Matt Hicks is the President and Chief Executive Officer of Red Hat, a role held since 2022, and IBM lists Hicks among its senior leaders as Senior Vice President and CEO of Red Hat. Red Hat's biography describes Hicks as a founding engineer on the OpenShift team and, before becoming CEO, Executive Vice President of Products and Technologies, overseeing product strategy, engineering, and support. It says that under Hicks, Red Hat launched OpenShift AI and Red Hat Inference Server for developing and deploying models, and acquired Neural Magic, strengthening Red Hat's role in the open-source vLLM inference project. Hicks began in engineering roles at IBM and at startups.123
At a glance
- Current roles
- President and Chief Executive Officer +1 more
- Sector
- Company
- Education
- Georgia Tech
- Work listed
- 2
- Sources cited
- 6
- Profile reviewed
Career
Matt Hicks began in engineering roles at IBM and at startups before joining Red Hat in 2006 as a developer on the IT team. Hicks was a founding member of the engineering team that built Red Hat OpenShift, which Red Hat describes as becoming a Kubernetes platform for hybrid cloud.14
As Executive Vice President of Products and Technologies, Hicks was responsible for Red Hat's product strategy, engineering and support. Red Hat named Hicks President and Chief Executive Officer in July 2022, succeeding Paul Cormier, who became chairman; IBM lists Hicks as a Senior Vice President and CEO of Red Hat.412
Products and projects
Under Hicks, Red Hat launched OpenShift AI and, in May 2025 at Red Hat Summit, Red Hat AI Inference Server, an enterprise inference server built from the open-source vLLM project and Neural Magic technologies. Red Hat completed its acquisition of Neural Magic in January 2025, and its announcement quotes Hicks on adding inference performance engineering and model optimization expertise to Red Hat AI.156
Work and contributions
Red Hat OpenShift
Red Hat's biography describes Hicks as a founding engineer on the OpenShift team who helped establish it as a Kubernetes platform.1
Red Hat OpenShift AI and Red Hat Inference Server
Red Hat's biography says that under Hicks's leadership Red Hat launched OpenShift AI and Red Hat Inference Server as platforms for model development and deployment, and led the acquisition of Neural Magic, which the biography ties to Red Hat's position in the vLLM project.1
Timeline
- Joined Red Hat as a developer on the IT team.4
- Named President and Chief Executive Officer of Red Hat, succeeding Paul Cormier.4
- Red Hat completed its acquisition of Neural Magic, an inference optimization company, under Hicks.6
- Red Hat announced Red Hat AI Inference Server, built on the vLLM project, at Red Hat Summit.5
Other documented roles
Roles the sources document that are not confirmed as current.
Where they work
Related people
- Steven HuelsAlso at Red Hat
- Stefanie ChirasAlso at Red Hat
- Chris WrightAlso at Red Hat
- BartowskiAlso at Red Hat
- Ashesh BadaniAlso at Red Hat
- 0xSeroInference and serving · Developer tools
- Dane KnechtInference and serving · Developer tools
- Luis Héctor ChávezDeveloper tools · Inference and serving
- Pedro CuencaInference and serving · Developer tools
- Olivier ChafikDeveloper tools · Inference and serving
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References
6 sources · profile reviewed Oct 21, 2026 · data updated Oct 21, 2026
- Matt Hicks — President and Chief Executive Officer (Red Hat executive leadership team)
- Senior leadership — IBM Investor Relations
- Red Hat executive leadership team
- Red Hat Names Matt Hicks President and Chief Executive Officer
- Red Hat Unlocks Generative AI for Any Model and Any Accelerator Across the Hybrid Cloud with Red Hat AI Inference Server
- Red Hat Completes Acquisition of Neural Magic to Fuel Optimized Generative AI Innovation Across the Hybrid Cloud