Alan Kay

Alan Curtis Kay (born May 17, 1940) is an American who worked at Apple Computer and is best known for his pioneering work on object-oriented programming and   (GUI) design.

Education
Kay received a bachelor's degree in mathematics and molecular biology from the in 1966. He received M.S. in electrical engineering in 1968 and a Ph.D. in computer science in 1969 from the.

Career
In 1970, Kay joined Xerox PARC in Palo Alto, California, where he developed object oriented programming concepts that led to the creation of. He also developed the concept at Xerox, a predecessor to the. From 1981 to 1984, Kay was Atari's Chief Scientist.

Apple Computer
Kay joined the Apple Advanced Technology Group (AATG) and was designated an Apple Fellow in 1984. He spoke at the 1990 Worldwide Developers Conference. In December 1995, Kay collaborated with other engineers to adapt Smalltalk into a new programming dialect called Squeak. He left Apple with the closure of AATG in 1997.

After Apple
Kay then joined as a Disney Fellow. He founded the in 2001 and remained its the president of the  until its closure in 2018. Kay is an of computer science at the. He is also on the advisory board of. Until mid-2005, he was a senior fellow at, a visiting professor at , and an adjunct professor at the (MIT).

Recognition
Kay was elected a Fellow of the, the , and the.