Smarak Pattnaik

Smarak Pattnaik is a skilled software engineer and project manager, currently serving as a Founding Engineer at Salient since March 2024. Prior to this role, Smarak worked as a Software Developer at Google from February 2022 to March 2024 and gained valuable experience as a Project Manager and Consultant at Illinois Business Consulting, where contributions included developing risk analysis models and predictive modeling. Previous positions also featured roles as a Research Assistant at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, where work involved algorithm development, clustering methods, and course assistance. Internships at Amazon Web Services and Citadel Securities enhanced software development expertise, while earlier roles involved VR programming and data analysis. Smarak holds a Master’s degree in Computer Science and a Bachelor of Science in Mathematics and Computer Science from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, alongside foundational education at National Public School.