Joanna Peña-Bickley

Founder & CEO, Vibes Ai; AI Pioneer, Board Member & Keynote Speaker Joanna Peña-Bickley, a design engineer, is known as the mother of Cognitive Experience Design and a pioneer in Generative AI in Product Design. She is propelled by multidisciplinary acumen in research, design, technology, and media. Her dedication to lifelong learning and insatiable curiosity has produced 150+ enduring, market making products and smart experiences for the AI era. Joanna’s award-winning design and technology expertise has led to patented inventions and sparked business transformations in some of the world’s most recognized companies. IBM, Land Rover, L’Oréal, Sephora, American Express, NASA, Boeing, Nokia, Disney, MTV, Pepsi, Warner Bros and JayZ have all benefited from her ability to imagine, design, and launch remarkable products and services. Her approach has been characterized as a fusion of creativity and tech that uses leaps of imagination with feats of engineering, to create new AI powered products that when introduced are indistinguishable from magic. Whether creating one of the first streaming video players that changed the delivery of live news for ABC, Launching Ovi for Nokia, designing the first banking experience on the Apple Watch for Citibank, reinventing the connected car as a smart mobility platform for General Motors, building new AI powered Alexa Devices at Amazon, or reimagining the way world moves goods for Uber, Joanna’s customer obsession and tenacious leadership delivers business results. Named one of Fortune’s Most Powerful Women, a 2022 Hispanic Star and a Power Woman of New York her visionary leadership is fueled by a mission to design inventions that work for everyone, everywhere, every day. Joanna’s founding of the A.I. Design Corps has positioned her as dynamic voice and advocate for S.T.E.A.M.D. apprenticeships, workforce upskilling and economic empowerment for women, girls, and ethnic minorities. Her executive leadership has catalyzed the inclusion of women on US currency as well as contributed to AI Ethics and Governance Policies. As the founder and CEO of Vibes Ai, she is leading a company to launch a new generation of wearable computers built to harness the power of AI for good. These notable accomplishments have made her a coveted keynote speaker at prestigious conferences, including Fortune’s Brainstorm Design, CES, Cannes Lions, The One Show, SxSW, Verizon’s Data Summit, AWS re:Invent, the TriBeCa Film Festival, 3% Conference, and C2 Montreal.

Founder & CEO, Vibes Ai; AI Pioneer, Board Member & Keynote Speaker

Joanna Peña-Bickley, a design engineer, is known as the mother of Cognitive Experience Design and a pioneer in Generative AI in Product Design. She is propelled by multidisciplinary acumen in research, design, technology, and media. Her dedication to lifelong learning and insatiable curiosity has produced 150+ enduring, market making products and smart experiences for the AI era.

Joanna’s award-winning design and technology expertise has led to patented inventions and sparked business transformations in some of the world's most recognized companies. IBM, Land Rover, L'Oréal, Sephora, American Express, NASA, Boeing, Nokia, Disney, MTV, Pepsi, Warner Bros and JayZ have all benefited from her ability to imagine, design, and launch remarkable products and services. Her approach has been characterized as a fusion of creativity and tech that uses leaps of imagination with feats of engineering, to create new AI powered products that when introduced are indistinguishable from magic. Whether creating one of the first streaming video players that changed the delivery of live news for ABC, Launching Ovi for Nokia, designing the first banking experience on the Apple Watch for Citibank, reinventing the connected car as a smart mobility platform for General Motors, building new AI powered Alexa Devices at Amazon, or reimagining the way world moves goods for Uber, Joanna’s customer obsession and tenacious leadership delivers business results.

Named one of Fortune's Most Powerful Women, a 2022 Hispanic Star and a Power Woman of New York her visionary leadership is fueled by a mission to design inventions that work for everyone, everywhere, every day. Joanna’s founding of the A.I. Design Corps has positioned her as dynamic voice and advocate for S.T.E.A.M.D. apprenticeships, workforce upskilling and economic empowerment for

women, girls, and ethnic minorities. Her executive leadership has catalyzed the inclusion of women on US currency as well as contributed to AI Ethics and Governance Policies. As the founder and CEO of Vibes Ai, she is leading a company to launch a new generation of wearable computers built to harness the power of AI for good. These notable accomplishments have made her a coveted keynote speaker at prestigious conferences, including Fortune's Brainstorm Design, CES, Cannes Lions, The One Show, SxSW, Verizon's Data Summit, AWS re:Invent, the TriBeCa Film Festival, 3% Conference, and C2 Montreal.

Activities for Joanna

Speaker | Designing with AI Deep Dive | 2024

Artificially Inspired: The Controversial Muse of Modern Design

As we stand on the brink of a new era in product and industrial design, the shadow of Generative AI looms large, sparking a controversy that divides the design community. Is Generative AI the dawn of unprecedented innovation, or does it herald the end of human creativity as we know it? This keynote dares to confront the elephant in the room, challenging preconceived notions about the role of AI in design and questioning the future of human designers in an AI-dominated landscape.

Presentation topics include:

Synergy of Human Creativity and AI: Generative AI serves as a transformative partner, enhancing human creativity. For instance, Adidas has used AI to generate innovative sneaker designs, showcasing a blend of human aesthetic judgment and AI’s vast pattern generation capabilities.
Empowerment over Obsolescence: AI empowers designers by automating mundane tasks. Vibes Ai Example of Ear Models to craft next generation of ear buds, Autodesk’s Dreamcatcher is an example where designers input goals and constraints, and the AI proposes optimized designs, allowing creators to focus on innovation and complex problem-solving.
Navigating Ethical and Creative Coexistence: The keynote highlights the importance of ethical guidelines in AI use. The collaboration between IBM’s Watson and Marchesa to create a dress that changed colors based on social media sentiment analysis demonstrates how AI can be used responsibly and creatively, respecting intellectual property while pushing the boundaries of design.