Joe Reis is a business-minded data nerd who has worked in the data industry for 20 years. His responsibilities have ranged from statistical modeling, forecasting, and machine learning to data engineering, data architecture, and almost everything else in between, a breadth that few practitioners in the field can claim.

That breadth is exactly what Joe brings to his work as CEO and Co-Founder of Ternary Data, a data engineering and architecture consulting firm based in Salt Lake City, Utah. Ternary Data helps organizations design and build the robust data infrastructure and architecture that analytics and machine learning depend on, and Joe’s consulting philosophy is simple: technology choices follow from business needs, never the other way around.

Joe is also a well-known voice in the data community. He is the co-author, with Matthew Housley, of Fundamentals of Data Engineering, an O’Reilly book that has become a standard reference for planning and building data systems that actually last. In addition, he volunteers with several technology groups and teaches at the University of Utah, helping the next generation of data practitioners get grounded in the fundamentals.

In his spare time, Joe likes to rock climb, produce electronic music, and take his kids on crazy adventures.