized as one of the Top 100 Most Important Blacks in Technology (2007-2010). She is the recipient of the 2006 Summit Heritage Award from the IT Senior Management Forum, the 2006 Share the Light Award from the IBM Austin Black Diversity Network Group, the 2005 Black Engineer of the Year Award for Outstanding Technical Contribution in Industry, the 2002 YWCA of Greater Austin Woman of the Year in Science / Technology Award, the 2001 INROADS Supervisor of the Year Award, the 2000 National Society of Black Engineers’ Golden Torch Award for Lifetime Achievement in Industry, and the 1998 Women of Color Technology Award for Research Leadership.