Yujian Tang: Why I Joined Zilliz as Developer Advocate
A brief introduction to myself
My name is Yujian Tang, and I work as a developer advocate at Zilliz, where I build, explain, and play with AI applications. My career began by winning the American Computer Science League (ACSL) twice in a row, which led to an internship at IBM during high school. After three summer internships, I attended UNC, where I studied Computer Science, Statistics, and Neuroscience. During this time, I also researched machine learning, and one of my papers on data fusion for data integrity was published on the IEEE Big Data. My presentation at that conference helped me secure a software engineering position at Amazon, where I generated $2.5M in value. I left Amazon to pursue startups, seeking to advance and expand my skills more quickly.
What drove me here?
Choosing to join Zilliz was an easy decision for me. As I went through the interview process, it became clear that Zilliz was my top choice. I've worked in the AI/ML area for my entire post-college professional career. During my interviews with Frank, Director of Operations and ML Architect at Zilliz, and Charles, CEO of Zilliz, I better understood how vector databases play a role in AI, which were a real driving factor for me to join Zilliz.
During my conversation with Frank, we discussed ML and vector databases and their correlation. I learned three things about him. Firstly, he has exceptional knowledge in this field, as evidenced by the specific questions he asked. Secondly, he is highly capable. It is not just because of his qualifications and achievements but how he talks about them. You will get the same feeling if you take an interview with him. Lastly, Frank and I share common interests in the startup world, including identifying the correct problems and finding the right people to solve them.
What really grabbed me about Charles was his deep understanding of the vector-searching space. He's been in databases for a long time, and he told a gripping story about how he came to build Milvus and Zilliz. I found his unwavering dedication to Milvus to be truly impressive. It's particularly interesting how he chose to move back to China to prove the viability of Milvus at the scale of billions of vectors, and even more impressive that he was right, and it worked.
Another aspect that caught my attention was his vision for vector databases to become the go-to solution for unstructured data. Moreover, I appreciate how aligned we are on the open-source ethos, which Charles has instilled in Zilliz and is a significant differentiating factor.
Having a lot of fun at Zilliz
To be honest, I haven't made enough open-source contributions in my life, probably less than 25, to truly claim myself an open-source enthusiast. However, working here at Zilliz is helping me change that. As a developer advocate, I work with a lot of open-source software and have already made multiple contributions. In addition, I have the opportunity to work with some of the most cutting-edge AI technologies, such as LangChain, LlamaIndex, and AutoGPT. Aside from creating content, I host meetups and give talks at conferences and hackathons. Speaking in front of an audience is a new experience, but I find it enjoyable.
Another great aspect of being a developer advocate at Zilliz is the marketing support I get. Our VP of Marketing, Chris, is a great leader who guides us without being too controlling or micromanaging. We share a mutual understanding of communicating with developers, which is essential for an advocate. Our primary objective is to provide developers with the tools and resources they need to understand, build with, and innovate using vector databases.
Come and join us!
We're doing a lot of cool things here, and I could benefit a lot from additional support in content generation and human resources for attending and hosting more events. If you're looking for a DevRel role, hit me up! You can also check out our career page for more information and to apply.
Yujian TangYujian Tang is a Developer Advocate at Zilliz. He has a background as a software engineer working on AutoML at Amazon. Yujian studied Computer Science, Statistics, and Neuroscience with research papers published to conferences including IEEE Big Data. He enjoys drinking bubble tea, spending time with family, and being near water.
- A brief introduction to myself
- What drove me here?
- Having a lot of fun at Zilliz
- Come and join us!
Content
Start Free, Scale Easily
Try the fully-managed vector database built for your GenAI applications.
Try Zilliz Cloud for Free