Keynote Speaker: Ping Fu, Geomagic
Ping Fu, Chairman, President and Chief Executive Officer of Geomagic, presented the week's keynote address. She co-founded Geomagic and has led its growth from startup to worldwide leader in the digital shape sampling and processing (DSSP) industry. Geomagic has attracted more than $8 million in capital from private and institutional investors, and won millions of dollars in research innovation grants from NSF and NIST. The company has been profitable since 2002, and increased its revenues by 381 percent during the last five years.
Before starting Geomagic, Ms. Fu was Director of Visualization at the National Center for Supercomputing Applications (NCSA), where she initiated and managed the Mosaic software project that led to Netscape and Internet Explorer. She has more than 20 years of software industry experience in database, networking, geometry processing, and computer graphics. Ms. Fu is a respected thought leader and frequent keynote speaker at international conferences.
Ms. Fu has received numerous awards for her management achievements, including Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year for the Carolinas, worldwide "Fast 50" executive by Fast Company magazine, Entrebizneur of the Year by Business Leader magazine, and businesswoman of the year by Triangle Business Journal. In 2005, she was named Entrepreneur of the Year by Inc. magazine, the leading publication for American entrepreneurs. She holds graduate degrees in computer science and Chinese literature, and is an adjunct professor at Duke University.
