Oren is the founder of the AI2 Incubator, and the founding CEO of the Allen Institute for AI (Ai2), which he led from 2013 to 2022, and Professor Emeritus of Computer Science at the University of Washington. A pioneer in applied AI, he has authored 200+ technical papers and founded multiple companies, including MetaCrawler, Farecast (acquired by Microsoft), and Decide.com (acquired by eBay). Oren has advised the White House, written for The New York Times and Nature, and shaped AI policy and research agendas globally. At the incubator, he helps founders bridge the gap between frontier research and commercial opportunity.

Since August 17, 2018, Dr. Ines Hanrahan has expertly guided the Washington Tree Fruit Research Commission (WTFRC) as its Executive Director, a role she assumed after serving as the Commission’s project manager since 2005. In her current position, she provides strategic direction, oversees staff operations, and ensures that research investments are meticulously aligned with the industry’s most pressing needs. Her focus is unwavering: to empower growers with the tools and knowledge necessary to achieve increased productivity, enhance product quality, and thrive in a competitive global marketplace.

Dr. Hanrahan is a strong advocate for collaborative innovation, fostering vibrant public-private partnerships with leading tree fruit scientists around the world. She believes that active engagement with a diverse range of industry stakeholders is crucial for driving progress and enabling the industry to proactively shape its future. Furthermore, she is deeply invested in nurturing the next generation of tree fruit professionals, serving as both a mentor and an inspiring role model.

Ananth Kalyanaraman is a Professor, Boeing Centennial Chair in Computer Science, and the Interim Director for the School of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, Washington State University in Pullman. He is the Director of the NSF-USDA NIFA funded AgAID AI Institute for Transforming Workforce and Decision Support in agriculture. He holds a joint appointment at Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL), and affiliate faculty positions at the Molecular Plant Sciences Graduate Program and the Paul G. Allen School for Global Health. Ananth received his bachelors from Visvesvaraya National Institute of Technology in Nagpur, India (B.E. in Computer Science and Engineering, 1998); and subsequently M.S. (Computer Science, 2002) and Ph.D. (Computer Engineering, 2006) from Iowa State University.

Ananth works at the intersection of parallel computing, graph analytics, and bioinformatics/computational biology. His focus is on developing algorithms and software for scalable analysis of large-scale data from various scientific domains and particularly agriculture, plant and life sciences. Research in his lab has been supported by various funding sources including the National Science Foundation (NSF), U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), and the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Ananth is a recipient of U.S. Department of Energy Early Career Research Award, and his student-led research works have received multiple conference best paper awards and a prestigious graph challenge award. Ananth serves/has served on the editorial boards of several reputed journals (including TPDS, TCBB, JPDC, ParCo), and also regularly serves in various capacities including organizational capacities at various conferences in the areas of parallel processing and bioinformatics. He is currently serving as a Vice-Chair for the IEEE Technical Committee on Parallel Programming (TCPP). Ananth is a senior member of IEEE, and a member of ACM and SIAM.

Derek Sandison was appointed director of the Washington State Department of Agriculture by Gov. Jay Inslee effective June 15, 2015. As WSDA director, Derek oversees an agency responsible for animal health, plant inspections, food safety, fruit and grain inspection and certification, weights and measures, pesticide registration and marketing the state’s agricultural products regionally and globally. Derek is familiar to many in the agriculture industry from his previous role as director of the state Department of Ecology’s Office of Columbia River, where he oversaw numerous water supply development projects important to farmers and ranchers. He was also a principal architect of the Yakima River Basin Integrated Water Resource Management Plan and has played a key role in the Odessa Ground Water Replacement Project.