Innovation and people in the 21st century
Photo: Justin Heller
Marylene Delbourg-Delphis is a serial technology CEO, executive consultant and board member who has focused on avant-garde products throughout her career.
For 30 years, she has empowered organizations to continuously reshape their future by creating breakthrough platforms and applications as a full-time CEO (4 companies), shadow CEO, board member or advisor (over 30 companies). In 2018, she was awarded the French Legion of Honour, the highest order of merit for military and civil accomplishments.
She has been directly involved in areas that matter to every single company today: Artificial Intelligence, Big Data Storage and Analytics, Business Process Management and Digital Transformation, Virtual and Augmented Reality, Social Networks, Cloud Management, Lean Supply Chain Management, Platform and architecture independent data interchange, Search Engine and Web Site Marketing Optimization, Database Management Systems, Talent Management and Employee Engagement, etc.
Marylene started her entrepreneurial career in France as the founder of ACI (now 4th Dimension), which published the first relational database for Macintosh in 1985. In 1987, she became one of the first European women to found (with Guy Kawasaki) a technology company in Silicon Valley, where she has resided ever since. Marylene went on to become the CEO of Exemplary Software (a Hewlett Packard spin-off), Brixlogic (acquired by Diebold), and TalentCircles. She currently sits on the board of several companies (including Virtual reality and Culture Assessment companies), and is a member of the National Council of the University Musical Society (UMS) of the University of Michigan.
A graduate of l’Ecole Normale Supérieure in France, she holds a Doctorate in Philosophy and earned minors in Mathematical Logic and History of Sciences, which she studied under the tutelage of French Academician and former Stanford Professor Michel Serres. A prolific writer, Marylene has turned out a large number of articles as a journalist and a blogger, curated content on technology, innovation, leadership and employee engagement, authored several books on the history of fashion and fragrances and translated and/or prefaced a dozen books by Guy Kawasaki, Robert Scoble and Seth Godin into French.
Marylene is the mother of Sophie Delphis, who is an opera singer.