Julian Bleecker is a product designer, engineer, researcher. He is the Founder of the Near Future Laboratory, a discovery-based design practice that uses Design Fiction as its primary approach to its work. The Near Future Laboratory helps its clients make sense of chaotic, imminent futures in order to guide strategic and tactical decision making.

He has been a professor at the School of Cinematic Arts at the University of Southern California, and a designer-engineer at Nokia’s Advanced Design Studio, and consultant on future-facing thorny problems for many clients and partners including Google, IKEA, Nokia, Facebook, Nike, Warner Bros, Boeing, Electronic Arts and many, many others over his 25 year professional career.

Julian has a Bachelor’s Degree in Electrical Engineering from Cornell University, a Masters Degree in Engineering (Interface Design, Virtual Reality) from the University of Washington. He did his doctoral work on the intersection of design, science-fiction and technology which formed the bedrock for defining Design Fiction, the Near Future Laboratory’s discovery-based approach for revealing, analyzing, and creating futures.

Julian is also Founder and CEO at Omata, Inc., a design-led engineering product company.