Alvin Huang, AIA, NOMA is a Los Angeles-based architect with a global profile. He is an award-winning architect, designer, and educator who explores the intersections between technology and culture to produce innovative design work that challenges convention and expresses universal values. He is a vocal advocate for justice, equity, diversity and inclusion in design culture. His work spans all scales ranging from hi-rise towers and mixed-use developments to temporary pavilions and bespoke furnishings. He is the founder and principal of Synthesis Design + Architecture and an Associate Professor at the University of Southern California, where he is also the Director of Graduate and Post-professional Architecture. Prior to establishing SDA, he gained significant experience working in the offices of Zaha Hadid Architects, Future Systems, AL_A and AECOM. He received an M.Arch from the Graduate Design Research Laboratory at the Architectural Association in London and a B.Arch from the USC School of Architecture in Los Angeles.

His design work has been published and exhibited widely and has gained international recognition with over 40 distinctions at local, national, and international levels including being selected as one of 50 global innovators under the age of 50 by Images Publishing in 2015, being featured as a “Next Progressive” by Architect Magazine in 2014, and being named one of Time Magazine’s 25 Best Inventors of 2013. He has been an invited critic, guest lecturer, and keynote speaker at various institutions in the US, Canada, Mexico, Chile, UK, Germany, Italy, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Israel, New Zealand, India, Singapore, Thailand, Japan, and China.

Curtis Rodgers is a construction technologist and investor at Brick & Mortar Ventures, with six years of construction operations experience across federal, energy, industrial, infrastructure, and commercial markets at both Kiewit and McCarthy Construction. Curtis founded The Society for Construction Solutions (SCS) in 2014, contributed to the NASA Centennial 3D Printed Habitat Challenge, and participated as a lecturer for the US DOE’s Project Leadership Institute.

Kathleen Hetrick is an Associate at Buro Happold and is a Bloomberg Fellow at the Bloomberg School of Public Health at Johns Hopkins University. As part of the Buro Happold Los Angeles Sustainability team, Kathleen combines her passion for regenerative design with a technical background in Architectural Engineering. She leads the sustainable design process on a wide range of cutting-edge projects including LEED Platinum, ILFI Zero Carbon and Living Building Challenge buildings, portfolio-wide scope 3 emissions reduction plans, social impact studies, resiliency analysis and corporate sustainability implementation workshops. She also facilitates Buro Happold’s regional outreach initiatives to encourage local K-12 students to pursue sustainability-focused careers in STEM. She is currently a board member of USGBC-LA and is one of the founding instigators of Carbon Leadership Forum – Los Angeles.

Nikhil Choudhary is a Silicon Valley based venture capitalist and general partner of Nirman Ventures (www.nirman.vc), a VC fund focused on prop-tech, construction-tech, clean-tech, web3+real-estate, and blockchain tech shaping real estate. Previously, Nikhil has founded several award-winning AEC companies in the United States and has been an investor for over a decade. Nikhil is a highly published figure in the real estate industry and has been covered in notable publications such as Business Collective, Forbes & Inc.com. Some of Nikhil's notable awards include getting the former firm he led as its CEO to #1 growth rank in Inc500, Top 40 Thought Leaders on LinkedIn 2023, & Indian Achiever Award – Entrepreneur of the Year.

Niknaz is the CEO and co-founder at aec+tech, an all-in-one innovation platform and community connecting AEC/O (Architecture, Engineering, Construction & Operations) professionals with the latest tools and technologies. Prior to launching aec+tech Niknaz practiced architecture in the bay area, California, both as a design professional as well as a design technologist. Niknaz is passionate about technology and innovation in the AEC space, and she has been a keynote speaker at various international aec-tech events. Niknaz is a member of AIA San Francisco design technology committee, and has also been developing curriculum and teaching architecture courses online to Bahai students in Iran who continue to be deprived of access to universities in their own country.

Wendy W Fok (she/them), trained as an architect, is interested in design, technology, and creative solutions for the built environment. They have experience in Product Development and Program Management from Zero to Launch, Design-Build, Manufacturing, Hardware/Software, and Digital Fabrication.
Fok holds a Doctor of Design from the Harvard Graduate School of Design (GSD) in partnership with the Harvard Law School, obtained a Master of Architecture and Certification of Urban Policy/Planning from Princeton University, and a Bachelor of Arts in Architecture with a Concentration in Economics (Statistics) from Barnard College, Columbia University.

Hassan is an Egyptian interdiscisplary designer/artist based in southern california. He holds a bachelor degree in architectural design and his experiences vary between Museography, Exhibition design, Computational design, Furniture design, Architecture and Construction, Digital Fabrication and Conceptual art. Alongside his work as a computational designer for the AEC industry; Hassan is currently exploring the digital art scene using artificial intelligence

Alloy Kemp joined Thornton Tomasetti in 2011. As a long standing member of the firm’s Façade Engineering practice, she is responsible for structural engineering of façades, detail / prototype development, parametric modeling and fabrication planning. Her multi-disciplinary education and dual licensure as an Architect and Engineer enables her to adapt easily to the creative nature of engineering of non-traditional elements; such as tensile membranes, structural glass, and long-span gridshells. Alloy has experience in US and UK / Europe markets.

Zacua Ventures is an early stage global VC specialized in investing in the Built Environment sector. We work with exceptional founders from the conception of the idea and work to make them successful. We are backed by top tier corporates across the globe and help startups tap into their expertise to build best in breed companies

Sophie holds over 12 years of experience in the design of complex structures and facades. She joined Enclos in 2018, where she has led various projects’ specialty facades scope sales and design assist efforts, engaged in prototyping, modular curtainwall systems, and various research topics such as ultra-thin glass and acoustical analysis. Prior to joining Enclos, Sophie worked on international projects as a Senior Structural Engineer with Arup in New York where she contributed to the coordination of large design teams, complex geometry and big data management. In 2010 she engaged in the industry-academia partnership research project IAPP ARC for which she developed cold bent glass numerical analysis. Sophie authored several research papers on structural glass and is actively involved in the development of US structural glass codes with ASTM, the Journal of Architectural Engineering as an associate editor, and the Facades Tectonics Institute where she serves in the Special Advisory Council and the 2020 World Congress Organizing Committee.

Rohan Jawali is founder and CEO of Joist.ai, a marketing enablement platform for the built world. Prior to founding Joist.ai, Rohan worked for more than 12 years with Hensel Phelps, where he focused on innovation and Virtual Design and Construction.

Mr. Siegel is a Principal with Stantec Architecture. He has over three decades of experience with large, complex, cultural, institutional, corporate and mixed-use development projects. He has worked with prominent international architects around the globe, Tadao Ando, Ricardo Legoretta, Gert Windgardh and Ma Yansong.

His recent work has lead the design teams for the Swedish Embassy in Washington DC, Pioneer Park in Shenzhen China and Roosevelt Universities Vertical Campus in Chicago.

Michael is a designer, builder and athlete. Fascinated with the process of design connecting vision to craft, he has built a yacht and lives in endless renovation projects. As an athlete he is challenged by unfathomable events like the Ironman triathlon. The process of realizing the unfathomable comes to bear in his leadership of the design and engineering team on the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art in Los Angeles.

Ben is a creative professional with over fifteen years of experience in television development and marketing. He leads marketing for Canvas, the iOS app that’s the most efficient way to create as-built drawings and models. Instead of spending hours measuring spaces and even more time modeling them, architects can scan houses in minutes and get accurate, editable as-builts in as little as one day. Focus on designing the future instead of measuring the past.

Cory is an associate at Stantec specializing in the design and delivery of complex buildings. His work combines an expertise in computational design with deep investigations of specialty materials and assemblies. He has designed buildings, public spaces, and artworks with internationally acclaimed firms. Currently he is the lead architect for the façade and complex interior spaces of the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art.

My research interests include deep learning, machine learning, big data, structural health monitoring, anomaly detection, sensor networks, compressed sensing, digital image correlation, mobile sensing

I’m Thomas. I am a trans-disciplinary experience designer + builder. My work employs a user centered design process, driving thoughtful programming from deep context sensitivity. As a designer I craft rich narratives for stakeholders, as a builder I ensure the clarity of the narrative pushes through the experience. Being a builder extends the reach of my design thinking through applied knowledge. My skills are even more diverse than my potential titles: designer, strategist, researcher, technologist, developer. I craft experiences. From buildings to objects to services to businesses.

In over 20 years of professional practice I have managed multi-million dollar architectural projects, designed and developed websites during each of the 5 versions of HTML, built interactive mixed reality experiences, developed custom data driven design software, grown a unique educational design/technology startup to multiple locations + expanded B2B services, and most recently built a home on wheels for 2 young adventurers,.

Joe leads a team of IMAGINiT’s dedicated services professionals who ensure that the people, technology and processes exist to provide the best possible solution for clients every time. Joe and his team provide leadership to building design firms through the process of selecting, implementing, and optimizing software solutions. They engineer new workflow processes that dramatically improve productivity and efficiency, managing cultural change necessary for firms to be successful.

Laura Karnath is a registered architect and Senior Enclosure Technical Designer at Walter P Moore’s Los Angeles office. She is a leader in computational design and holds broad global experience in the organizational models and technical challenges involved in the delivery of large international projects. Having overseen the delivery of highly complex building envelopes on four continents, Laura applies her knowledge and experience to the burning question of embodied carbon in the built environment. An impassioned advocate for computationally driven building data management and for high-performance facades, she believes both to be central in the ultimate decarbonization of the built environment.

Laura is co-founder of the Los Angeles chapter of the Carbon Leadership Forum. She holds a Master’s degree from the Southern California Institute of Architecture and a Bachelor of Science in Architecture from the University at Buffalo.

• Auckland University – Bachelor of Architectural Studies
• Over 25 years at the forefront of the architectural technology industry
• Managing Director and majority owner of Cadimage Group (1996-2016)
  • New Zealand Distributor of ARCHICAD – Building Information Modelling System developer in Budapest
  • Exited in 2016 after 20 years
  • Tested and Launched a number of worldwide initiatives on behalf of GRAPHISOFT
• Global Director  of Business Development for GRAPHISOFT – Budapest Hungary (2016-2018)
• Consulting to architectural businesses launching recurring business models
• Started what has become Spaces in late 2019
• Based in Hungary

Kais Al-Rawi is an Associate Director in Eckersley O’Callaghan’s Los Angeles office, Kais is an established architect with a reputation for working on a diverse range of projects from art-forms to towers, stadia and aviation developments. His expertise lies at the intersection of architecture, engineering and technology – with a focus on solving complex design challenges through digital design. Kais’ expertise has been leveraged on several world-class projects including SoFi Stadium, the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art and the Orange County Museum of Art. In 2022, Kais was listed as one of Aviation Pros’ Top 40 under 40 in the Airport Business.

A keen educator, he serves as an adjunct lecturer at the USC School of Architecture where he teaches parametric design to undergraduate and graduate students. Additionally, he is a visiting critic and guest speaker at USC, UCLA, CalPoly Pomona, Sci-ARC, and the AA.