Carl Bass is president and chief executive officer of Autodesk, the world's leading maker of design software for the architecture, engineering, and entertainment industries. The company's products range from its flagship AutoCAD program to digital modeling and prototyping tools for industry. Autodesk's CG apps have been used on every movie that's won the Academy Award for Visual Effects in the past 15 years, from Titanic to Avatar. Under Bass' leadership the California-based firm has been repeatedly honored by Fast Company as one of the world's most innovative companies.

After graduating from Cornell, Bass cofounded a computer graphics business called Flying Moose Systems, later renamed Ithaca Software. He moved west when Autodesk purchased the company in 1993. In the past decade, he's held nearly every executive role at Autodesk. From 2002 to 2004, he served as head of the Design Solutions Group, where he led the company's crucial transition from 2-D to 3-D and model-based design.

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