2026 speaker

Ariel Yeh, PhD, is the Co-founder and CEO of Leafy Lab, a pioneer in agentic design optimization for the semiconductor value chain. She earned her PhD from Harvard University, specializing in signal processing and advanced technology development, and was honored as a Featured Alumna. Under her leadership, Leafy Lab builds the agents and tools to enable autopilot for chip designs, utilizing proprietary Intelligence Agents to transform trial-and-error approaches, ensuring first-silicon success. Leafy’s platform achieves a global optimum in power, performance, and area (PPA), delivering significant performance improvements and at least 50% faster time to market for top global chip design houses.
Prior to founding Leafy Lab, Ariel was a founding member and the first employee at a high-growth deep-tech firm that reached a Nasdaq IPO within 2.5 years. She later served as the Director of Business Development and Head of Corporate Strategy, managing strategic alliances valued at over $3 billion. Ariel’s professional background also includes a tenure as a consultant at McKinsey & Company in the United States’ Digital and AI practice, where she led AI transformation journeys for Fortune 500s and managed portfolios worth hundreds of millions.
Awards & Special Honors
•IC Taiwan Grand Challenge Winner (2026)
•Design Automation Conference (DAC) Invited Speaker (2026)
•NVIDIA Inception Program Member (2026)
•Silicon Valley VC, South Park Commons (SPC) Founder Fellow (2025)
•All-Time MVP and Forbes 30 Under 30 Honoree (2021)
•Harvard Magazine Research Feature (2021)
•Inventor of 10+ US patents and author of high impact research in journals such as Nature with 3,400+ citations