Joy A. Thomas

Joy Aloysius Thomas (1 January 1963 – 28 September 2020) was an Indian-born American information theorist, author and a Senior Data scientist at Google. He was known for his contributions to information theory and was the co-author of Elements of Information Theory, a popular text book which he co-authored with Thomas M. Cover. He also held a number of patents and was the founder of startups such as 'Insights One'.

Joy A. Thomas
Born(1963-01-01)1 January 1963
Kerala, India
Died28 September 2020(2020-09-28) (aged 57)
Mountain View, California, United States
Occupation(s)Information theorist, Data scientist, Author
SpousePriya
ChildrenTwo children

Biography

Joy Thomas, born on January 1, 1963, in the south Indian state of Kerala, did his schooling at St Joseph's Boys' High School, Bangalore.[1] He stood first in the IIT Joint Entrance Examination.[2] After graduating from the Indian Institute of Technology, Madras, he migrated to the US where he continued his studies to secure a PhD from Stanford University in 1984.[3] It was here, he met with Thomas M. Cover, the renowned information theorist[4] and together they wrote a book in 1991, Elements of Information Theory, which is considered by many as a benchmark text book on the subject.[5][6] In 1990, he joined the IBM Research at the Thomas J. Watson Research Center as a research staff member where he worked until he became involved in the founding of Stratify, a startup founded in 1991, which was later rebranded as Iron Mountain Digital. Later, he founded InsightsOne, another startup which was subsequently acquired by Apigee in 2014.[7]

Joy Thomas was an adjunct professor at Columbia University and Stanford University and held a number of patents.[8] He died on September 28, 2020, at Mountain View, California, at the age of 57, survived by his wife, Priya, and children, Joshua and Leah.[1]

Patents

Selected bibliography

Books

Articles

References
  1. "India-born global expert in Information Theory, Joy Thomas, passes away in US". www.indiatechonline.com. Retrieved 5 October 2020.
  2. Narayan, Shoba (28 January 2011). "A word of advice for the IITs". Mint. Retrieved 22 October 2020.
  3. "Bloomberg profile". www.bloomberg.com. Retrieved 5 October 2020.
  4. "ഇൻഫർമേഷൻ തിയറി വിദഗ്ധൻ ഡോ. ജോയ് തോമസ് അന്തരിച്ചു". ManoramaOnline (in Malayalam). Retrieved 5 October 2020.
  5. Andrew Myers (12 April 2012). "Thomas Cover, acclaimed information theorist and electrical engineer, dies at 73". Stanford University. Retrieved 5 October 2020.
  6. Kieffer, John (1994). "Book Review-Elements of Information Theory (Thomas M. Cover and Joy A. Thomas)". SIAM Review. 36 (3): 509–511. doi:10.1137/1036124. ISSN 0036-1445.
  7. "Apigee discloses $20M transaction after buying InsightsOne". www.bizjournals.com. Retrieved 5 October 2020.
  8. "Joy Aloysius Thomas Inventions, Patents and Patent Applications". patents.justia.com. Retrieved 5 October 2020.
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