See and hear inventor Dr. Marian Rogers Croak at the next all-virtual installment of the USPTO Speaker Series Wednesday, October 21, from 3:30-4:30 p.m. ET. Dr. Croak, USPTO Director Andrei Iancu, and the audience will discuss her decades of work on advanced technologies for voice and data networks and the internet. The conversation will cover her career, what inspired her, and the future of innovation. Register for this special event and watch the discussion online.
Dr. Croak holds more than 200 patents and has more than 100 pending patent applications. Her many achievements include:
Pioneering work advancing the Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) with inventions that made internet phone calls more reliable and secure.
Text-to-donate technology inspired by Hurricane Katrina that revolutionized how people give to charitable organizations.
Work on the telephone network and voting system used for American Idol.
Dr. Croak is now vice president for site reliability engineering at Google, Inc., where she works on initiatives such as the Loon project, which seeks to use high-altitude balloons as cell towers for WiFi access to trains in rural India and other parts of the world.
If you would like to submit a question to Dr. Croak in advance, please send it to directorspeakerseries@USPTO.GOV.
The USPTO Speaker Series is a regularly occurring program featuring American inventors and entrepreneurs who share their remarkable personal stories of invention, innovation, entrepreneurship, or leadership. View past Speaker Series programs on the USPTO’s YouTube channel.