To help celebrate #HyperledgerWomen here in the month of March, we are spotlighting just some of the women who are driving forces in our community. These women wear a variety of hats but all play important roles in advancing the development and deployment of enterprise blockchain technologies.
Help us highlight the role of women in blockchain by tagging others in the community with #HyperledgerWomen.
Tracy Kurt, Accenture
Tracy Kuhrt is a Senior Technology Architect within Accenture’s Blockchain and Multiparty Systems group with 20+ years of experience covering the entire software development lifecycle. Tracy has been involved in the blockchain space since 2015, with a focus on Hyperledger. At Accenture, besides architecting and delivering solutions for clients, Tracy is educating the next group of Blockchain and Multiparty Systems Technology Architects, is a frequent speaker on the topic, and is an advocate for inclusion and diversity in the technology. Tracy drove Accenture’s efforts to open source its Blockchain Automation Framework and Blockchain Integration Framework as Hyperledger Labs.
Tracy is currently a member of, and one of the first women elected to, the Hyperledger Technical Steering Committee and a Hyperledger Lab Steward. Check out her recent talk at Hyperledger Global Forum 2020 on creating an inclusive community and blog on contributing to the Hyperledger Labs. Prior to Accenture, Tracy served as a Community Architect at Hyperledger, where she worked to build the community, evangelized Hyperledger and its projects worldwide, and helped develop the first Hyperledger EdX course.
ConsenSys
The PegaSys team at ConsenSys is focused largely on the development of Hyperledger Besu. There is a core of women working together to drive this project, including:
Madeline Murray is a product owner for privacy and documentation at the protocol engineering team at ConsenSys. She is part of the product development team and works with engineers to define, deliver, and document Hyperledger Besu functionality. She has a Bachelor of Science in Computer Science from the University of Otago and runs marathons in her free time.
Sally MacFarlane is a Software Engineer at PegaSys, and has been working on Hyperledger Besu (among other things) for two years. The codebase has grown and changed significantly over that time, with many features added. Sally writes code, reviews PRs, updates the wiki and lurks on Rocketchat. Sally is based in Australia.
Grace Hartley is a Strategy & Operations Associate at PegaSys, the protocol engineering team at ConsenSys. Her role with Hyperledger Besu is business-focused. Some of her activities include promoting Hyperledger Besu within the community and engaging with companies using Hyperledger Besu for their use cases. Prior to joining PegaSys, Grace was a management consultant at KPMG in the Financial Services practice. She has a Bachelor of Science in Business and Enterprise Management from Wake Forest University.
Maryam Mahjoub manages product marketing for Hyperledger Besu and the PegaSys suite of products. She holds over 12 years of SaaS marketing experience and holds her MSc in Healthcare Leadership. Maryam is a snowbird between Canada and Mexico.
Gina Rubino handles digital and social media marketing for Hyperledger Besu as well as the PegaSys suite of products and team as a whole. She has been involved in the blockchain space for 3 years and has over 10 years of marketing experience with a degree in Marketing Communications.
Leanne Kemp, Everledger
Leanne Kemp is Founder and CEO of Everledger and Queensland Chief Entrepreneur. In her role as CEO, she works to increase transparency and trust with technology, in close collaboration with industry partners. Leanne co-chairs the World Economic Forum’s Global Future Council on the Future of Manufacturing and takes part in the Global Future Council on Blockchain. She also leads workstreams at the Global Blockchain Business Council and co-chairs the World Trade Board’s Sustainable Trade Action Group.Leanne’s awards include the AIM Global Allan Gilligan Award 2019, Advance Global Australian Awards 2018 for Technology Innovation, and Innovator of the Year 2016 and 2018 at the Women in IT Awards (London). More recently, Leanne has been appointed to the Global Blockchain Business Council as a Regional Ambassador of Australia, an Adjunct Professor in the Institute for Future Environment at the Queensland University of Technology, and Blockchain Advisory Board Member of the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD).
Lisa Butters, Honeywell
Lisa is the General Manager for the GoDirect Trade Greenhouse business, which is considered a genuine “garage-style” software start-up inside the Honeywell four walls. She has over 15 years of experience in multiple functions across Honeywell Aerospace. A tech geek at heart, she graduated from college at 19 and started her career as a teenager in web development and database programming. Through the years, she has been passionate about developing her craft in the User Experience.
GoDirect™ Trade is blazing a trail to push the $4B aerospace used parts industry far outside its comfort zone. It is the first marketplace to require price, product images and quality documents to post a listing. It is the first marketplace to give sellers the opportunity to launch customized storefronts to maintain brand identity. Lastly, it’s the first platform to leverage Blockchain to provide consumers as much part history as possible to help make buying decisions quicker and easier. Everyone wants transparency and everyone wants it easy. GoDirect™ Trade is determined to provide both.
GoDirect Trade recently earned a coveted spot on the Forbes Blockchain 50 list alongside tech giants such as Amazon, Facebook, Google and Square. Lisa is a recipient of the Honeywell CEO Award and was the first recipient of the Honeywell Aerospace Navigator Award. She has served as a board member on About Care which empowers people to live independently and has also served on the Chandler Arizona Transportation Commission. She is a member of The Connected Place Council which is sponsored by the Greater Phoenix Economic Council and is a volunteer volleyball coach for the YMCA. She earned a Bachelor’s degree in Computer Information Systems from Arizona State University, a Master’s degree in Business Administration from Arizona State University, and a Master’s degree in Finance from Harvard University.
Mary Hall, Oracle
Mary leads Oracle’s global marketing for the Oracle Blockchain Platform. In this capacity, Mary works to deliver Oracle’s messaging on the benefits of Blockchain technology. She works closely with partners and customers to develop case studies, videos and blogs around blockchain projects. Mary was voted one of the “Top 100 Women in Blockchain” by Richtopia. She has also been voted one of the TOP 100 INFLUENCERS IN THE AREA OF IDENTITY by One World Identity. Mary has won many awards for marketing hardware & software products, as well as social media and digital marketing. She is a member of the Hyperledger Group Marketing Committee and the Supply Chain Marketing Special Interest Group. Mary holds a JD from the Univ. of Toledo College of Law and a BA in English from Miami Univ. Oxford, Ohio.
Prior to joining Oracle, she was with IBM for 13 years in a variety of marketing roles, including blockchain marketing.
Heather C. Dahl, Sovrin foundation
Heather C. Dahl is the CEO and Executive Director of the Sovrin foundation, the nonprofit working to administer the Sovrin Network–an open source system using distributed ledger technology for decentralized identity. Under her direction, the Sovrin Network has expanded to six continents, enabled enterprises around the world to develop applications across all verticals, and ushered in a revolution in decentralized digital identity. Heather is widely-respected as a thought leader in cybersecurity technology and media with over 25 years of strategic leadership experience in newsrooms, multinational corporations, and high-tech startups. She has a Masters of Business Administration from Johns Hopkins University, a Masters of Science from Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism, and a Bachelors of Arts from Willamette University.
Walmart
Archana Sristy, Sr. Director – Blockchain Platforms, Walmart Global Technology
Archana Sristy is committed to creating innovative solutions to solve business problems at Walmart. As Senior Director of Engineering, she is responsible for software engineering and operations functions for Walmart’s enterprise Blockchain Platforms team. Her teams implement blockchain at scale, powered by Hyperledger Fabric, for driving Food Safety in our supply chain.
An advocate for diversity in tech, Archana is also FIRST youth mentor with 4H and sponsors Asian Women in Technology (AWIT) and Women in Technology (WIT) groups at Walmart.
Asma Ishak-Mahdi, Senior Buyer – DSCSA Serialization Lead for Walmart Health and Wellness
Asma Ishak-Mahdi received her PharmD from the University of New Mexico, her MBA for Executives from California State University and has completed advanced education from Saïd Business School at Oxford University in London. A strong advocate for digital transformation, problem-solving, process improvement, and technology-infused initiatives, she is respected by her peers as a leader who is dedicated to further advance the profession of pharmacy.
With over 18 years of experience in the pharmaceutical industry and a passion for innovative technology, she’s served in numerous roles and committees at Walmart and has recently joined Walmart Corporate Offices as the Lead for Drug Serialization under the Drug Supply Chain Security Act, DSCSA. She is also serving as the Blockchain Lead for Health and Wellness and has led two successful blockchain pilots for the FDA’s DSCSA Pilot Project Program while working with industry partners in defining attributes of an electronic interoperable system for data exchange to comply with the Federal mandate.
Her professional interests focus on evaluation of blockchain technology in the pharmaceutical industry to solve for use-cases such as waste mitigation and cold-chain monitoring and in serving to develop young leaders. In addition, she served as the industry expert advising graduate students at Rutgers Business School in collaboration with the Healthcare Distribution Alliance Research Foundation and at the Sam M Walton College of Business.
Nischala Murthy Kaushik, Wipro
Nischala is the Global Marketing Director for the CTO Office at Wipro. As the marketing partner and advisor to the CTO office, she crafts and executes high impact integrated marketing programs for emerging technology and innovation areas – like blockchain, open source, robotics and smart machines, industry academia research, open innovation. As part of her role as at Wipro, Nischala is an active champion of enterprise blockchain and Hyperledger technologies. She overseas global marketing initiatives for blockchain for Wipro and, as part of the Hyperledger PR / marketing committee, provides input on enterprise use cases on Hyperledger, thought leadership contributions to the community blog and support for Hyperledger events across the globe.
She is a writer, mother, IIM (Indian Institute of Management) alum (a top business school in India), speaker (TEDx, industry, academia), horizon gazer and polymath artist. She is part of the jury for Marketing Awards like DMA ECHO awards. Most recently, she was a Winner (Among Top 3 in India) for the Women Leadership Influencer Awards | Women In Tech – Leader / Innovator / Disruptor of the year category & WICA (Women In Corporate Awards) – Growth Champion (Among Top 3 in India). She uses her voice for causes that she believes in like supporting the case of #WomenAtWork, nurturing skills for new age talent.