Francisco Ramirez is the Chief Architect for State and Local Government operating out of Red Hat's CTO Organization. He has been helping customers and partners transform their enterprise environments, enhance their security posture, and develop new service offerings for over two decades. Francisco helps them gain insights into their people, processes, and technologies through his engagement. Having worked across many industry verticals, he brings a balanced perspective on how implementing the right solutions can positively impact an organization's bottom line and provide new and innovative services. In addition, Francisco supports State governments with their Department of Transportation, Health and Human Services, Cybersecurity, and Digital City/IoT initiatives.

Self-proclaimed bureaucracy hacker, slayer of technical debt, and vocal proponent of digital services, technology transformation, and modular acquisition in government IT.

With over 30 years in information technology, 25 of them in public service, I continue to provide strategic leadership in all areas of information technology to my fellow executives .

I am a strong advocate for integrating IT industry best practices into government program delivery, to provide human-centered services to residents in a secure and cost-effective way.

After working for Dell and Microsoft in Europe, and a Cisco VAR, Microsoft Solution Partner, and a municipal government in Canada, I have been with the State of Michigan Department of Technology Management and Budget for almost 9 years, where I report to the Chief Technology Officer as the Director of Technology Transformation Services.

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