Biography
Michelle K. Lee serves on the boards of MassMutual, Unity Technologies and MIT, and is the founder and CEO of Obsidian Strategies. Obsidian Strategies (“Architects for AI-Driven Strategies”) advises companies on identifying and implementing their most impactful AI opportunities and provides education to boards and companies on AI and AI governance.
Ms. Lee recently served as a senior executive and Vice President at Amazon Web Services (AWS), where she ran key parts of their global AI business including the Machine Learning (ML) Solutions Lab and Computer Vision business. Ms. Lee was also the leading business executive in charge of AWS’ responsible AI efforts.
Prior to Amazon, Ms. Lee served as the Under Secretary of Commerce for Intellectual Property and Director of the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO). In this role, she was the CEO of one of the largest intellectual property offices in the world with annual revenues of over $3 billion and ~13,000 employees and principal advisor to the President of the United States (through the Secretary of Commerce) on intellectual property matters. Ms. Lee is the first woman to hold this position in our country’s history.
Prior to public service, Ms. Lee served as Deputy General Counsel at Google. She joined the company when it was a private company, with domestic revenue only and a few products and services, and helped the company grow into a global corporation.
From 2017 to 2018, Ms. Lee held the appointment as the Herman Phleger Visiting Professor of Law at Stanford Law School where she taught on disruptive technologies (artificial intelligence and autonomous vehicles) and their impact on policies and regulations.
Ms. Lee is a current Lifetime Member of the Council on Foreign Relations.
Prior to Google, Ms. Lee was a partner at Fenwick & West, where she advised high-technology clients on licensing, intellectual property, litigation, corporate and mergers and acquisition matters. She has worked as a computer scientist at Hewlett-Packard Research and the MIT Artificial Intelligence (AI) Laboratories. Ms. Lee holds a B.S. and an M.S. from MIT in electrical engineering and computer science and a J.D. from Stanford Law.
Ms. Lee is a frequent speaker on the topics of AI and AI governance, digital transformation and innovation including at the Consumer Electronics Show, South-By-Southwest, Stanford Directors’ College (multiple years), the National Association of Corporate Directors (multiple times including at their Annual Summit in 2023), the Corporate Director Academy and Silicon Valley Directors Exchange. Ms. Lee has testified before Congress about 10 times in her various areas of expertise. Ms. Lee also serves as a presidentially-appointed Special Advisor on the American Bar Association’s AI Task Force.
Ms. Lee has spent most of her professional career building some of the country’s most innovative companies (Google and Amazon) and brings unique multi-disciplinary insights to her board work.
