Emma Skovgård
IT Security Engineer, Danske Bank
Founder, dinoframe.io
Copenhagen, Denmark
This piece is part of the 2026 Planet Mainframe Influential Mainframers series.
For Emma Skovgård, the path into the mainframe ecosystem has been anything but traditional, but that may be exactly what makes her impact so significant.
An IT Security Engineer at Danske Bank, Skovgård represents a new generation of mainframers—one shaped by curiosity, experimentation, and a willingness to challenge assumptions. From an early age, she explored technology hands-on, building the perspective that would later define her work in enterprise computing and security.
Today, she is recognized not only for her technical contributions, but for her candid voice on some of the industry’s most pressing issues: the skills gap, the future of mainframe security, and the importance of modernization through automation and infrastructure as code.
A Platform Built for New Learners
Skovgård’s most visible contribution is dinoframe.io, a platform she founded to rethink how mainframe knowledge is shared.
Designed with accessibility in mind, the site offers short-form, practical content, including videos, tutorials, blog posts, and code snippets, tailored for those new to the platform. In contrast to traditional documentation, which can be difficult for non-experts to navigate, dinoframe.io focuses on clarity, usability, and real-world application.
The platform is also collaborative by design. Open to contributors, it encourages peer review, shared authorship, and continuous improvement, bringing more voices into the process and creating a more dynamic learning environment.
As one nominator noted, the approach resonates strongly with emerging talent: the platform provides “a format that really works for new-to-Z folks,” making it easier to engage with and retain complex technical concepts.
Open Source as a Force Multiplier
Skovgård’s influence extends beyond education into open source innovation.
She is the creator of SEAR and Blackwall, projects focused on expanding and modernizing access to RACF. Rather than keeping these tools internal, she chose to release them openly, an intentional decision that has enabled broader adoption and collaboration across the mainframe community.
“The work Emma has done with SEAR and Blackwall could have been kept in-house… but by open sourcing it, she has really helped other companies in the mainframe space,” one contributor shared.
Her contributions were formally recognized in 2024 when she received IBM’s Excellence in Open Source Contribution award for her work on Dinoframe, highlighting both her technical creativity and her commitment to community-driven progress.
A Voice for Cultural Change
In addition to her technical work, Skovgård is an outspoken advocate for evolving how the mainframe community supports new entrants. She has written and spoken candidly about the challenges newcomers face—particularly when expectations are shaped by legacy ways of thinking. In her view, the future of the platform depends not only on technical modernization, but on cultural change.
She frames this evolution as essential not just for survival, but for growth:
“Survival of the mainframe is one thing, but it is different from a thriving ecosystem. We need to get back to the roots, back to a thriving ecosystem that can innovate in areas like security, developer experience, and reliability. If you truly love something you will want it to improve continuously—that’s why we need to look towards good things other ecosystems have that we don’t.”
Her perspective challenges the idea that new talent should simply replicate existing approaches. Instead, she emphasizes curiosity, experimentation, and the importance of learning from other ecosystems as critical to building a more resilient and forward-looking mainframe community.
Building Community in Real Time
Beyond platforms and projects, Skovgård is actively engaged in community spaces. She contributes to open discussions, moderates conversations within the System Z Enthusiasts Discord, and helps maintain an environment that is both welcoming and constructive.
Her presence in these spaces reflects a broader commitment: not just to share knowledge, but to shape how that knowledge is exchanged.
A New Model of Influence
What makes Skovgård’s work particularly notable is how quickly it has taken shape.
Relatively new to the IBM Z ecosystem, she has already established herself through a combination of technical contributions, open collaboration, and a clear point of view on where the industry needs to go. Her work bridges security, education, and modernization—while also addressing the human side of the talent pipeline.
As one nominator put it, “Emma is just one of the most amazing people in the mainframe community… she is so clearly a top influencer.”
Her influence is not built on self-promotion, but on action—creating tools, building platforms, and contributing in ways that others can immediately use and build upon.
As a 2026 Planet Mainframe Influential Mainframer, Emma Skovgård represents a shift in how impact is defined: not by tenure, but by contribution; not by visibility, but by value.
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