Adobe celebrates distinguished inventors
Q1 and Q2 of FY16 were innovative quarters at Adobe with a total of 185 patents issued. For the special few who have achieved 10 or more patents at Adobe, they earn recognition as a “Distinguished Inventor.” Meet the seven employees who received Distinguished Inventor status in the first half of FY16, and learn about the innovations they’ve contributed to Adobe.
Sanjeev Biswas, Lead Senior Computer Scientist II, Digital Media, Bangalore
What technology have you patented?
I have patents in image processing, audio processing, digital rights management, eLearning and more. Most of my patents are in digital rights management (DRM) which help with the anti-piracy initiatives of Adobe.
Of all your professional achievements at Adobe, what are you most proud of and why?
Out of all the awards in Adobe, I believe my Adobe Founders’ Award in 2014 stands out at the top. I am extremely proud of it. As you know, it is rare to get nominated and even rarer to win it. It also brought me closer to our founders and I was lucky enough to sit next to Chuck (Geschke) at the Founders’ Award dinner table. I still remember his golden words of advice to me. He said, “Do not leave Adobe; there are plenty of people who will hear your voice”.
What’s next – any new patents/breakthroughs in the near future?
I want to break status quo. I hate doing my work in a pre-defined and standard way set by others. I will continue to challenge the status quo and break it to innovate and come up with mind-blowing ideas.
Brandon George, Engineering Manager, Analytics Web UI, Digital Marketing, Lehi
What technology have you patented?
Most of the patents have been focused on integrating emerging technologies such as mobile, social and geo with various Marketing Cloud solutions. Many have been specifically focused on various analytics and data science concepts.
Of all your professional achievements at Adobe, what are you most proud of and why?
Over the past two years my team (and several other contributing teams) have strived to overhaul our analysis experience throughout Adobe Analytics, in order to truly provide something that our customers love. It has been really exciting to see this progression and how much value this product has provided to our customers.
What’s next – any new patents/breakthroughs in the near future?
There are always new, emerging technologies to integrate with the Marketing Cloud, and analytics provides several opportunities as well, especially in the realm of data science. Hopefully we will get to patent some of them!
Paul George, Principal Computer Scientist Digital Media, San Jose
What do you currently work on at Adobe?
I am a software engineer working on mobile applications for drawing and painting — specifically Adobe Illustrator Draw and Adobe Photoshop Sketch.
What technology have you patented?
My patents are all related to drawing and painting in one form or another. They cover aspects of features in the mobile applications I currently develop and from the time I spent prior to this working on Illustrator.
Of all your professional achievements at Adobe, what are you most proud of and why?
When it comes to software for drawing and painting, details can be important. I’m proud that I’ve been able to create software that is used and I think enjoyed, by some talented visual artists.
What’s next – any new patents/breakthroughs in the near future?
I continue to develop features for the mobile drawing and painting applications. Sometimes that requires inventing new solutions to problems that merit a patent application. It’s all part of what keeps things interesting.
Brian Price, Senior Research Scientist, Cloud Technology, San Jose
What technology have you patented?
My patents are mostly focused on the areas of processing stereo image pairs (i.e. “3D” images like you get in 3D movies like Avatar) and in selection/masking in images.
Of all your professional achievements at Adobe, what are you most proud of and why?
I’m most proud that I’ve been able to transfer some of the technologies that I’ve developed into Adobe products, and that these technologies are impacting the lives of our customers.
What’s next – any new patents/breakthroughs in the near future?
I have several more patents pending now.
Xiaohui Shen, Research Scientist 2, Cloud Technology, San Jose
What technology have you patented?
The issued patents range from image analysis techniques such as object/face detection and object retrieval, to automatic editing tools such as automatic image cropping.
Of all your professional achievements at Adobe, what are you most proud of and why?
I feel most proud when the techniques we developed not only result in patents and academic publications, but are also transferred to products and improve the experience of our customers.
What’s next – any new patents/breakthroughs in the near future?
I am particularly excited that our new technology can be applied in multiple platforms including mobile and cloud service, bringing more content-intelligent features to connect workflows.
Kevin Smith, Senior Research Scientist, Digital Marketing, Lehi
What technology have you patented?
I managed the Emerging Technologies research lab for several years, and as such, most of my patents have been in areas of new and exciting technologies before they became mainstream, such as mobile, social, geo and IoT. Examples include methods to measure, stitch and score social content, identifying unique users on mobile devices and personalizing touch interfaces to the individual, and personalizing marketing based on the local weather of the visitor. However, with my previous core competencies being in analytics and search marketing, I also have several patents in areas such as success event attribution and search campaign automation.
Of all your professional achievements at Adobe, what are you most proud of and why?
In nearly 12 years at Adobe, I have played many different roles and been part of a lot of very satisfying initiatives. However, I would probably say my biggest achievement may have come as Chair for the 2015 Tech Summit in San Francisco. I was privileged to work with a great co-chair and put together amazing program committees consisting of many of Adobe’s finest. As a year-long project that really pushed me out of my engineering comfort zone, it was very satisfying to see all of our hard work come together into a great event enjoyed by thousands of my peers.
What’s next – any new patents/breakthroughs in the near future?
Right now, Virtual Reality and Augmented Reality both look hot. Both of these technologies have been around for a while, but are just now on the cusp of going mainstream which is the perfect time to play around with them.
Sachin Soni, Engineering Manager, Digital Media, Noida
What technology have you patented?
My patents span a variety of technologies related to Documents, Videos and Digital Marketing.
Of all your professional achievements at Adobe, what are you most proud of and why?
I think it is that I have more than 10 issued patents and more than 50 patents still pending. A lot of these, especially related to Internet of Things, will significantly impact the lives of people in times to come and that is what I am proudest of.
What’s next – any new patents/breakthroughs in the near future?
The desire and passion to innovate should help new patents/breakthroughs to continue to come to me in the near future.
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