Yulia Ovchinnikova

Yulia Ovchinnikova sits at the intersection of emerging technology, applied AI, and the human systems that make innovation stick. A tech entrepreneur, innovation strategist, and educator with deep roots in software development and IT consulting, she has spent her career translating complex technical trends into real-world practice — for organizations, communities, and the next generation of builders.

In 2009, she made history as the first woman elected to the Russian Internet Council. In 2017, she founded OpenHub following a winning concept at a Google Hackathon, growing it into a NYS-certified technology think tank and training provider serving the Hudson Valley. Through bootcamps, workshops, and applied curricula, OpenHub puts tools like AI directly in the hands of practitioners.

Yulia leads the Hudson Valley Tech Meetup network — a community of over 3,000 members — and co-leads Google Developer Group (GDG) Hudson Valley, through which she has facilitated Build With AI programs for the past two years. She organizes HV Tech Fest annually, an event combining a developer conference, hackathon, and community convening around the technologies shaping our world.

With a PhD in Economics from the Russian Academy of Science and an MA in Applied Mathematics & Computer Science from Moscow State Technical University, Yulia brings rare technical rigor to conversations about where AI and emerging technologies are headed — and what it takes to prepare people and organizations to meet that future securely and confidently.