Alex Bandar is the creator and director The Columbus Idea Foundry. The Greater Columbus Arts Council named Bandar 2011Œs Emerging Arts Leader and he was a finalist for TechColumbusf CEO of the Year for small companies. He has been a speaker at events such as TEDx Columbus, Pecha Kucha Columbus, eTechOhio Education Conference, Universitas Columbus and other science & tech platforms. Bandar is also a metallurgist engineer. He earned his M.S. and Ph.D in Materials Science and Engineering from Lehigh University and is a Senior Research Scientist at Scientific Forming Technologies Corporation.