Carl Yang

Carl Yang, a devoted father, technologist, poet, cat lover and dear friend to many, passed away on September 16, 2023, at home in Cambridge, MA. He was 48.
Carl's two children meant everything to him. He was dedicated to Felix, now a high school Junior, and to Ryan, now a Freshman at Carleton College (Carl's alma mater). He was proud to be their dad, and was devoted to raising them to find and claim their own paths and identities, to be good people.
Carl spent his career at the intersection of technology, design, and financial services. He was a creative force focused on futures thinking, strategy, innovation and technological development. He worked with and for a number of organizations, including Fidelity, Tata Consultancy Services, and the MIT Media Lab.
Carl pursued his creative passions in poetry, music, skateboarding, and dance throughout his life. His prolific writing began in adolescence with a series of poems and stories distributed in the high school literary magazine, editorial and self-published prose in an "underground" student newspaper, and in letters and artworks for friends, and it continued through his life online. He was a participant in Cambridge's music and dancing community. Carl was a connector: in social circles, in the arts, and through his work.
Carl Wei-Hsing Yang was born on August 29, 1975, to Richard and Mei-Chi in Chicago. He grew up on the flat suburban plains of South Holland, IL, which was a classic mid-century American Village: a mix of residential cul-du-sacs, concrete strip malls, and plenty of well-lit parking lots serving daytime shoppers and nighttime skateboarders. South Holland spread along the tracks of a light-rail train and was several stops from the towering skyscrapers of downtown Chicago. It was even fewer stops from Chicago's historic Chinatown, which served as anchor for the close-knit Taiwanese American community of greater Chicagoland.
Carl's parents immigrated from Taiwan and settled in Chicago. His father, Richard, ran a research lab at Rush University, and his mother, Mei-Chi, worked at the University of Chicago's Regenstein Library. Carl's brilliance and creativity was obvious from a young age. He began playing violin at age two and, at age five, he performed onstage with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. Like many children of his generation and culture, Carl's childhood was marked by holidays and special occasions often celebrated in favorite Chinatown restaurants, or in the homes of his many aunties, uncles, and cousins.
Carl attended the University of Chicago's Laboratory Schools from age three through high school, a Labbie "lifer." He graduated in 1993 with honors. At Lab, Carl distinguished himself as editor of U-High's award-winning literary magazine, The Renaissance, pursued independent scientific research in the world class laboratories of the University of Chicago, collaborated on a regular cartoon strip in the official student paper, The Midway, and agitated for student and workers rights as publisher and writer of the U-High Underground (a mildly controversial, completely unsanctioned, alternative student newspaper usually printed on the faculty's copying machine). As with all his projects, Carl used his distinctive voice, a balance of sartorial humor and biting commentary, to amplify the sometimes righteous, sometimes ridiculous, causes of the masses.
Carl matriculated at Carleton College in Northfield, Minnesota. There he studied philosophy and psychology. He joined the thriving Ultimate Frisbee culture on campus, sledded on cafeteria trays during their long winters, and met his beloved future wife, Erin Fyfe. Ever innovative and creative, Carl focused on a unique blend of the theoretical and practical (eastern religion, logic and mathematics, and philosophies of the mind and of language) and worked hard at his chosen field. Already a futurist, Carl was always thinking beyond time and place. He carved a novel academic path, which was thwarted by the powers that be-in this case, his own Philosophy Department. They sent him to Psychology, where Carl completed his work, pulling from the fields of psychology, neuroscience, and social sciences. He later continued his studies at Tufts University, earning a Masters in Engineering Management.
Carl's college sweetheart Erin was a dancer, and would become a teacher and reading specialist. They married in 2001 in Chicago, their post-college hometown. Later the couple moved to Erin's birth state of North Carolina, then to Boston, and finally settled in Cambridge, MA, where they purchased a townhome big enough for children (and beloved cats). Carl and Erin celebrated the births of Ryan in 2004 and Felix in 2007, and proceeded to lead the Yang Gang on many adventures.
Carl's longest-serving professional roles were at Fidelity's Center for Applied Technology and at Fidelity Labs, where he led the Digital Consumer Practice, and, most recently, as a Consulting Partner at Tata Consultancy Services' Banking, Financial Services, and Insurance business unit. He advised numerous businesses, centers, and project leads throughout his career. He was invited to lecture at MIT's Media Lab and Sloan School of Business, Boston University's Questrom School of Business, and elsewhere. Throughout, he distinguished himself with creativity, empathy, and innovative thinking.
Carl is survived by his parents, Richard and Mei-Chi Yang, of South Holland, IL; his ex-wife Erin Fyfe Yang, and his children Ryan and Felix, of Cambridge, MA; his loving aunts, uncles, cousins, and other devoted relatives from the Yang and Fyfe families; as well as his friends, mentors, colleagues, and associates around the world. Carl left an impression on those whose path intersected his own. He will not be forgotten. We are grateful for the time we had with Carl, no matter how much more of it we might have wished for.
A memorial service will be held at First Parish Unitarian Universalist Church in Cambridge, MA, on December 9, 2023. The family requests donations to Broken Tail Rescue Cat Adoption Center in lieu of flowers at this time.