Josephine Cheng

For more than 30 years, Josephine Cheng stood at the vanguard of IBM’s research into emerging technologies, and databases in particular. The first product she helped develop and release, in 1984, was a data management system known as Db2, and it quickly became indispensable to organizations around the world, including nearly all Fortune 500 companies at the time. Cheng went on to establish herself as a celebrated authority on databases and a champion of exploratory and applied research.

Born in Vietnam in 1953 to Chinese parents, Cheng grew up in Hong Kong alongside four brothers and two sisters. Her academic pursuits flourished under her mother’s encouragement — and through the influence of her siblings. All four of her brothers were talented students in math, physics and science.

By the time Cheng reached college — halfway around the world, at the University of California, Los Angeles — she knew that she wanted to go into the sciences too. She planned to pursue a pharmacy degree, until she happened upon a class in computer science — specifically, programming in BASIC. It would set her on the path that would define her life and career.

Directly out of UCLA in 1977, with bachelor’s degrees in mathematics and computer science and a master’s in computer science, Cheng joined IBM’s Santa Teresa Lab — now the Silicon Valley Lab, a division of the Almaden research facility in San Jose, California — as an associate programmer on the Db2 database project (originally called the Eagle project). Cheng would work various areas of the project, and she eventually led the entire relational data system department. She oversaw the proposal and management of advancements and modifications for the database and its code.

Db2 would soon become ubiquitous in the world’s data centers, and its success would propel Cheng’s career at IBM. Along with another accomplished researcher, Patricia Selinger, she cofounded IBM’s Database Technology Institute (DBTI), a program to establish common goals inside IBM Research to focus and accelerate the creation of database technology. Their intent was to create a space for both emerging technologies research and product development by bringing experts from the two fields into the same room. “DBTI accelerates evolution,” Selinger articulated at the time. “Exploratory scientists lead revolutions.”

At DBTI, Cheng focused on solutions for how to most effectively deploy data to the internet. By the end of 1995, she and her team launched a prototype of the Db2 World Wide Web, followed by Net.Data, an application server providing internet access to corporate databases. The team’s XML Extender for the Db2, meanwhile, enabled integration of XML-formatted data into Db2.

Db2 Everywhere debuted shortly thereafter. It was a tiny, self-managing database system to extend Db2’s functions to handheld computers and cell phones. Through these contributions, Cheng helped to shepherd IBM’s database technology into the internet age, thereby granting average internet users access to vast amounts of data, previously accessible only through proprietary systems.

In 2000, Cheng was recognized for this groundbreaking work on the frontlines of database research, receiving the appointment of IBM Fellow — the first Chinese woman to achieve the designation.

After more than a decade at DBTI, Cheng pivoted to become vice president and director of IBM’s China Development Lab, responsible for both hardware and software development in the region. During her four years there, she helmed the China Software Development Laboratory, with its three campuses — in Beijing, Shanghai and Taipei — and more than 3,000 employees.

In 2008, Cheng was called back to the US to head IBM Research-Almaden and charged with spurring the company’s artificial intelligence initiative. Cheng and her team explored how to simulate the functions and behaviors of the brain through computing technology. It was formative research that resulted in a knowledge framework that would provide the basis for Watson.

In 2009, Cheng hinted at how her team’s work might unfold: “As the digital and physical worlds continue to merge and computing becomes more embedded in the fabric of our daily lives, it’s imperative that we create a more intelligent computing system that can help us make sense of the vast amount of information that’s increasingly available to us, much the way our brains can quickly interpret and act on complex tasks.”

At Almaden, Cheng also oversaw exploratory and applied research in nanotechnology, materials science, storage systems, data management, web technologies, workplace practices and user interfaces. After three years in her leadership post, Cheng was asked to return to China as the VP of Development Client Enablement for IBM Systems and the region’s chief technology officer. She would remain there until her retirement.