Tom McKinney is a Software Engineering Director at Cisco Systems, Inc. Tom has over 25 years experience building software teams and products. Tom has worked for Cisco for eight years. During this time, Tom began building MPLS (formerly known as Tag Switching). Tom has been involved not only in development, but also in support, test team, and products (June 1997). With Tom's help Cisco was the first network vendor to release MPLS (Q2 CY1998). Tom is also responsible for RSVP (ReSerVation Protocol) and GMPLS (Generalized MPLS). Today, Tom is responsible for 75+ staff.

Tom McKinney formerly worked for DEC (Digital Equipment Corp.) on operating systems, electronic imaging and networking. Prior to that, Tom worked for Unisys on software technical support and for the U.S. Navy on anti-submarine weapon systems.