KEYNOTE: Twilio -- Why Great Infrastructure is the Foundation of Innovation (duplicate)

Jeff Lawson is a serial entrepreneur who co-founded the cloud communications company Twilio during the Great Recession of 2008. Since then, TechCrunch named him Founder of the Year, Fortune named him to their 40 Under 40 List, and Twilio is now among the world’s five fastest growing tech companies with a valuation that tripled since March 2020 due to companies turning to them for survival by software. Prior to co-founding Twilio, Jeff was Founder & CTO of NineStar, Founding CTO of Stubhub.com and Founder, CEO & CTO of Versity. He was also one of the original product managers for Amazon Web Services. Jeff grew up in the suburbs of Detroit, started his first company in middle school, and earned his BS in Computer Science & Film/Video from University of Michigan. He is the author of ASK YOUR DEVELOPER:  How to Harness the Power of Software Developers and Win in the 21st Century (January 12, HarperBusiness) with a foreword by Lean Startup author Eric Ries. Lawson is donating the proceeds of the book to organizations that teach underrepresented populations to code.

Justin Kitagawa is a Senior Director of Engineering  at Twilio where he is responsible for Commons Platform at Twilio. Justin’s teams are responsible for the application components that serve as the front door for Twilio’s API & Console, and enable Twilio to innovate rapidly.

He believes in the power of small teams, vision, goal setting, generative cultures, and growth mentality.
 
Justin has 20 years of experience working in technology where he has been a cloud computing pioneer, patent inventor, and loving husband and father of two. As a technologist, he has worn many hats from software engineer, team lead, architect, project manager, sales engineer, principal consultant, and software leader. He loves to build and is fascinated by the process of transforming ideas into creations.