Pilar Manchon
Director of Cognitive Interfaces
Amazon Machine Learning
As a young woman entrepreneur in a highly
competitive industry, Pilar Manchon shares
she felt she had to prove herself in ways her
male counterparts never did. Her ‘emotional
stability’ was often thought to be the reason
behind her successful business, as if it was the
exception for a woman.
“I was frequently the only woman in executive
meetings, often patronized, and sometimes my
opinions were disregarded,” shares the Seville,
Spain native. “As a Latina entrepreneur, it is
hard to explain how often and how much
disbelief we encountered when pitching our
technology and the capabilities of our team,
simply because we were Spanish.”
But Manchon’s resilience, outspokenness
and self-assuredness continues proving wrong
those who underestimated her. Today, she
serves as Director of Cognitive Interfaces at
Amazon Machine Learning. She is responsible
with looking at all services across Amazon’s
artificial intelligence and machine learning
portfolio where advanced Human-Computer
interaction technologies are relevant.
“My role involves exploring new paradigms
and architectures for multimodal conversation
and intelligence in the development of smart
conversational agents,” she says.
According to Manchon, the multimodal
conversation is about understanding how
different modalities and redundant information
can enrich and improve conversation to make it
more “intelligent, efficient and useful.”
At its core, she says multidimensional
intelligence is about catering for other human
cognitive needs, such as social and emotional
intelligence, how they impact performance of
conversational agents and how users perceive them.
Always equally fascinated by the potential of
science and technology as she is passionate
about languages and human cognition, Manchon
spent time switching between fields until finding a
way to combine her professional passion.
“I discovered that deep diving into research
and methodologies --- which at face value didn’t
seem to have much in common --- gave me
valuable insights and a perspective that helped
me grow,” she explains. “A career in STEM
gives you the tools to fix, improve and create
anything you can imagine. When you understand
the challenges, have the tools to fix them, and
the drive and stamina to get the job done, there
is nothing stopping you.”
Manchon --- who is proud of her Spanish
heritage and gives back to the community by
participating in internal programs at Amazon
and collaborating with Latinxs in Tech,
LatinoSphere, Latino Founders, Girls in Tech
and other organizations --- is driven by the nature
of her work as well as her colleagues who she
considers extremely talented.
“It is our responsibility to offer a helping hand
to all those who might need it,” Manchon shares.
“I feel very fortunate to now hold a leadership
role at a company that values diverse perspectives
and encourages employees from all backgrounds
to succeed.”
make it possible for veterans’ health records to
be accessed after Hurricane Katrina hit.
“Whether it’s our veterans or soldiers, I really
want to make sure our folks are safe,” she states.
“That’s one of the things I’ve been very focused on
since I started working with the federal government.”
Microsoft has agreements with the federal
government including with the Navy. She is
currently chief technology officer for the U.S. Navy
where her team provides guidance on Cloud
solutions as well as data and analytic solutions.
Solutions can include determining the best
harbor pilot to drive a specific kind of ship, orders
that come in, how a ship can get to a canal
faster, special solutions for river and dam ships,
water levels, environmental factors and more.
Dr. DeZulueta presented her latest findings at
the National Defense University. Her passion
for serving others extends to her humanitarian
efforts, including mentoring young girls and
underrepresented minorities. She has been
involved with Microsoft’s DigiGirlz, CODeLLA,
Girls Develop It and with robotics competitions
and clubs.
Prior to Microsoft, she served as a project
leader at NASA, on the communications systems
for Shuttle Launch and Payload Processing. Her
internship at NOAA consisted of flying on-board
the hurricane reconnaissance aircraft. She was
named one of the 100 most green Latinos by
Poder360 and profiled in the book, Latinnovating.
She has a Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering, a
Master of Science in Computer Engineering
and another Master of Science in Engineering
Management. She also has a Bachelor of
Science in Electrical Engineering. Her doctoral
dissertation was on applying neural networks
to security.
“There are so many resources, including
scholarships, available to Latinas, from college
to the start of their careers to enable them to
live out their dreams and not have to worry
about being able to pay back student loans,”
she says.
LS
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