Officers - ACM Irving Professional Chapter

Tejas Pravinbhai Patel

Chapter Chair (Founding Member)

Tejas Pravinbhai Patel is a Senior Software Engineer at Amazon in Irving, Texas, where he designs and delivers large-scale distributed systems that drive intelligence for sellers and buyers across Amazon's global marketplace. With over eighteen years of engineering experience, he operates at the intersection of distributed systems architecture, artificial intelligence, and real-time data engineering, building platforms that process billions of events and serve tens of millions of customers and sellers worldwide.

His technical contributions at Amazon span the full spectrum of retail intelligence. He has architected seller insights platforms that surface actionable, AI-driven analytics to merchants operating across Amazon's international marketplace, enabling them to optimize pricing, inventory, and customer engagement at scale. He has designed and deployed real-time fraud detection systems that protect the marketplace's integrity for buyers and sellers alike, leveraging machine learning pipelines and distributed stream processing to identify and neutralize threats across billions of transactions. He has engineered recommendation and personalization engines that shape the buying experience for millions of customers globally, applying advanced AI techniques to deliver relevant, timely product discovery at unprecedented scale.

Tejas has also led the design of real-time analytics infrastructure processing billions of events daily, enabling the organization to make data-driven decisions at the speed of commerce. He has driven large-scale DynamoDB migrations handling trillions of records, demonstrating deep expertise in distributed storage systems and data architecture at a scale that few engineers in the world operate at. His work on Buy Box allocation algorithms, the core mechanism that determines product selection for buyers on Amazon's marketplace, reflects his ability to apply rigorous algorithmic thinking to systems with direct, measurable impact on global commerce. Across all of these contributions, his work reflects a consistent orientation toward driving greater intelligence, efficiency, and trust for both the sellers who power the marketplace and the buyers who depend on it.

Beyond his industry role, Tejas holds the distinguished designation of IEEE Senior Member, a recognition conferred upon fewer than ten percent of IEEE's global membership and reserved for those who have made significant contributions to the engineering profession. He is a Distinguished Fellow of the Soft Computing Research Society (SCRS) and a Fellow of the Hackathon Raptors Association. He actively serves as a peer reviewer, session chair, and technical program committee member at international IEEE conferences and journals, further cementing his role as a recognized authority bridging industry practice and academic research in computing.

Responsibilities

As Chapter Chair & a founding member of the ACM Irving Professional Chapter, Tejas Pravinbhai Patel discharges a broad and consequential set of leadership responsibilities that extend well beyond administrative management. His role encompasses strategic visioning, community governance, academic engagement, and international outreach: Strategic Leadership & Chapter Governance • Provides executive oversight and strategic direction for all chapter activities, programs, and initiatives, ensuring alignment with ACM's global mission of advancing computing as a science and profession. • Sets the chapter's annual agenda, defines key performance objectives, and ensures accountability across all officer roles and working groups. • Chairs all formal chapter meetings, facilitating professional deliberation and consensus-driven decision-making among chapter officers and members. • Ensures the chapter maintains compliance with ACM's policies, reporting requirements, and standards for professional chapter operations. Technical Programming & Event Leadership • Curates and oversees the chapter's technical programming, including speaker series, research colloquia, hands-on workshops, and hackathons, ensuring that content reflects the highest standards of technical rigor and relevance. • Leverages his professional network at Amazon and within the IEEE and ACM research communities to attract distinguished speakers, practitioners, and faculty to chapter events. • Designs programming that bridges cutting-edge academic research with real-world industry practice, reflecting the chapter's mission to serve both professionals and researchers in the computing field. Member Engagement & Professional Development • Fosters an inclusive, intellectually vibrant community that supports the professional growth of members across career stages, from students and early-career engineers to senior practitioners. • Mentors chapter members and emerging professionals, drawing on his experience as a recognized engineering leader and IEEE Senior Member to guide members' technical and career trajectories. • Leads initiatives to expand chapter membership and participation, particularly among underrepresented groups and early-career professionals in the Dallas–Fort Worth technology corridor. Institutional Outreach & External Collaboration • Represents the ACM Irving Chapter at regional and national computing events, conferences, and inter-chapter forums, enhancing the chapter's visibility within the broader ACM and IEEE ecosystems. • Establishes and nurtures strategic partnerships with academic institutions, technology companies, and professional societies in the Dallas–Fort Worth region and beyond. • Coordinates collaborative programming and joint events with neighboring ACM and IEEE chapters, contributing to a cohesive regional technology community. • Engages with ACM's international headquarters and regional councils to ensure the chapter's alignment with global computing education and professional development priorities. Communication & Thought Leadership • Oversees the chapter's communication strategy, including newsletters, social media, and public announcements, ensuring consistent and professional representation of the chapter to the global computing community. • Authors and disseminates thought leadership content that positions the ACM Irving Chapter as a credible voice at the intersection of industry practice and computing research. • Maintains and grows the chapter's digital presence and engagement, extending the chapter's reach to academia, industry professionals, and emerging talent internationally.

Sandeep Shivam

Vice Chair (Founding Member)

✉️ sandeep.shivam@ieee.org in LinkedIn

Sandeep Shivam is a product and technology leader with nearly two decades of experience building AI driven solutions in the financial sector. As Associate Director for the Touchless Lending platform at Tavant, he leads innovation in borrower and lender experience, intelligent automation, and advanced decision systems for enterprise scale customers. He is a Fellow of BCS, an IEEE Senior Member, and a member of the Forbes Technology Council, recognized for shaping practical and responsible applications of artificial intelligence across complex digital ecosystems. Sandeep has delivered keynote talks at industry conferences across the globe and has served as a reviewer, judge, and session chair for international journals and research conferences. His work is frequently published through Forbes, the Mortgage Bankers Association, HousingWire, and other industry platforms. He is passionate about engineering AI native products that create real value and continues to advocate for thoughtful innovation that improves outcomes for businesses and the communities they serve.

Responsibilities

Sandeep Shivam is a founding member and serves as the Vice Chairperson of the Irving ACM Professional Chapter. In this role, Sandeep is prepared to assume the office of Chairperson or temporarily act in that position whenever needed. He maintains a thorough familiarity with the duties and responsibilities of the Chairperson, as well as those of the other elected officers and committee chairpersons. As an integral part of the chapter's operations, Sandeep plays a key role in driving the chapter's success. He is responsible for overseeing the activities and progress of the various committees and chapter programs, ensuring that they remain aligned with the chapter's goals and mission.

Viswanathan Ranganathan

Co-Chair & Treasurer (Founding Member)

✉️ vish.ranganathan@ieee.org in LinkedIn

Viswanathan Ranganathan is a Senior Distributed Systems Engineer at Netflix, specializing in deployment infrastructure and developer platforms. His core expertise is reliability at scale - building systems that remain dependable whether processing massive data volumes or enabling safe software releases across large engineering organizations.

What distinguishes his approach is product thinking applied to infrastructure: designing technical systems from the perspective of the engineers who use them, rather than optimizing purely for technical metrics. This methodology has driven measurable impact throughout his career - from architecting analytics platforms that served enterprise customers processing over 250,000 events per second, to designing governance frameworks that reduced developer onboarding from six days to minutes.

His 11-year career spans five technology sectors: healthcare, e-commerce, communications, enterprise software, and streaming. Each domain contributed distinct capabilities - healthcare's discipline and precision, e-commerce's adaptability, communications infrastructure's scale under pressure, enterprise software's coordination skills, and streaming's end-to-end planning across large organizations. This cross-domain experience provides perspective on which distributed systems challenges are universal versus domain-specific.

He holds an M.S. in Computer Science from the University of Houston. He is an active member of the ACM Fremont Chapter and serves as a technical judge for hackathons, evaluating projects on architectural soundness, scalability, and operational maturity.

Responsibilities

Viswanathan Ranganathan is a founding member who serves as a Co-Chair and Treasurer of the Irving ACM Professional Chapter. In this role, Viswanathan is responsible for the overall fiscal operation and financial reporting of the chapter, including all committees and programs established by the chapter. Upon assuming office, Viswanathan ensured that the necessary banking and account signature updates were completed to maintain proper financial oversight. As part of his ongoing responsibilities, he maintains all chapter financial records and the chapter checkbook, ensuring accuracy and transparency in all financial matters. Viswanathan is also responsible for collecting funds at chapter meetings when applicable, and for filing the mandatory annual financial report with ACM headquarters. He regularly supplies budget reports to the chapter's executive board and keeps the broader chapter membership informed of the chapter's financial status. Additionally, he works closely with the Membership Chair to coordinate membership procedures and associated fees, ensuring smooth and consistent financial operations across the chapter.

Gajendra Babu Thokala

Co-Chair & Communications Chair (Founding Member)

✉️ gajendra2k2@gmail.com in LinkedIn

Gajendra Babu Thokala is a Senior Engineering Leader who has gained international recognition by applying over 18 years of experience developing and implementing large-scale, real-time data platforms using artificial intelligence, distributed systems, and knowledge graphs.
He has served in key technical positions with prominent global companies, and has provided input into the design of high-scale data governance, privacy-aware architecture, and real-time streaming infrastructure to support millions of users. Through his original contributions in metadata intelligence, large-scale distributed processing, and governance-by-design systems, he has enhanced how companies develop scalable, compliant, and intelligent data platforms. His efforts span multiple regional clouds operating on billions of data assets and demonstrate global impact.

Gajendra Babu Thokala is a senior member of IEEE and a fellow of the BCS, both are distinguished memberships representing sustained achievement and significant contribution to the computing profession. As part of his active participation in the international research community, Gajendra Babu Thokala serves as a peer reviewer, a member of the technical program committees, and an evaluator for conferences and journals.

Additionally, he is an author of two books and scholarly publications focused on the topics of distributed systems, data engineering, and governance; which further represents his commitment to providing thought leadership in the area of bridging research and industry practice.

Beyond his global influence as a technology leader, Gajendra Babu Thokala currently serves as the Communication Chair of the ACM Irving Chapter, and leads the chapters strategic communication, professional outreach, and global engagement efforts. In this capacity, he is responsible for increasing the chapter's visibility to the international computing community and ensuring that the chapter's programs maintain technical rigor, innovation, and professionalism. As a result of his stature and expertise, the chapter's credibility increases, and the chapter expands its reach to include academia, industry, and emerging professionals.

Responsibilities

Gajendra Babu Thokala is a founding member who serves as a Co-Chair & Communication Chair of the Irving ACM Professional Chapter. In this role, Gajendra is responsible for managing and maintaining the chapter's communication channels, ensuring that members and the broader community stay informed about chapter activities, events, and programs. Gajendra oversees the production and distribution of the chapter newsletter, which serves as a key tool for building member engagement and encouraging participation in chapter activities. He is also responsible for managing the chapter's social media presence — creating informative and interactive posts, announcing upcoming meetings, and connecting with other ACM chapters and the wider computing community. In addition, Gajendra coordinates outreach efforts by establishing contact with other computer societies and organizations in the area, facilitating the exchange of announcements and fostering collaborative relationships. He plays a vital role in ensuring the chapter's voice reaches its members and the public, helping to strengthen the chapter's presence and impact within the Irving community.

Chapter Officers

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