Jim Webber Picture

Jim Webber

Chief Scientist, Neo4j

Jim Webber is the Chief Scientist at Neo4j working on next-generation solutions for massively scaling graph data. Prior to joining Neo4j, Jim was a Professional Services Director with ThoughtWorks where he worked on large-scale computing systems in finance and telecoms. Jim has a Ph.D. in Computing Science from the Newcastle University, UK.


Latest Posts by Jim Webber

RDF vs. Knowledge Graph: Choosing the Right Approach for Implementing Knowledge Graphs.

RDF vs. Property Graphs: Choosing the Right Approach for Implementing a Knowledge Graph

The generative AI market has grown by a staggering 3,600% year over year according to O’Reilly, fueling renewed demand for knowledge graphs. The technology of choice for highly connected, heterogeneous data, knowledge graphs work well for grounding large language models (LLMs). In fact,... read more


Jim Webber with Dr. Edgar Osuna: Using Graphs to Take Down Fraudsters

Last year's NODES event concluded with the enigmatic Jim Webber – Neo4j's Chief Scientist and CTO – interviewing a series of graph devotees, users, customers, and community members. Interviewees included a risk modeling scientist, a civic tech practitioner, and a software... read more



Jim Webber with Matthias Sieber: Teaching Neo4j to Make the World a Better Place

And we’re back with another installment from NODES 2021! In the third of the day’s closing keynote interviews, Jim Webber, Neo4j’s Chief Architect and CTO, sat down (virtually) with Matthias Sieber, a long-time graph devotee whose vast experience has served him across industries and... read more


Jim Webber with Matt Cloyd: The Power of Graph in Conflict Resolution

At this year’s NODES event, Jim Webber – Neo4j’s Chief Architect and CTO – wrapped up the day with an enthralling series of interviews with customers and community members. His keynote showcased the stories of four different Neo4j users, each of whom had their own unique path to... read more


Jim Webber with Asurion’s Julie Fisher on Her Singular Path to Graph

At this year’s NODES 2021 closing keynote, Dr. Jim Webber, Neo4j’s Chief Scientist, unearthed some of Neo4j’s most varied and vibrant community members and customers to give them a chance to tell their graph stories. As he said in his intro leading up to this session, “I've tried to... read more



Top 10 Use Cases: Identity and Access Management

Graph technology is the future. Not only do graph databases effectively store relationships between data points, but they’re also flexible in adding new kinds of relationships or adapting a data model to new business requirements. But how do companies today use graph databases to solve tough... read more



Top 10 Use Cases: Master Data Management

Graph technology is the future. Not only do graph databases effectively store relationships between data points, but they’re also flexible in adding new kinds of relationships or adapting a data model to new business requirements. But how do companies today use graph databases to solve tough... read more


Top 10 Use Cases: Empowering Network and IT Operations Management

Graph technology is the future. Not only do graph databases effectively store relationships between data points, but they’re also flexible in adding new kinds of relationships or adapting a data model to new business requirements. But how do companies today use graph databases to solve tough... read more


Discover how graph technology enhances artificial intelligence and machine learning with graph theory and algorithms.

Graphs for Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning

Editor’s Note: This presentation was given by Dr. Jim Webber at GraphTour Boston in 2019. Full Presentation If there’s any area of computer science that’s prone to nonsense today, it’s artificial intelligence. I'm going to walk you through some no-nonsense definitions of AI-cronyms,... read more




Top 10 Use Cases: Knowledge Graphs

Graph technology is the future. Not only do graph databases effectively store relationships between data points, but they’re also flexible in adding new kinds of relationships or adapting a data model to new business requirements. But how do companies today use graph databases to solve tough... read more


Top 10 Use Cases: Real-Time Recommendations

Graph technology is the future. Not only do graph databases effectively store relationships between data points, but they’re also flexible in adding new kinds of relationships or adapting a data model to new business requirements.c But how do companies today use graph databases to solve... read more


Top 10 Graph Database Use Cases: Fraud Detection

Graph technology is the future. Not only do graph databases effectively store relationships between data points, but they’re also flexible in adding new kinds of relationships or adapting a data model to new business requirements. But how do companies today use graph databases to solve tough... read more


Learn everything you need to know about Neo4j 4.0 graph database.

Introducing Neo4j Graph Database 4.0 [GA Release]

I feel particularly pleased to be able to announce the GA release of Neo4j Graph Database 4.0. I've been with the Neo4j codebase since 2009 and have to tell you: 2009 Jim Webber couldn't imagine the way 2020 Neo4j would look. “2009 me” was building a REST API (if you've ever seen... read more


Check out this rapid retail example of Cypher query code for graph data recommendations.

Powering Recommendations with a Graph Database: A Rapid Retail Example

It’s one thing to say that Neo4j streamlines real-time recommendations; it’s another to show you the code so you can see for yourself. In this series, we discuss how real-time recommendations support a number of different use cases, from product recommendations to logistics. Last week,... read more


Discover how real-time recommendations support a number of different use cases that translate into business value.

Powering Recommendations with a Graph Database: Proven Business Benefits [+ Case Studies]

Relevant, real-time recommendations drive revenue, but they are challenging to deliver. That’s because good recommendations require bringing together so much data, surfacing the relationships between all that data and delivering just the right suggestion in context and in the moment. In... read more


Learn how graph database technology powers recommendation engines with connected data

Powering Recommendations with a Graph Database: Connect Buyer and Product Data

Effective recommendations increase revenue and drive up average order value. But delivering highly relevant, real-time recommendations requires as much context as possible. Connecting the user to the perfect recommendation is an art. In this three-part series, we explore using recommendations to... read more


Learn why the distinction of native graph databases matters when it comes to connect data

A Note on Native Graph Databases

It’s fun to watch the graph database category evolve. From being a seemingly niche category a decade ago (despite the valiant efforts of the Semantic Web community) to a modest – but important – pillar of the data world as it is today. But as the category has grown, we see some... read more


Learn how Neo4j's engineering evolved into the scalable native graph database that it is today

The Engineering Evolution of Neo4j into a Native Graph Database

Hi everyone. My name is Dr. Jim Webber. I'm Neo4j's chief scientist, and I'd like to take a few minutes to talk to you about Neo4j's evolution from an engineering point of view. Our Origin Story: Overcoming Complicated SQL Queries I don't know if many people know this, but Neo4j actually... read more


Learn why the native graph database distinction matters and how Neo4j grows with hardware capacity

The Co-Evolution of Computer Hardware & Graph Databases: Why Graph-Native Matters

Neo4j is a native graph database, which means all of the code – from the web browser to the drivers, Bolt protocol, page cache, cluster protocols, disk storage format — is optimized for graph workloads. As hardware advances come along, we’re uniquely positioned to adapt our software design to... read more


Watch Jim Webber’s Very Sciency Keynote Presentation on the Graph Database Landscape

Trekking Boldly into the Future: Going Who Knows Where in the Graph Space

Editor’s Note: Last October at GraphConnect San Francisco, Jim Webber – Chief Scientist at Neo Technology – delivered this very sciency closing keynote on the graph database landscape. For more videos from GraphConnect SF and to register for GraphConnect Europe, check out... read more