Text Engine Consulting, Inc. was founded by Alan Reade, an instructional designer and writer with 20 years of consulting experience in companies that range from ad agencies to software, from banks to nonprofit community groups, in Seattle, New York City, and the San Francisco Bay Area.

Alan started out in the late eighties working with aerospace engineers to write and edit commercial aircraft engineering specifications. He started contracting in the software industry in the early nineties, developing help systems for graphics programs. From there, he took on a long-term contract at Microsoft Corporation, writing certification exams for their Professional Developer certification track, and it was at that time that he developed an affinity for creating graphics, soon working with companies such as DDB Needham, Revlon, and Discovery Channel in Manhattan to develop graphics for their print campaigns.

In 1999, in San Francisco, Alan signed on as an instructional designer at DigitalThink, a dot-com focused on training. Within a year, he was overseeing a cross-functional team of instructional designers, graphic designers, and producers to create courseware for many subjects, including information technology and banking. After those dot-com days, Alan developed help systems for the first version of Creative Suite at Adobe Systems and headed up an effort to introduce new audiences to Adobe products by producing tutorials and other technical content for online publication.

Alan started Text Engine in 2006, to develop training programs in the information technology, biotech, healthcare, and banking industries. Text Engine also specializes in green-business training, to build ecology-minded ideas in today's business world.