John Cochrane

John started writing software in the early 1980s and has helped build several computer-related companies. He was responsible for business development at Wolfram Research, Inc. from the formative stage of the company through the introduction of Mathematica and subsequent growth of the company into one of the world’s leading technical software vendors. Subsequently, he started two companies that developed and marketed software relating to information security and software license management.

In addition to the work that he has done at companies that he helped establish, John has worked as a software engineer and as the number two executive at a U.S.-based contract software firm which specialized in developing software for major Japanese corporations. The software that he has written has varied from consumer-oriented applications to tools and libraries for software developers to real-time systems for running machines in an industrial environment. In addition he has written technical documentation ranging from consumer-oriented software manuals to an integrated circuit design language text.

John’s favorite sport is soccer, and if he could play it every day, he probably would. He has coached a university soccer team. His other interests include sailboat racing and alpine skiing.

John is a 1988 graduate (B.S. Economics) of the business school at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and a 1985 graduate of University High School in Urbana, Illinois.