Don Syme
Don Syme is a Senior Researcher at Microsoft Research, Cambridge, and the lead architect on the F# programming language. He specializes in making aspects of computer science research work "for real" in more industrial settings, particularly with regard to programming techniques, and doing the research and development needed to make that happen. He co-designed and implemented generics for .NET in 2001-2004, and before this was a PhD at the University of Cambridge, and before that grew up in a little country town in Australia with an Apple IIe.