Engineers and experts from AG Grid, Bryntum, and beyond who spoke about what it takes to build
applications that hold up in production.
Matt Webb
Co-founder, Inanimate
Matt is co-founder of Inanimate, consumer hardware bringing agents into the real world. Previously he has consulted with Google's AI research group, run startup accelerators with R/GA Ventures, and was CEO and co-founder of the design studio BERG which invented some of the world’s first internet-connected consumer products like Little Printer (and has work in the New York MoMA). He is co-author of Mind Hacks (O’Reilly, 2004). Since 2000 Matt has blogged at interconnected.org. He writes weekly+ on computing, design, and speculative futures. He lives in London.
Stephen Cooper
Team Lead, AG Grid
Stephen is the Team Lead for AG Grid and loves sharing practical, experience-based tips, tricks, and case studies from years in the codebase. He's gone deep into grid performance and framework integrations, and has spent more time than he'd like profiling render cycles. Outside of work, life revolves around family, four kids and two dogs, and he's happiest when the whole crew is out together exploring in the park.
Maggie Appleton
Staff Research Engineer, GitHub
Maggie is a Staff Research Engineer at GitHub, where she works on tools for thinking, writing, and building with code. With a background in anthropology, she’s known for her visual essays that explore how developers understand systems, languages, and ideas. She’s a strong advocate for “digital gardens” over traditional publishing, and spends her time mapping out how knowledge grows on the web. Outside of work, she’s usually sketching concepts, writing, or connecting dots between code and culture.
Sophie Koonin
Web Discipline Lead, Monzo
Sophie leads a team within the Operations collective at Monzo, building the software that powers the bank's award-winning customer experience. She's also Monzo's Web Discipline Lead, advocating for web and empowering others to lead web platform improvements throughout the company. Outside of work, Sophie loves arranging pop songs for her choir Mixtape, playing video games, cooking, and gardening.
David Khourshid
Founder, Stately.ai
David is the founder of Stately.ai and creator of XState, the most popular open-source state machine & statecharts library. He's a longtime advocate for event-driven modeling and visual diagramming as the foundation for reliable UIs and, increasingly, AI agents. When he's not at a computer keyboard, he's at a piano keyboard.
Mats Bryntse
Founder & CEO, Bryntum
Mats is the founder and CEO of Bryntum, where he and his team build advanced scheduling and project planning tools for modern web apps. For the past 15 years, he has obsessed over JavaScript performance, developer experience, and making complex UIs feel simple. He used to enjoy chess, badminton, and independent thought, until Claude entered his life and optimized those away.
Steve Ruiz
CEO, tldraw
A developer, designer, and now startup founder in London. With a background in visual art, Steve works primarily in creative tools for the web. He is known for tldraw, and demos of perfect arrows.
Matt Pocock
Senior Developer Educator, AI Hero
Matt is a senior developer educator at AI Hero, a TypeScript author, and an educator passionate about bringing real software engineering rigour to the age of AI. He co-organizes the AI Coding for Real Engineers cohort, a community for experienced developers who want to build with AI tools without throwing away everything they already know. Outside of the keyboard, Matt enjoys long runs through the Oxfordshire countryside, loudly supporting Arsenal, and experimenting with new ways to make complex ideas click for developers everywhere.
Bernie Sumption
Engineer, AG Grid
Bernie is an engineer at AG Grid specialising in theming. "The other engineers make it work fast and well, I make it look pretty" he likes to say. Outside work he goes hiking, plays with his kids, and once made a tweeting cat flap that has 10x more social media followers than he does.
Josh Hobson
Developer, AG Grid
Josh is a developer at AG Grid, where he's been building AG Studio, a new dashboard library with multi-agent AI baked in. He's a mathematician by training and a maker by instinct, with a particular love for developer tooling, type systems, and intelligent interfaces. Outside of work, Josh can be found tinkering with 3D printers, ski touring in the Alps, or out on long walks with his dog.
Adam Wang
AG Studio Product Lead, AG Grid
Adam is the AG Studio Product Lead at AG Grid, with around 10 years of experience in product management across various disciplines. He previously worked on AG Grid Integrated Charts before focusing on AG Studio. He enjoys the creative process of product management and is keen to solve problems by truly understanding user needs. Outside of work, he's a spin instructor who loves to put together a fire playlist. He also collects coloured vinyl.
Patrick Rau
Senior Developer, TCS
Patrick builds and maintains core parts of Team Centric Software's fleetplan platform, specializing in UI integration and complex components like AG Grid, Bryntum's Scheduler Pro, and modules for audit tracking and safety reporting. He's driven by a passion for creating software that makes a real difference for the people who use it. When he's not solving problems at work, you'll find him exploring new technologies through personal projects, gaming, or planning his next trip.
Johan Isaksson
Head of Engineering, Bryntum
Johan is responsible for architecture, gate keeping, performance and styling across all Bryntum products. When not checking pull requests, recording performance profiles or tweaking CSS he enjoys watching hockey and playing floorball.
John Masterson
CEO, AG Grid
John is the CEO of AG Grid, which he first joined in 2016 as employee number two. After a detour as CTO of a London health-tech startup, he returned in 2020 and stepped into the CEO role in 2024. He's spent fifteen years building software and leading engineering teams, and is determined to keep AG Grid the first choice for JavaScript developers. Outside of work, John can be found on his bike, in his headphones listening to a podcast, or picking up a guitar.
Phil Hawksworth
Event MC
With a passion for browser technologies, and the empowering properties of the web, Phil loves seeking out ingenuity and simplicity, especially in places where over-engineering is common. After 25 years of building web applications for companies such as Google, Apple, Nike, R/GA, and The London Stock Exchange, he has worked to challenge traditional technical architectures in favour of simplicity and effectiveness, working in Developer Experience at Netlify and Deno.
