Adobe CEO Shantanu Narayen, MBA 93, will give the MBA commencement speech on Saturday, May 19, at 9 a.m., and Margo Alexander, BS 68, a former PaineWebber senior executive, will be the commencement speaker for undergraduates on Friday, May 18. Both commencements will be held in the Greek Theatre.
Since 2007, Narayen has led Adobe, one of the world's largest and most diversified software companies, with $1.2 billion in revenue in 2011. As CEO, he led the company's $1.8 billion acquisition of Omniture, which makes Web analytics and an online optimization platform. Narayen joined Adobe in 1998 as vice president of engineering and worked his way up to president and COO in 2005. In that role, he co-led the company's $3.4 billion acquisition of Macromedia.
Before joining Adobe, Narayen was co-founder of Pictra, an early pioneer of digital photo sharing over the Internet. Prior to that, he was an executive at Silicon Graphics and held various senior management positions at Apple. He is a member of the Haas School Board, which advises the dean.
Alexander climbed the corporate ladder from stock analyst to one of the most senior women on Wall Street. She spent nearly 30 years at PaineWebber, becoming the first woman to head a top-ranked research department and the first woman to oversee a major trading floor. She was among the first females to head a large asset management business, serving as chairwoman and CEO of UBS Global Asset Management (UBS acquired PaineWebber).
Alexander, now retired, serves on the Haas School Board and the advisory council of the Acumen Fund, which supports entrepreneurs focused on offering critical services to people earning less than $4 a day.
Read a CalBusiness Profile of Shantanu Narayen
Read a CalBusiness Profile of Margo Alexander