Hi, I'm Elena Lape.
I'm a founder and engineer. I build developer tools, help shape the standards the Web runs on, and organize hackathons. My work has reached millions of developers, from the GitHub Student Developer Pack to Holopin.
I've been shipping software since my early teens: platforms, open source tools, websites, and productivity apps. Developer experience is the thread through all of it.
I'm the Founder and Head of Engineering at Holopin, a digital badge platform built on the W3C Verifiable Credentials standard. Think of the stickers developers put on their laptops, made portable and verifiable. Companies use Holopin to recognize contributors and grow their developer communities. Here's my badge board:
More than 150,000 developers use Holopin to show what they've achieved. Partners include DigitalOcean & Hacktoberfest and Cloudflare.
I was elected to the Advisory Board of W3C, the World Wide Web Consortium, in 2024 and re-elected for 2026–2028. My job there is making sure developers, small businesses, and open source have a say in how the Web evolves.
Background
Before Holopin, I ran Theta Labs, a consultancy building cloud native, open source products: infrastructure tooling, monitoring, API design, and developer experience. I still spend at least half my time writing code. It's the best way to stay close to the people you build for.
Before that, I was Product Partnerships Lead for Education at GitHub. I scaled the GitHub Student Developer Pack to over 2 million users and more than 100 partners, including AWS, Unity, and Typeform.
Earlier, I was an engineer at Inclusive Energy and HTTPie, and interned at Nasdaq while studying Artificial Intelligence and Computer Science at the University of Edinburgh.
Community
I've competed in and organized dozens of hackathons around the world. I directed Hack the Burgh, Scotland's largest student hackathon, and I organize the W3C TPAC hackathon, most recently in Dublin in 2026.
I also speak at conferences and meetups about developer experience, open source, and web standards. Most recently, I explained why AWS is, undeniably, an experience.
See what I've built and where I've spoken.
Outside of Tech
Away from the keyboard, I make electronic music, do CrossFit, and run long distances. That's me at the Boston Half Marathon.
Languages are my other obsession. I'm fluent in English, Spanish, German, and Lithuanian, and I can follow TV series in Russian and Persian (sometimes with subtitles for Persian).
Get in Touch
I take on a few consulting projects a year and say yes to talks I'm excited about. If you're building something interesting, I'd love to hear about it.