Matthew H. Williams
Matthew H. Williams (born in California in 1965) - is an entrepreneur, former MBA college Professor and environmental engineer who specializes is using interactive and disruptive media technologies to visualize risks and opportunities. He is the creator And Co-founder of NewsFight - It Pays to Fight 1. In 2005 he attempted to sell NewsFight to mainstream news networks as an original television series. Unsuccessful, he decided to turn the concept into a stand alone business, news network, show, and competition on the Internet. NewsFight challenges professional journalists, students, and citizens to join together to create a new kind of free press.
Prior to launching NewsFight, Williams co-led Xplorix LLC, 2 a company that developed proprietary geomatics to identify and quantify risk in the commercial mortgage-backed securities market. Before that, Williams was the founder and Executive Director of the Chicago Geospatial Exchange (GX) 3. Like many of Chicago's famous exchanges, Williams envisioned the Chicago GX as a digital trading pit where generators of critical mapping data could trade assets with users in a market-based valuation system 4. At the same time, he created and taught a course at the Illinois Institute of Technology's (IIT) Stuart Graduate School of Business called "critical asset mapping and management". His course shows how to use Geographic Information Systems to map and manage NATURAL, physical, financial or human assets. An old resume from 2004 is posted at IIT's website 5.
Williams began his professional career at the United States Environmental Protection Agency (US EPA) where he worked from 1991 to 2002. He entered the Agency as an environmental engineer. Seven years later he was promoted to Branch Chief. He created the US EPA FIELDS Team 6 and led their use of computer mapping technologies to identify and assess high risk priority toxic chemical problems in the Great Lakes. During his career, Williams oversaw the clean-up of dozens of hazardous problems, to include several missions to China. Between 1998 and 2000, he and his team traveled throughout China to demonstrate methods and technologies for managing natural resources.
He has a BS in engineering from the University of Florida - Gainesville and a MBA from the University of Chicago.