Speaker
Plenary Speaker
Hadi Partovi

Hadi Partovi

Code.org
CEO

Hadi Partovi is a tech entrepreneur and investor, and CEO of the education non-profit Code.org.

Born in Tehran, Iran, Hadi grew up during the Iran-Iraq war. His school did not offer computer science classes, so he taught himself to code at home on a Commodore 64. After immigrating to the United States, he spent his summers working as a software engineer to help pay his way through high school and college. Upon graduating from Harvard University with a computer science degree, Hadi pursued a career in technology starting at Microsoft where he rose into the executive ranks. He founded two startups – the first was a huge success and the second a dismal failure – and he now invests and advises other technology startups.

In 2013 Hadi and his twin brother Ali launched the education nonprofit Code.org, which Hadi continues to lead full-time as CEO. Code.org has established computer science classes in 20% of US classrooms, created the most broadly used curriculum platform for K-12 computer science, and launched the global Hour of Code movement that has reached over 100 million students.

Hadi has served as an early advisor or investor at many tech startups including Facebook, Dropbox, airbnb, and Uber. He currently serves on the Board of Directors of Axon and Convoy.