Irving Wladawsky-Berger’s Career In Innovation

I retired from IBM on May 31, 2007 after 37 years with the company. Since then, I have collaborated with colleagues at IBM on a number of initiatives including Cloud Computing and Smarter Planet. In March of 2008 I joined Citigroup as Strategic Advisor, working on innovation and technology initiatives including the transition to mobile digital money and payments. In April of 2012 I became a regular contributor to the Wall Street Journal’s CIO Journal. At IBM I was responsible for identifying emerging technologies and marketplace developments that are critical to the future of the IT industry. I was also responsible for our university relations office and for the IBM Academy of Technology where I served as Chairman of the Board of Governors. I led a number of IBM’s company wide initiatives including the Internet and e-business, supercomputing and Linux. I am Visiting Lecturer at MIT’s Sloan School of Management and Engineering Systems Division; Executive-in-Residence at NYU’s Center for Urban Science and Progress; Senior Fellow at the Levin Institute of the State University of New York; and Adjunct Professor in the Innovation and Entrepreneurship Group at the Imperial College Business School. I am a member of the Board of Directors of Inno360, ID³ and CNRI, the InnoCentive Advisory Board, the Visiting Committee for the Physical Sciences Division at the University of Chicago, and the Advisory Board of USC’s Annenberg Innovation Lab. I served on and later became co-chair of the President’s Information Technology Advisory Committee from 1997 to 2001, and was a founding member of the Computer Sciences and Telecommunications Board of the National Research Council in 1986. I am a former member of University of Chicago Board of Governors for Argonne National Laboratories, the Board of Overseers for Fermilab, and BP’s Technology Advisory Council. A few years ago, I was elected a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Having been born in Cuba and come to the US at the age of 15, I was named 2001 Hispanic Engineer of the Year. I have an M.S. and Ph. D. in physics from the University of Chicago.      

Check back for additional videos in the series where Irving shares his insights on technology and small business.