Aditi Javeri Gokhale is a dynamic Fortune 100 C-suite leader with proven success in driving scalable growth, creating value through innovation, and leading through change. An all-around leader with expertise in strategy, wealth and asset management, digital, transformation, marketing and product innovation, Aditi has delivered lasting impact across the Financial Services, Health and Wellness, and Travel industries.

As Chief of Strategy at Northwestern Mutual, Aditi re-architected the company strategy that resulted in record growth and a historic number of customers. In addition, Aditi oversaw more than $630 billion in company and client assets. As President of the Wealth Management business, she led it to record growth of over 40%, making it one of the largest independent broker dealers in the country. Also, as Head of Institutional Investments, the team consistently achieved above-benchmark returns that backs the company’s life insurance products. Prior to that, Aditi was named the first CMO in company history and received recognition for transforming both the marketing strategy and organization. As a testament to her success, she was named by the Wall Street Journal as one of the world’s most influential marketers and Forbes cited her as one of the “top 50 CMOs redefining the marketing role and driving its evolution.”

Brad Porter is the CEO and Founder of Collaborative Robotics (Cobot), a robotics company headquartered in Santa Clara, California, backed by Sequoia Capital, General Catalyst, Khosla Ventures, Mayo Clinic, and more. Before founding Cobot, Brad was Vice President and Distinguished Engineer at Amazon, where he led a global team of 10,000 people overseeing robotics for all of Amazon’s logistics network. He also served as CTO of Scale AI, was Platform Architect for Tellme Networks, and began his career as an engineer at Netscape. Brad holds both a Bachelor's and a Master’s degree in Computer Science from MIT, where his research focused on computer graphics under the guidance of Professor Seth Teller.

‍

Ethan Mollick is the Ralph J. Roberts Distinguished Faculty Scholar and Associate Professor at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, where he studies the effects of artificial intelligence on work, entrepreneurship, and education. His academic research has been published in leading journals, and his work on AI is widely applied, leading him to be named one of TIME Magazine’s Most Influential People in Artificial Intelligence. Ethan also writes to a wider audience about AI, including in his book, Co-Intelligence, a New York Times bestseller.

In addition to his research and teaching, Ethan is the Co-Director of the Generative AI Labs at Wharton, which build prototypes and conduct research to discover how AI can help humans thrive while mitigating risks. Prior to his time in academia, Ethan co-founded a startup company, and he advises numerous organizations.

‍

‍

Drew Houston is co-founder and CEO of Dropbox. Since founding the company in 2007 with Arash Ferdowsi, Drew has led the company’s growth from a  simple idea to a service used by over 600 million people around the world.

Drew received his bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering and computer science from MIT in 2006. After graduating, he turned his frustration with carrying USB drives and emailing files to himself into a demo for what became Dropbox.

Today, Dropbox is one of the world's leading business collaboration platforms, with 15 million paying subscribers and nearly 3000 employees across 12 global offices.

Fotini Christia is the Ford International Professor of the Social  Sciences in the Department of Political Science at the Massachusetts  Institute of Technology. She is Director of the Sociotechnical Systems Research Center (SSRC), Associate Director of the Institute for Data, Systems, and Society (IDSS), and Chair of the doctoral program in Social and Engineering Systems (SES) at MIT's Schwarzman College of Computing.

Her research had focused on issues of conflict and cooperation in the  Muslim world, and she has conducted fieldwork in Afghanistan, Bosnia,  Iraq, Iran, the Palestinian Territories, Syria, and Yemen. She is currently working to bridge the social sciences, data science, and computation by bringing researchers from these disciplines together to  address systemic racism across housing, healthcare, policing, and social media. She also has a new line of research that examines how to  effectively integrate AI tools in public policy.

Fotini is the author of “Alliance Formation in Civil War” (Cambridge University Press, 2012), which was awarded the Luebbert Award for Best Book in Comparative Politics, the Lepgold Prize for Best Book in International Relations, and a Distinguished Book Award from the International Studies Association. She is co-editor with Graeme Blair (UCLA) and Jeremy Weinstein (Stanford) of "Crime, Insecurity, and Community Policing: Experiments on Building Trust", forthcoming with Cambridge University Press (2024).  Her research has also appeared in Science, Nature Human Behavior, Review of Economic Studies, NeurIPs, Communications Medicine, IEEE Transactions on Network Science and Engineering, American Political Science Review, and Annual Review of Political Science among other journals. Her opinion pieces have been published in Foreign Affairs, The New York Times, The Washington Post, and The Boston Globe among other outlets. Fotini graduated magna cum laude from Columbia University in 2001 with a joint BA in Economics–Operations Research and  an MA in International Affairs. She joined the MIT faculty in July 2008  after receiving her PhD in Public Policy from Harvard University that  year.

Ray Stata Ray Stata co-founded Analog Devices in 1965 to focus on high-performance signal processing technology, initially targeting operational amplifiers but later expanding to other linear integrated circuits (IC) and digital signal processors (DSP). He has served as President and CEO from 1971 to 1996 and as Chairman of the Board from 1973 to 2022 and continues to serve on the ADI Board of Directors today.

Mr. Stata is active in the high technology industry and in public service, including being the co-founder and the first President of the Massachusetts High Technology Council, a Board member of the Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA) from 1996 to 2013, and serving from 1987 to 2005 on the Executive Committee of the Council on Competitiveness. Ray holds a BSEE and MSEE from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and has remained actively involved with his alma mater over the years, including serving until 2010 on the Executive Committee of the MIT Corporation and as Chairman of the Visiting Committee of the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science.  Ray is a member of the National Academy of Engineers and American Academy of Arts and Sciences.Since stepping down as CEO of Analog Devices, Ray has been actively engaged as a venture investor in early-stage startup companies.  Outside of the high technology industry, Ray is an active philanthropist and contributor to the community in which he lives.

Dr. Wardah Inam is the Co-Founder and CEO of Overjet, the leading provider of AI technology for the dental industry to help improve patient care. Before founding Overjet, she led product development at a healthcare startup, Q Bio, working on biomedical imaging. Before that, she was a Postdoctoral Fellow at MIT Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Lab, working on remote biomedical sensing using machine learning on wireless signals.Dr. Inam received a PhD from MIT, where she developed AI-powered microgrid technology. This work received widespread recognition, including National Geographic covering it as a breakthrough that could transform how we power the world.

She has corporate experience with GE and Apple and has received the MIT Graduate Women of Excellence Award.

Dr. Inam has been ranked among the 32 most influential people in dentistry by Incisal Edge, listed by Inc. Magazine as one of the Top 100 Female Founders, and received the Shils Innovator Award in 2022. She is also a member of the Santa Fe Group’s Strategic Advisory Council, a think tank that advocates for better dental services.

Anna Khan is a General Partner at Charles River Ventures (CRV), one of the oldest venture capital firms in the US that has invested in companies like DoorDash, Vercel, Cribl, Mercury, Zip, Twitter, and others. Prior to CRV, Anna spent five years at Bessemer Venture Partners investing across the software ecosystem. Anna is also the Founder and CEO of Launch X, an accelerator that helps female founders learn how to raise capital for their business. Launch X has been featured in the Harvard Alumni Magazine and on Bloomberg Business.

Anna was named a Forbes 30 under 30 Venture Capital Winner in 2017. She was also the author of several industry-leading papers on the cloud ecosystem - namely the State of the Cloud Anna started her career as a former operator, serving as the Chief of Staff at 4INFO (Acq. by Cadent) - where she helped build mobile ad products for the rapidly growing smartphone ecosystem in 2010. Prior to 4INFO, Anna worked as an investment manager at both Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley in the midst of the financial crisis in the summers of 2008 and 2009.

Anna graduated with Honors from Stanford University and received her MBA with Distinction from Harvard Business School where she was an Arthur Rock Fellow and a World Economic Forum Global Shaper. At Stanford University, Anna was elected to the Cap & Gown Academic Honor Society and was President of the largest undergraduate women's organization on campus - Stanford Women in Business. Today, Anna serves on Stanford's LEAD Council.

Ansaf Kareem is the founder and managing partner of Latitude Capital, a venture capital firm focused primarily on software and AI investments.

Prior to Latitude, Ansaf was a partner at Lightspeed Venture Partners, one of the largest global VC firms. Ansaf joined the firm in 2016 when the firm was just $3B under management and was a core member of that partnership that grew the firm to over $20B under management. During his time at Lightspeed, Ansaf has been involved with or on the board of companies like Teneobio (acquired for $2.5B), Grab (NASDAQ: GRAB), FortySeven (acquired for $4.9B), Glean ($4.5B+), Clever (acquired for $500M), Plushcare (acquired for $450M), and several others.

Prior to becoming a venture capitalist, Ansaf worked on the product team at RelateIQ, one of the earliest AI companies, which was acquired by Salesforce for ~$400M. Ansaf started his career as a management consultant at McKinsey & Company in New York.

Ansaf graduated with honors from Stanford University. He has a MBA from Harvard Business School where he was a David M. Rubenstein Fellow and a MPP from Harvard Kennedy School where he was a George Leadership Fellow.

‍

Habib is the founding Managing Partner of the E14 Fund, the MIT Media Lab affiliated venture fund. His investments include Figur8, Wise Systems, Thruwave, OPT Industries,  Kiwi Technologies, Overjet,  Formlabs, Tulip and more.

Prior to E14 Fund he was part of multiple startups in the Boston and the Middle East. From 2011 to 2016 he was the founding CEO of Wamda, a platform of entrepreneurship programs, networks and venture fund focused on the Middle East and North Africa region.

Before Wamda, Habib was based in Boston where he founded Yamli a linguistics startup that he exited to Yahoo! In 2012. He was also the founding member of Mok3, a venture backed MIT CSAIL spinoff that developed an image based modeling software.

In 2009, the World Economic Forum recognized Habib as a Young Global Leader and was named as a top innovator under 35 (TR35) by the MIT Technology review in 2011. In 2013, He was the Vice Chair of the World Economic Forum council on entrepreneurship and currently sits on the Global Future Council on Systems and Platforms.

Habib holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Computer and Communication Engineering from the American University of Beirut and a Master's Degree in Electrical Engineering from the University of Southern California.

‍

Jake Seid is General Partner of Ballistic Ventures and brings a unique combination of operating and investing experience, which supports founders as they grow their businesses. Previously, as sole founder of Stone Bridge Ventures, 12 of his early-stage investments grew to become unicorn companies. Prior to that, he was president of TenX/Auction. With 800 people in his reporting organization, he grew the real estate-focused transactional online marketplace to be the industry’s leading platform. The company was acquired for $1.6B. Jake started his tenure in venture capital as a member of the team that launched Lightspeed Venture Partners and became a key Managing Director helping drive the firm’s early growth. Early on, he was a Cisco product lead for the team that commercialized broadband technology, helping the group grow from startup to a $1B revenue run rate in two years and drove many important cybersecurity-focused innovations into his products. He holds an SB in Electrical Engineering and an M.Eng in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science from MIT. At MIT, he was awarded the Karly Taylor Compton Prize, the highest honor given to a student. He is a long-serving board member of the MIT Club of Northern California. In 2009, he was named a Young Global Leader by the World Economic Forum.

James Cham is a Partner at Bloomberg Beta, a firm focused on investing in the future of work. James invests in companies working on applying machine intelligence to businesses and society. He's currently invested in companies like Weights and Biases, Lambda Labs, Chroma, and Yurts AI. James speaks and writes on the implications of AI for companies, including an early landscape of machine intelligence companies https://www.oreilly.com/content/the-current-state-of-machine-intelligence-3-0/. Business Insider recognized James as the third best seed investor two years in a row (https://www.businessinsider.com/bloomberg-beta-vc-james-cham-look-startup-founders-2024-4) in their 2024 Seed 100 list. In the past, he's been involved in investments with companies like Streamlit, LinkedIn, and Twilio. James was previously an investor at Bessemer Venture Partners, a management consultant at The Boston Consulting Group, and a software developer. He attended Harvard and MIT but enjoyed MIT more. He lives in Palo Alto.

‍

Kahini brings to Obvious product and software experience, and a passion for building data and AI-enabled solutions in healthcare, fintech, and enterprise.

Before joining Obvious, Kahini was an investor at Google’s early-stage AI fund, Gradient Ventures. She started her career as software developer writing embedded systems code for the Iridium NEXT Satellite Constellation. Kahini then managed product and sales for an AI group at Booz Allen Hamilton, focused on natural language processing and data science.

Kahini holds a B.S. and M.S. in Electrical and Computer Engineering from Carnegie Mellon University. She also earned an MBA in Finance and Entrepreneurship from The Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania.

‍

Kyle is  a General Partner and Co-Founder at Sugar Free Capital, Seed & Series A  fund which cross-pollinates world-class [often MIT] Technical Founders with  proven go-to-market talent, playbooks & best practices. Prior to founding  Sugar Free Capital, Kyle was an operating Partner at 2 VC Funds:  The Legal Tech Fund and Exactius Capital  Management. Previously, Kyle founded an enterprise software company called  Capgains, which automates the monitoring and compliance of lucrative, startup  & investor-focused tax incentives.

Kyle spent the first decade of his career at Benchmark-backed Axiom, where  he built the Business Development functions (from scratch), which he  ultimately led globally.

Axiom created  the category of Legal Tech, which ultimately spawned three 9-figure revenues  companies:  Axiom, Knowable &  Factor.

Kyle earned a J.D. from Emory Law School with a concentration on Venture  Capital Law & Fund Formation.  He  holds a B.S. from Penn State University, where he graduated with High  Distinction.

Mark Gorenberg has three decades of venture capital experience, funding and serving on the boards of numerous successful start-ups.  Mark is the Founder and a Managing Director of Zetta Venture Partners, the first and leading early-stage fund focused only on AI for enterprise. Prior to his career in venture capital Mark served as a software executive, entrepreneur and a member of the first SparcStation team at Sun Microsystems.

Mark is also currently the Chair of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Corporation (Board of Trustees). In 2011, Mark was appointed by President Barack Obama to the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology, a 21-person advisory group of the nation’s leading scientists and engineers.

He graduated from MIT and received Masters Degrees from the University of Minnesota and Stanford University.

‍

Michel Zaidler is a fintech-focused venture capital investor covering Latin America at Quona Capital. Previously, he held roles in private equity, growth investing, and equity research.

Rebeca is a venture capital investor who has collected experiences as innovator and inventor, founder and entrepreneur, social entrepreneur, educator and ecosystem builder.  Most recently, Rebeca co-founded Kalei Ventures, which invests in early stage technology startups from Latin America. Prior to Kalei, Rebeca was co-founded and Managing Director at Rivet Ventures, which focuses in companies targeting women-led markets where female usage, decision-making, and purchasing are crucial to company growth. Rebeca is also co-founder of the San Francisco-born startup YouNoodle, which helps companies and governments engage with communities of entrepreneurs for open innovation and co-creation of products and services.

Rohini Chakravarthy (MBA ‘99) is Managing Partner at NewBuild Venture Capital, where she invests in early-stage enterprise and supply chain software companies. AI is an important enabling trend for her thematic firm.

Prior to founding NewBuild Venture Capital, Rohini was a venture capitalist at NEA, Intel Capital, and NGP Capital for over 20 years. Over her career, she has invested through several enterprise architectural shifts including wireless networking, big data, cloud computing, and AI. Rohini has served on 15+ boards as an investor board member, and has shepherded many companies through exponential growth, successful acquisitions, and IPOs.

Outside her work as a venture investor, Rohini is deeply involved in alumni engagement and giving, and actively supports women in technology. She is a board member of the MIT Club of Northern California, was on the board of the IIT Madras Foundation for six years, and is a member of Indiaspora, which is a community platform to shape successful US-India relations.

‍

Sheena (MIT’ 13) is a General Partner and Co-Founder at Sugar Free Capital, Seed & Series A fund which cross-pollinates world-class [often MIT] Technical Founders with proven go-to-market talent, playbooks & best practices. Prior to founding Sugar Free Capital,

Sheena was a Partner at Comcast Ventures where she pioneered new investment verticals within the fund and led 11 investments. Sheena started her career at the Boston Consulting Group (BCG) — advising clients in the financial services and retail sectors on growth strategy and transformation. Deepening her operating experience,

Sheena joined a Series A startup, Symphony Commerce, one of the first compound solutions for e-commerce. Sheena started her VC career 8 years ago at Bessemer Venture Partners before joining the team at Comcast Ventures in 2019 as a Principal. Sheena holds a B.S. from MIT and an MBA from the Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth.

-

Somak is the founder and Managing Partner of Armory Square Ventures (ASV), a venture capital firm based in Upstate New York and New York City. ASV leads early-stage rounds in software companies targeting industries in the early stages of digital transformation. ASV manages over $100M in capital across its funds and has generated top decile returns primarily to nonprofits, institutions, and business leaders in New York State. The firm plays a key role in recruiting talent and follow-on capital in secondary markets like Upstate New York. Somak was an early investor in Buffalo-based ACV Auctions (NADSDAQ: ACVA), NYC-based BentoBox (acquired by Fiserv), and numerous other high-growth technology companies. Somak has been operating and investing in early-stage startups in New York State and other emerging venture regions since 1999. Before launching ASV in 2014, he was a partner at Tribeca Venture Partners, where he was instrumental in nearly every investment of its first fund and helped launch its second fund. He started his venture career at Edison Partners. Prior to entering the VC industry, Somak held senior operating roles at Shopping.com (acquired by eBay for over $600M by eBay) and Medtower, a knowledge management company for the life science industry. He has served on the boards of numerous companies in the startup and nonprofit sectors. Somak received his Bachelor's in Mechanical Engineering from MIT and his Master's in Entrepreneurship and Finance from Columbia Business School.

‍

Tod Hynes is the Founder of Clymate Studios and a Senior Advisor for Climate & Energy at the Martin Trust Center for MIT Entrepreneurship. As a Senior Lecturer at MIT, he has taught a graduate course called Climate & Energy Ventures since 2008 and co-founded the MIT Climate & Energy Prize in 2007. Over 50 companies have come out of this course, and over 160 teams from 44 countries participated in the 2024 prize. Tod led the effort to create an AI Judge for the ClimaTech Great Global Innovation Challenge and is incorporating a suite of custom AI tools into the CEV course as well as the book he is co-authoring on Climate & Energy Startups. He Founded Clymate Studios and advises and invests in over 20 companies and funds in the climate and energy sectors. He has started several companies since 2002, including XL Fleet (now called Spruce Power), which went public in 2020. He is the Vice Chair of the board of the Woodwell Climate Research Center, the MIT Leadership Partner for Ocean Visions, and an International Advisory Council Observer for Climate Impact X. He previously launched the wind development business at Citizens Energy and co-chaired the Energy Committee for CERC, the organization the greened the Democratic and Republican National Conventions in 2004. Hynes holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Management Science from MIT.

Alice Nawfal comes from a business and policy background, and her role as Chief Operating Officer at Notabene is to combine business strategy with hands-on execution. With a mission to make digital assets a larger part of the everyday economy, Notabene brings trust and safety to crypto transactions. As COO of Notabene, Alice leads the commercial and operations side of the business, including driving regulatory engagement. With a math and economics background from MIT, she has been in deeply analytical business and policy roles early in her career. First, she was a Management Consultant at Bain & Company serving Fortune 500 companies. Later, she was a Public Policy Consultant at the Economist Intelligence Unit, where she managed policy projects for the Gates and Clinton Foundations and the World Bank focused on tech policy, gender studies, and “Future of Work”. While getting a dual MBA / MPA at the Wharton School and Harvard Kennedy School respectively, she transitioned to focusing on fintech and blockchain startups where she led business development and new product expansion projects. She joined uPort, the leading decentralized identity project, where she was Business and Operations Lead and Project Co-lead, running business development, operations, and marketing.

Erkko is CEO and Co-Founder of Brooklyn Investment Group, an A.I.-powered managed accounts platform for financial advisory firms and asset managers. Prior to founding Brooklyn, Erkko was Managing Director at Goldman Sachs, where he led a team responsible for creating and managing systematic investment strategies for wealth management clients. Erkko began his career as Economist at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York at the onset of the Financial Crisis. Erkko has also served as an Adjunct Professor at NYU Stern School of Business and has published in top finance journals, including the Journal of Finance, the Review of Financial Studies and the Journal of Portfolio Management. He is winner of the 2015 Amundi Smith Breeden Prize for outstanding capital markets research and the 2016 Engle Prize in financial econometrics. Erkko earned a Ph.D. and M.A. in Economics from Harvard University where he was a Presidential Scholar. He also holds a B.S. Phi Beta Kappa from MIT.

John Nay is the CEO of Norm Ai, the Regulatory AI company. He has more than a decade of research experience at the intersection of AI and law, most recently at Stanford, where he is pioneering A Legal Informatics Approach to AI Alignment as a Fellow at CodeX. John was also the founding CEO of Brooklyn Investment Group, an AI-powered investment software platform with an SEC Registered Investment Adviser subsidiary, where he now serves as Chairman. As a Ph.D. student at Vanderbilt University, he conducted AI research funded by the U.S. National Science Foundation and the U.S. Office of Naval Research. After Vanderbilt, he was a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at NYU and an Affiliate at Harvard. As an Adjunct Professor, he created the first AI course at the NYU School of Law. John has authored dozens of research articles on AI and AI policy, many of which have been published in leading technical journals and law reviews. His article “Artificial Intelligence and Interspecific Law” was recently published in Science.

Jon Xu co-founded and was the Chief Technology Officer of FutureAdvisor, one of the first Robo-Advisor solutions to make highly personalized investment management available to everyone. FutureAdvisor was acquired by BlackRock where Jon continued to lead Product and Engineering as Managing Director in the Aladdin Wealth Tech Group. Jon is an active investor, advisor and board member for early-stage startups, particularly at the intersection of AI and finance. Jon is also a Visiting Group Partner at Y Combinator.

Lisa Besserman, Founder of Startup Buenos Aires (acquired), has been named as Business Insider’s “Top 100 Most Influential Women in Tech”, sharing the list with other women such as Sheryl Sandberg, Arianna Huffington, and Marissa Mayer (..she wants to emphasize that she was #94 on the list so don’t get too excited).

Lisa currently serves as the Head of Innovation at JP Morgan Chase Operations, where she works with startups and emerging technologies to solve problems at scale for the largest financial institution in the world.

Prior to her current role, she served as the Managing Director at Expa VC, a $350M venture fund and startup studio investing in pre-seed to series A startups.

Lisa was the Founder and CEO of Startup Buenos Aires, an accelerator program that supported startups and entrepreneurs throughout Latin America.

Lisa has been featured by NBC, Bloomberg TV, Reuters, Entrepreneur Magazine, Forbes, and CNN. She has guest lectured on entrepreneurship and innovation to universities such as NYU, Northwestern, Harvard, Berkeley, and the University of Pennsylvania.

She enjoys traveling, mountaineering, playing the guitar (poorly), advising startups (not poorly), and finds it awkward to write about herself in the third person.

‍

Matt is the Deputy Editor-in-Chief at Business Insider, leading a global newsroom of more than 200 editors and reporters focused on business, technology, and innovation.

Monica Brand Engel, co-founding Managing Partner of Quona Capital, is an investor and entrepreneur, who has spent her career dedicated to broadening financial inclusion globally. She spent her formative years in Silicon Valley, building alternative financing companies targeted at near-bankable businesses. With a desire to apply lessons learned in emerging markets, she moved to South Africa after graduating Stanford Business School to work in venture capital in a nascent ecosystem. From Cape Town, Monica was recruited by Accion as Head of Product and

Innovation to launch new financial services for underserved businesses and consumers globally. Her experience included a period in Mexico with Compartamos Bank, Latin America’s largest microfinance institute (re-branded Gentera Bank following its IPO in 2007). This IPO provided the funds to launch Accion’s Frontier Investments– its first fintech for inclusion fund and the predecessor to the creation of

Quona Capital. Monica leads the Africa, MENA, and Cross-Border investment strategy Quona. She’s served for over a decade as a graduate school professor at Johns Hopkins SAIS and has co-authored and contributed to numerous books. Monica earned an MBA and a MA of Education from Stanford University and a BA with honors in Economics from Williams College. She’s half-Peruvian and blessed with a fantastic husband and twins

‍

Runik Mehrotra is the Co-Founder & CIO of Vise. Vise is an asset manager that uses artificial intelligence to help financial advisors build, manage, and explain personalized portfolios for their clients. Vise’s mission is to create financial freedom for all with a platform that allows all investors, regardless of age, net worth, or geography, to access personalized, automated, and intelligent investments across all asset classes. The company is leading the industry-wide shift toward Wealth 3.0—the next step beyond mutual funds, ETFs, and index funds into personalized, automated portfolios. The team consists of world-class engineers, Ph.D. quant researchers, and investment strategists from top firms like Citadel, Google, AQR, and Dimensional Fund Advisors.

He and co-founder Samir Vasavada started Vise when they were 16 years old and living in the Midwest. They bootstrapped the company before raising a total of $128 million in venture funding from firms including Sequoia Capital, Founders Fund, and Allen & Company.

Runik is an active AI and Quantitative Finance researcher. Alongside research, Runik has consulted with firms such as UBS, BCG, Mass Mutual, Alliance Bernstein, Deutsche Asset Management and others on implementations of Artificial Intelligence in Finance.

Runik attended the Jerome Fisher Program for Management and Technology at the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School of Business and studied Computer Science at the Engineering School.

Runik has been featured in Forbes 30 Under 30 and covered in the Wall Street Journal, Fortune, TechCrunch, and many other publications.

‍

Aparna Chennapragada is a longtime Silicon Valley resident and technology leader who has 25+ years of experience as a technology and AI executive.  

Aparna has built and shaped impactful products such as Google search, YouTube, Google Assistant, Google Lens, Robinhood and now Microsoft Copilot. She currently leads Microsoft’s Generative AI initiatives within Microsoft 365, including Copilot, and Microsoft Designer. She leads teams building products that reimagine creativity and productivity in the world of AI and empower customer.  

Aparna has served on the board for Fortune 100 companies, and she’s currently an eBay board member and is part of the Technology and Audit committees.

Arun is a core member of Databricks's Field security practice and has 25 years of experience in building data products, including over a decade of experience in building data and AI products. Arun led and co-created the Security Analysis Tool (SAT) and SSPM for Databricks, he is coauthor of Databricks AI Security Framework (DASF). Arun has a Bachelor's in Computer Science, holds Cloud security and AI/ML industry certifications, and contributes to HITRUST and FAIR Institute AI workgroups.

‍

Burak Gokturk, Vice President of Engineering at Google Cloud AI, oversees the teams creating products and solutions that empower every developer to create applications, enterprises to transform their business with AI, including products that require little to no AI or machine learning user expertise. These portfolios include Google LLM models for enterprises and developers, search solutions for enterprises, and platforms such as Vertex AI, AI Studio, Kaggle and Colab.

Burak was previously Vice President of Google Shopping for 13 years, leading teams in shopping, commerce, and ads, focused primarily on bringing computer vision and machine learning science to successful commercialization within the shopping domain.

Prior to that, Burak was Chief Technology Officer, Chief Revenue Officer, and co-founder of Like.com, where he was responsible for an AI-based product discovery technology. There, he grew revenue exponentially via a unique, AI-driven approach. And before that, Burak led algorithm development at Canesta, Intel, and BEKO.

Burak has been in the AI/machine learning field for more than 25 years, published more than 40 papers, and holds more than 50 patents/patent applications. Burak received his MS and PhD degrees in electrical engineering from Stanford University and double BS degrees in electrical engineering and computer science from Boğaziçi University.

‍

Caroline O’Brien serves as the Chief Data Officer and Head of Product at Afiniti, an enterprise AI company dedicated to transforming customer experience. In her role, Caroline leads the Product Development organization and oversees the Data Governance and Responsible AI programs.

Caroline's experience spans both academia and industry, working as a data scientist at Commonwealth Australia bank and as a postdoctoral fellow MIT’s Institute for Medical Engineering & Sciences. Her research focused on using physics- and data-driven methods to understand cardiovascular disease, inform clinical decision-making, and guide the design of medical devices. She holds a doctorate in Biomedical Engineering from the University of New South Wales and a Bachelor’s degree in Engineering and Mathematics from the University of Queensland.

‍

Dr. Daniela Braga is the founder and CEO of Defined.ai, the largest marketplace of ethically sourced training data for AI. With a hybrid background as a linguist and an engineer and 20+ years of experience in AI, she has raised over $80 million of venture capital, making her the woman founder in Generative AI who has raised more capital in the world. Dr. Braga is also involved in shaping the AI strategy of the US and Portugal.

‍

Dr. Sherry Marcus is Director of Generative AI Science at Amazon Web Services (AWS) where she leads generative AI science for Amazon Bedrock. Sherry is a recognized expert in artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) and has spoken on behalf of AWS to White House leaders, Fortune 100 CEOs, and leading news outlets, including Bloomberg and Reuters.

Sherry started her career serving in senior, mission-critical roles in the intelligence community and the Department of Justice. She has led a series of highly successful scalable analytics solutions in support of national missions in counterterrorism, counternarcotic, counterintelligence, and naval surface warfare. Sherry received the technical medal of excellence from the Central Intelligence Agency.

Sherry then led in C-Suite positions in the financial sector. As Managing Director and Head of the Blackrock Artificial Intelligence (AI) Labs, she developed highly successful quantitative science solutions for trading and investment businesses. As Chief Data Analytics Officer at Millennium Partners (MLP), she led the development of integration of the AWS public cloud initiative in the delivery of next-gen analytic artifacts to the business. As Global Head of Big Data Analytics at Credit Suisse, she created solutions that merged private banking, communication, and news data for client analytics, and developed solutions in support of prime services.

Sherry is a founding member of the science board at the National Counterterrorism Center and is an advisory board member of the Allen Institute. Sherry has authored and co-authored more than 40 papers in nationally recognized journals. Sherry holds a Ph.D. from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Mathematics and a B.A. from Cornell University. When not creating the next generative models of AI, Sherry enjoys doing the New York Times crossword puzzle, practicing pilates, and listening to math and computer science lectures.

‍

‍

Fawad Ahmad Senior Vice President & Chief Strategy & Transformation Officer State Farm Mutual Automobile Insurance Companies®

Fawad joined State Farm in 2016 to lead digital strategy development and execution for the enterprise as Vice President – Digital. In 2017, he was promoted to Senior Vice President in Enterprise Technology and earned the additional title of Chief Digital Officer in 2019. He led Customer Experience until 2024, including the data science, analytics, and software design and experience teams who deliver and optimize end-user apps for customers, agents and employees. He assumed his current role in 2024 to drive the enterprise strategy and transformation work to position State Farm for future growth.Prior to joining State Farm, Fawad led business and digital strategies and transformations at other Fortune 500 organizations, including Staples and eBay. He has also provided legal, compliance and corporate oversight work for financial services organizations like Charles Schwab & Co., Inc. and U.S. Bank. Fawad earned his juris doctor degree from Thomas Jefferson School of Law, and his bachelor’s degree in marketing from Southeastern University. Outside of work, Fawad served as a member of the Governing Council for Carle BroMenn Medical Center from 2017-2022, and he joined the Carle Foundation in 2021. In 2023, he was appointed to the Board of Directors for Radian Group Inc., which focuses on responsible and sustainable homeownership through a comprehensive suite of real estate services. In 2024, he was appointed to the Advisory Board of Carnegie Mellon University’s Block Center for Technology and Society.

JJ Zhuang is an engineer, tech executive, and serial entrepreneur. He is a Co-Founder of NYA Labs, an incubator and operator of AI-native companies. JJ served as Chief Architect of Instacart, where he oversaw the company’s technology strategy and led the development of a full AI stack to drive both product transformation and workforce productivity. Prior to Instacart, JJ was a Distinguished Engineer at Microsoft, where he led Office365 app technology. He also co-founded Acompli, serving as CTO, and co-created the app that Microsoft acquired and adopted as the mobile Outlook. Additionally, JJ held Chief Architect roles at VMware and Yahoo!.

Jay Dawani is co-founder & CEO of Lemurian Labs, a startup at the forefront of general purpose accelerated computing for making AI development affordable and generally available for all companies and people to equally benefit. Author of the influential book "Mathematics for Deep Learning", he has held leadership positions at companies such as BlocPlay and Geometric Energy Corporation, spearheading projects involving quantum computing, metaverse, blockchain, AI, space robotics, and more. Jay has also served as an advisor to NASA Frontier Development Lab, SiaClassic, and many leading AI firms.

‍

Jesse is CEO of Decagon, a software company building AI customer support agents. Previously, Jesse studied AI at Harvard and started Lowkey, which was acquired by Niantic.

Jonathan Cohen is a VP of Applied Research at NVIDIA, where he leads development of platforms for Large Language Models and SpeechAI. He also oversees development of genomics software and foundation models.

Previously he was a Director of Engineering at Apple, and before that he spent eight years at NVIDIA in a variety of engineering and research roles.  Earlier in his career, he specialized in computer graphics as a software developer in the visual effect industry, winning a Scientific and Technical Academy Award in 2007.

‍

Jonathan Rosenberg is the Chief Technology Officer and head of AI at Five9. In this role, he is responsible for the engineering and operational teams building out Five9’s Genius AI portfolio, in addition to direct the overall technology evolution of Five9’s platform. Jonathan has dedicated his thirty-year career to transforming the telecommunications industry. First, from hardware to software, then software to cloud, and now, cloud to AI. He is well-known for his authorship of the SIP protocol, which is the foundation for modern IP-based telecommunications.

Prior to Five9, Jonathan was CTO for the Collaboration Technology Group (CTG) at Cisco Systems, and before that, Chief Technology Strategist at Skype. He received his bachelor's and master's degrees from MIT and holds a PhD in electrical engineering from Columbia University.

In 2002 he was named one of the most innovative young technologists in the world by Technology Review magazine. He also was named a ""Top Supergeek"" by CRN and won a Pulver Von Pioneer award for contributions to the VoIP industry. In 2015 he was presented with the Ohio University Strowger Award for transformational innovation in the Telecommunications industry.

Max Kolysh is a serial entrepeneur and investor. Max is currently the CEO of Dover.com, an all-in-one recruiting platform for fast-growing startups. Max previously started Zinc.com. Max graduated from MIT with a degree in CS.

‍

Omar Khawaja leads Databricks' Field Security practice globally, teaches at Carnegie Mellon’s CISO program, sits on the boards of HITRUST and FAIR Institute, spent 9 years as CISO of a $26B enterprise and is leading a team that developed an actionable AI security framework for 12,000 enterprise data platform customers at Databricks.

‍

Sami Shalabi is a technology serial entrepreneur and inventor. He is currently Founder & CTO of Maven AGI, a Generative AI platform on a mission to reimagine customer experience starting with support. Prior to Maven AGI, Sami led the reinvention of Google News integrating AI and expanding its user base by over a billion users. During his tenure at Google he co-founded Google Play Newsstand (grew it from zero to over a billion users), Google Play Magazines, Google Currents, and Google Friend Connect. In healthcare, Sami was COO at Outcomes4Me, an AI oncology patient empowerment platform leading the expansion of its footprint to over 25% of breast cancer patients in the U.S. Before joining Google, Sami co-founded several companies including Zingku, a venture-backed mobile social startup that was acquired by Google, and Istikana, the largest SVOD platform focused on Arab Indie films. Sami holds over 55 patents and was awarded the 2009 MIT Young Professional Award. He is a partner at the Mentors Fund and is an advisor and startup mentor with the US State Department, MIT, Harvard, Techstars, Endeavor, and others. Sami received his undergraduate and graduate degrees from MIT and started his career at Lotus / IBM.

‍

Surojit is CEO and Founder of Ema.co - a cutting edge agentic ai startup headquartered in San Francisco, USA. Ema is funded by notable investors like Accel Partners, Prosus Ventures, Section 32, Wipro Ventures and a host of prominent Silicon Valley Angels.

A seasoned Silicon Valley operator, Surojit has successfully built and scaled multiple industry-leading products within two decades of his career. Prior to his current role, Surojit was Chief Product Officer at Coinbase where he led Product Management, Product Design, User Research, and Program Management and helped lead Coinbase through its 2021 IPO. Previously Surojit was Vice President and Head of Product for Google Shopping, scaling it into a multi-billion dollar business with hundreds of millions of users. Surojit was also a founding member of Google's Mobile Search Ads product, where he guided Google in its transition from desktop to mobile advertising, a move that now generates the majority of Google’s Ad revenue. Surojit has a BS in Computer Science from Indian Institute of Technology, Kharagpur and and MBA from MIT Sloan School of Management. He has 40 US patents to his name in distributed computing, payments, mobile advertising, and location based technologies. Surojit continues to be an active angel investor in technology companies across Silicon Valley and India.

‍

Waseem AlShikh is the Co-founder and CTO of Writer, the full-stack generative AI platform for enterprises. Drawing on his extensive technological expertise and a deep-seated drive for machine-learning, Waseem has been instrumental in revolutionizing the way businesses incorporate generative AI.Writer transforms work by delivering high-quality outputs that are accurate, compliant, and on-brand. Our platform consists of Writer-built LLMs, a Knowledge Graph that connects our models to your internal data sources, AI guardrails to enforce your rules, a flexible application layer, and an ecosystem of robust APIs and integrations.Our enterprise-grade platform doesn't use your data in model training and complies with SOC 2 Type II, HIPAA, PCI, GDPR, and Privacy Shield. Leading enterprises choose Writer, including Vanguard, Intuit, L'Oreal, Accenture, Dropbox, and Salesforce. Visit us at writer.com.

Waseem's exceptional technical skills and guidance have helped position Writer as a trailblazer in the field of generative AI. With his commitment to driving innovation and empowering businesses, Waseem continues to shape the future of generative AI and revolutionize the way enterprises operate.

Serial CTO and entrepreneur with deep expertise in Artificial intelligence including NLP/NLU.

Machine Learning

Fundraising

GDPR/CCPA/Data privacy

Team building and scaling orgs.

Dan Mason - Dan is a product and technology leader with unusually broad experience -- in 20+ years at companies like ESPN, Shutterstock, Viacom and a variety of startups and scaleups, he’s accumulated a wealth of knowledge about how digital product development works (and doesn’t), and is excited to apply those insights to reimagining the way teams and products work in the age of LLMs.   He is a former engineer turned product manager, and the teams he leads are highly cross-functional -- often including product, technology, design, PMO and data science. Dan leads Stride’s AI/LLM practice and is focused on thought leadership, code automation, and generative AI client engagements.

‍

Leader  in the AI space focused on financial services and insurance     Led multiple large transformation programs related to AI/GenAI development and deployment

Juan Santiago is the founder and CEO of Santex Group, a global technology company. Santex  was established in 1999 in San Diego, California, with the aim of solving human, business, and community challenges through technology. Operating in over 18 countries with approximately 500 team members across 100 cities, Santex proudly maintains a carbon-neutral footprint.

In 2012, Juan founded Incutex, the first ""Company Builder"" for tech startups in LATAM. Since 2017, he has led Kalei Ventures, a venture capital fund based in Silicon Valley focused on propelling Latin American talent toward global leadership.

Juan is known for his ability to anticipate the future needs of the businesses and ecosystems he partners with and for leading high-impact projects. He envisions the entrepreneur of the future as someone who places social responsibility and sustainability at the core of their business strategies. This, he believes, will make their products, projects, and decisions sources of significant economic, human, and environmental impact. Juan’s vision deeply influences all his endeavors. In addition to his role at Santex, he actively participates in numerous boards of institutions focused on economic, social, and public-private innovation, both locally and nationally, where he promotes this vision.

Demonstrating his commitment to social transformation, in 2022, Juan founded the Technology with Purpose Foundation.  The nonprofit organization is dedicated to addressing social issues by creating opportunities through technology, establishing inclusive spaces, and providing technical training to vulnerable populations. Some examples of the Foundation’s initiatives include reducing the gender gap and facilitating access to a network of specialized mentors.

Juan is actively engaged in intellectual forums that explore the profound and complex changes driven by the most disruptive technological revolution since the dawn of the internet: Artificial Intelligence. Recently, he co-founded AI League For Good, a think tank that brings together experts from diverse fields. Their objective is to assess the threats and opportunities AI presents and foster constructive discussions and debates on the ethical and moral implications of its applications in different contexts.

Juan believes that achieving great things requires taking risks, challenging the status quo, working intelligently, and choosing the right people for the tasks at hand. He has built a path that is not linear but rather an ecosystem of knowledge, people, diverse industries, and many questions.

Follow Juan on LinkedIn to learn more about his career and projects.

‍

Michael Carlson is  a seasoned product leader and entrepreneur with 18 years of experience in  leveraging emerging technologies. As Partner at Stride and Head of Stride  Labs, I lead a cross-functional team applying AI to accelerate software  product development. Previously, as VP Product at CreateMe, I pioneered  automated manufacturing systems for top global brands. I've earned many  accolades, including a Webby and the National Magazine Award for Digital  Media, and have built applications that were featured at Apple’s WWDC.  Physical products I designed have been featured on Vogue.com and in the  Collette boutique, Paris.

Mikey is the co-founder & COO of Lighty AI, a fast-growing generative AI startup revolutionizing the way we work and live by building agentic workflows that help us be more productive and creative. Before Lighty, Mikey was the Director of Product Strategy & Operations for Google AI and transformed the Research/AI organization to bring the best tech to all Google products and services.  Mikey previously led custom machine learning and AI programs at Google Cloud as the co-Founder of the Advanced Solutions Lab and prior to that was the GM of Google Fiber for Business.  Before Google, Mikey was a successful business leader for Danaher where, as a General Manager, she had responsibility for $300M+ P&L, delivering significant growth during that tenure.

Mikey earned bachelor’s degrees in economics and management science with an IT emphasis from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a master’s in business administration from Harvard Business School.  She lives in the Bay area with her husband and their three sons.

Pablo Di Si was appointed President and CEO, Volkswagen Group of America, and CEO, Volkswagen North American Region, effective Sept. 1, 2022. He is responsible for the Group‘s growth strategy in the U.S., with a portfolio of more than 25 EV models planned by 2030. He assumes leadership for the 20,000+ employees across the region who are helping seize the historic market opportunities across the U.S., Mexico, and Canada.

Previously, Pablo was Executive Chairman of Volkswagen South America Region with more than EUR 7 billion in sales and 20,000 employees. He led the Latin American market’s return to profitability for the first time in years, promoting the most significant launch of new products in its history tailored to the region’s needs. He led a restructuring focused on cultural transformation, creating new business models, accelerating digitalization, and improving client satisfaction. Volkswagen became the leader in the A0 SUV segment in Brazil, and the brand remains the largest producer and exporter of light vehicles in the country.

Pablo began his career at Volkswagen Group in 2014 as President and CEO of Volkswagen Argentina. He took over the position of President and CEO of Volkswagen Brazil and Latin America in 2017. Recently, he was appointed Executive Chairman of Volkswagen South American Region.

Previously, he held key positions in finance and business development both in U.S. and Brazil with the Fiat Chrysler Group, Kimberly-Clark, and Monsanto. A graduate of Harvard Business School (AMP 2011), he holds an M.B.A in International Management at the Thunderbird School of Management (2002) and a Degree in Accounting at Northwestern University (1996). Pablo also earned a B.A. in Business Administration with a major in Finance at the Loyola University of Chicago (1994).

‍

Richard Rabbat (MIT S.M. ‘98, Ph.D ‘01) is co-founder and CEO of Lighty AI, an agentic AI company based in Boston and San Francisco. Prior to Lighty, he was a Vice President of Product at Twitter leading the Platform team where he ran the Data Platform product team at Twitter, with focus on big data analytics and ML infrastructure. Richard was co-founder, CEO of Gfycat, the largest GIF platform (top 60 US website, top 250 worldwide). Gfycat was acquired by Snap, Inc.

Richard had led ad monetization at a late-stage startup Tango and grew revenue from $0 to $30M ARR. Richard was a General Manager at Zynga, focused on monetization and platform, where he built the first SaaS platform for gaming. Richard started his career in product management at Google, where he worked on the search team and led a company wide initiative to make the web faster.

Roeland Nusselder is the CEO and co-founder of Plumerai, with offices in London and Amsterdam. Plumerai offers a full AI solution for intelligent cameras, from People Detection and Vehicle Detection to Familiar Face & Stranger Identification and Multi-camera Re-identification. Plumerai’s AI software is deployed on millions of cameras in the field and can be found in products on the shelves of Walmart and Best Buy. Thanks to its capability to run AI on-device with unmatched accuracy it has won several major US-based home and enterprise security companies as customers like Chamberlain Group. Roeland has been researching energy-efficient AI for years, which then led him to found Plumerai. Plumerai’s investors include Tony Fadell, Principal at Build Collective, Dr. Hermann Hauser KBE, Founder of Arm, and LocalGlobe.

Shishir Mehrotra is CEO and Co-founder of Coda, the all-in-one platform for business, which combines documents, spreadsheets, and applications into a single canvas. Before founding Coda, he co-ran YouTube as the CPO / CTO, overseeing the YouTube product, UX and engineering. Over his 6 years tenure, he helped grow YouTube to the world's largest video destination, one of Google's largest and fastest growing businesses, and the platform of choice for a new generation of video creators. Prior to Google, Shishir spent 6 years at Microsoft and held leadership roles in the Windows, Office, and SQL Server divisions. Before Microsoft, Shishir was the founding CEO of Centrata. Shishir is an MIT graduate, and was awarded the Technology Review's TR35 (""35 innovators under 35"") award in 2012. He has been an advisor to Spotify since 2015 and joined the board in June 2017.

Ziad is Spotify’s VP of Personalization, leading product, engineering and research to provide the world’s most personalized audio experience. During his time at Spotify he has had a considerable impact on bringing flagship, machine learning powered products to hundreds of millions of users worldwide, including AI DJ, daylist, Wrapped, Discover Weekly, Daily Mix, Blend and many more.

Prior to Spotify, Ziad was the Product Lead for Google News, using artificial intelligence to find great reporting done by journalists around the globe. Prior to that, he was the founder of Nextly, a venture-backed curation platform used by top publishers around the world, an Entrepreneur in Residence and Venture Investor with Longworth Venture Partners, and Management Consultant with the Boston Consulting Group. Ziad holds a B.S. and an M.Eng in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science from MIT.

‍

Andy is the co-founder and CEO of PathAI. Andy earned his MD from Brown Medical School and completed residency and fellowship training in Anatomic Pathology and Molecular Genetic Pathology from Stanford University. He completed a PhD in Biomedical Informatics from Stanford University, where he developed one of the first machine-learning based systems for cancer pathology. He’s been certified by the American Board of Pathology in Anatomic Pathology and Molecular Genetic Pathology.

Prior to co-founding PathAI, he was on the faculty of Harvard Medical School in the Department of Pathology at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center. He has published over 110 papers in the fields of cancer biology, cancer pathology, and biomedical informatics.

‍

Elissa Welle is a freelance science journalist specializing in health and medical technology. Her work has appeared in Reuters, STAT News, Nature, among others. Before becoming a journalist, Elissa received a PhD in biomedical engineering with a speciality in brain-computer interfaces.

Jared Goodner has  a unique background in the development of neural networks within a healthcare  environment and leads Akido’s AI, product and engineering teams. Prior to  co-founding Akido, Jared co-founded the USC Digital Health Lab (D-Health).  His work with D-Health complemented his PhD (on leave) in biomedical  engineering and neural networks.

"Manolis Kellis is a professor of computer science and artificial intelligence at MIT, and leads the MIT Computational Biology Group at MIT CSAIL and the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard. His research

seeks to understand the mechanistic basis of human disease, to develop new therapeutics that reverse disease circuitry, and to enable personalized medicine, using AI and machine learning to integrate

genetics and genomics, single-cell epigenomics and transcriptomics, and high-throughput experiments, applied to Alzheimer's, Obesity, Cancer, Schizophrenia, Cardiovascular, and Immune Disorders. He

helped lead several large-scale genomics projects, including Roadmap Epigenomics, ENCODE, Genotype Tissue-Expression (GTEx), and Comparative Genomics projects. He has authored over 280 journal

publications cited more than 160,000 times. He received the US Presidential Award for Science and Engineering by Barack Obama, the Mendel Medal for Outstanding Achievements in Science, the NIH

Director’s Transformative Research Award, the Argo Science Award by the Hellenic President, the Boston Patent Law Association award, the NSF CAREER award, the Alfred P. Sloan Fellowship, the

Technology Review TR35 recognition, the AIT Niki Award, and the Sprowls award for the best Ph.D. thesis in computer science at MIT. He has obtained more than 20 multi-year grants from the NIH, and

his trainees hold faculty positions at Stanford, Harvard, CMU, McGill, Johns Hopkins, UCLA, and other top universities. He lived in Greece and France before moving to the US, and he studied and conducted

research at MIT, the Xerox Palo Alto Research Center, and the Cold Spring Harbor Lab. For more info, see: compbio.mit.edu"

‍

Maryam M. Shanechi is the Alexander A. Sawchuk Chair and Professor in Electrical and Computer Engineering, Computer Science, Biomedical Engineering, and Neuroscience Graduate Program at the University of Southern California (USC). She is also the Founding Director of the USC Center for Neurotechnology. She received her B.A.Sc. degree in Engineering Science from the University of Toronto, her S.M. and Ph.D. degrees in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science from MIT, and her postdoctoral training in Neural Engineering and Neuroscience at Harvard Medical School and UC Berkeley.

She conducts research at the intersection of engineering, AI, and neuroscience to develop closed-loop neurotechnology and brain-computer interfaces. She is the recipient of several awards including the NIH Director’s New Innovator Award, NSF CAREER Award, ONR Young Investigator Award, ASEE’s Curtis W. McGraw Research Award, MIT Technology Review’s Top 35 Innovators Under 35, Popular Science Brilliant 10, Science News SN10, One Mind Rising Star Award, and a DoD Multidisciplinary University Research Initiative (MURI) Award. She is a Fellow of the IEEE and was named a 2023 Blavatnik National Awards Finalist.

‍

Peter Yoo is a neuroscientist with expertise in Brain-Computer Interface (BCI), functional MRI and human motor systems. He serves as the Senior Director of R&D, Neuroscience & Algorithms, at Synchron NY. He is also an active member in the Vascular Bionics Laboratory at the University of Melbourne. Over the decade of developing endovascular BCIs, he characterized how the human dorsomedial cortical network coordinates motor function utilizing ultra-high-field fMRI, created unique method of targeting endovascular BCIs to specific cortical targets, and pioneered ways to decode neural information from signals recorded from within a blood vessel in real-time. Leveraging his experience and skills, he was an integral member of the team who executed the world’s only first-in-human clinical trial and FDA early-feasibility-study of endovascular BCIs. He continues to make progress in commercializing minimally invasive endovascular neurotechnology by heading the neuroscientific, machine learning and data science capability of Synchron, directly managing a team of world-class PhD scientists and engineers from top ranking universities. He also supervises the next generation of bright scientists and engineers at the University of Melbourne.

Prashant Samant  believes in the power of social enterprise and leads the Akido Labs team  towards its vision for a transformed healthcare experience for all. Over his  career, Prashant has worked with some of the world’s most notable private,  public, and non-profit organizations, including Peugeot, Orange S.A.,  Stanford University, Roshan Telecom, Liquidnet and Doctors without Borders.  Along with his Akido co-founders, Prashant founded the USC Digital Health  Lab, developing innovative tech solutions for some of Los Angeles’ most  pressing issues in public health, including addressing the homelessness crisis.

Sadegh Salehi is a Principal Machine Learning Scientist at Overjet, a dental AI platform that lets dental professionals to put patients first and operate efficiently. At Overjet, Sadegh leads the advanced development of foundational models for dental X-ray, CBCT, and dental note processing. Previously, he served as a Staff Scientist at Hyperfine, where he led the development of AI-based products for low-field MRI reconstruction and processing.

Throughout his career, Sadegh has played a key role in advancing AI-driven medical image processing, contributing to the successful FDA clearance of five AI-based medical devices. During his PhD at Northeastern University, he worked as a Research Associate with the IMAGINE group at Boston Children's Hospital, Harvard Medical School, where he developed novel AI methods for real-time processing of fetal MRI.

‍

Sam Sinai, PhD, is a co-founder and head of machine learning at Dyno Therapeutics, a gene therapy company founded in 2018 and based in Watertown, MA. Dyno is a pioneer in solving some of the most challenging problems in gene therapy using artificial intelligence, which could help millions of people with untreatable genetic or acquired illnesses. Sam developed the underpinnings of the AI algorithms that Dyno uses to design therapeutic viruses, which were published in leading journals Science and Nature Biotechnology as well as leading AI conferences. Since its founding, Dyno has won Xconomy startup of the year in 2020, Endpoints promising startup in 2021,  NEVY Emerging company of the year in 2022, as well as making into Forbes' list of best startup employers in 2022.  In 2021, Dyno raised a $100 million series A round and currently employs more than 100 people across North America.

Dyno has so far reached partnership deals worth up to billions of dollars, with global brands such as Roche and Astellas, among others. Before Dyno, Sam received his PhD in Mathematical and Computational Biology from Harvard in 2019, supervised by scientists Martin A. Nowak and George M. Church. Sam received a B.Sc. and M. Eng. from MIT in computer science and AI. He is a co-author on more than 20 scientific publications and holds co-inventorship in several patents. He has also written publicly on issues concerning science, medicine, immigration in general publications such as Slate, Forbes, and Quartz. Sam immigrated from Iran, where he grew up.

‍

Professor Thomas Oxley MBBS BMedSc FRACP PhD is a vascular and interventional neurologist and world expert in brain computer interfaces. Dr Oxley is the founding CEO of Synchron, a neurotechnology company based in New York City, having raised over US$145M in capital. Synchron is a clinical stage company developing an endovascular implantable brain computer interface, StentrodeTM. The Synchron BCI is a minimally invasive brain implant for people with debilitating medical illnesses designed to restore autonomy by reconnecting them online in ways that can dramatically improve their lives.

He is a Clinical Instructor, Attending in the Department of Neurosurgery, Mount Sinai Hospital, New York City. Dr Oxley has performed over 1600 endovascular neurosurgical procedures, including cerebral aneurysm coiling and clot retrievals in acute stroke. Dr Oxley has published over 120 internationally peer reviewed articles in journals including JAMA Neurology, Nature Biotechnology, Nature Biomedical Engineering, New England Journal of Medicine and The Lancet. He has over 100 patents filed. He is also Professor of Medicine, University of Melbourne, Australia.

In 2023, Dr Oxley and Synchron completed enrollment in an FDA-approved clinical trial on the Stentrode motor neuroprosthesis that is paving the way towards first FDA marketing approval for an implanted brain computer interface, bringing the total number of patients implanted with the system to 10 worldwide.

Dr. Julie Pullen is an oceanographer and meteorologist working on climate resilience and climate solutions. Her expertise spans climate, weather and water with a particular focus on earth system prediction, AI and climate tech. Currently founding Partner and Chief Scientist with Propeller Ventures, an ocean climate solutions VC fund, she previously was on the leadership team of Jupiter Intelligence, an early climate risk analytics startup.

While an ocean engineering professor at Stevens Institute of Technology for a decade, she held a joint appointment with the Department of Energy’s Environmental and Climate Sciences division and was a Fulbright Visiting Professor in the Philippines. She is a Fellow of the Explorers Club for her scientific exploration achievements.

A former oceanographer with the Navy, she was a Science Fellow at Stanford’s Center for International Security and Cooperation and led the Department of Homeland Security’s National Maritime Security Center. Dr. Pullen serves on the U.S. Climate Security Roundtable.

Dr. Pullen was a member of the National Academy of Sciences committee peer-reviewing the two most recent National Climate Assessments. She was a chapter co-author of the New York City Panel on Climate Change report. She served on the leadership councils of both the American Meteorological Society and The Oceanography Society, by election, and also co-chaired their largest meetings.

Dr. Pullen holds a Ph.D. in physical oceanography from Oregon State University and a master’s degree in applied mathematics/nonlinear dynamics from the University of Arizona. The first undergraduate intern at the Santa Fe Institute, she later worked at the Center for Nonlinear Studies at Los Alamos National Laboratory.

‍

Himanshu Gupta is the CEO and co-founder of ClimateAi- a series-B company that uses AI to help companies and countries adapt their food and water supply chains to climate change. The company's platform was listed in TIME as one of America’s Top GreenTech Companies in 2024 and one of  the Best Innovations for 2022, along with OpenAi and others. He has previously worked with Vice President Al Gore and Lord Nicholas Stern, and was the lead emission modeler for India with contributions to the Paris Discussions. Himanshu was listed in Tech Insider's TOP 100 people in Artificial Intelligence globally.

Himanshu's thought leadership has been published by FT, CNN, WSJ, Forbes, BBC, Reuters, and Stanford Social Innovation Review, among 20+ other publications. He has co-authored a book on the low-carbon economy for India and is an MBA/MS graduate of Stanford University School of Business and Engineering.

Jim Collins is the Termeer Professor of Medical Engineering & Science and Professor of Biological Engineering at MIT, as well as a Member of the Harvard-MIT Health Sciences & Technology Faculty. He is also a Core Founding Faculty member of the Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering at Harvard University, and an Institute Member of the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard. He is one of the founders of the field of synthetic biology, and his research group is currently focused on using synthetic biology to create next-generation diagnostics and therapeutics. Professor Collins' patented technologieshave been licensed by over 25 biotech, pharma and medical devices companies, and he has co-founded a number of companies, including Senti Biosciences, Sherlock Biosciences and Cellarity, as well as Phare Bio, a non-profit focused on AI-driven antibiotic discovery.

He has received numerous awards and honors, including a MacArthur ""Genius"" Award and the Dickson Prize in Medicine, and he is an elected member of all three national academies - the National Academy of Sciences, the National Academy of Engineering, and the National Academy of Medicine.

Dr. Qichao Hu (Ph.D.) is the founder and CEO of SES AI, a global leader in Lithium Metal (Li-Metal) battery technology that is bringing the next generation of high energy density battery technology safely to the world, powering the future of transportation on land and in the air. SES AI also harness AI to accelerate the pace of material discovery and improve EV safety. Since founding SES AI in the basement of MIT over a decade ago, Qichao has led the company to become the first in the world to introduce 100Ah Li-Metal cells and the first to enter automotive A-sample and B-sample joint development agreements with major OEMs. Under Qichao’s leadership, SES AI is also spearheading an AI-powered transformation across the company to drive greater progress in material development, cell manufacturing quality, battery health monitoring and incident prediction, supply chain and sustainability management, aspiring to build “God-like” AI that will drive battery innovation for electric transportation. Today SES AI is headquartered in Boston with operations in Shanghai and Seoul. The company has strategic partnerships with top global automakers, including General Motors, Hyundai, and Honda and major financial investors such as SK and Temasek. Qichao has been recognized by Forbes as part of its distinguished “30 under 30” rankings along with MIT Technology Review’s Innovators Under 35 list. He holds a Ph.D. in Applied Physics from Harvard University and a Bachelor of Science degree in Physics from MIT.

Avishan  Bodjnoud stands at the forefront of responsible AI, and data analytics as the  Chief of the Information Management Unit at the United Nations Departments of  Political and Peacebuilding Affairs and Peace Operations. Her co-lead role in  the UN Secretary-General's data strategy underscores her extensive expertise  in enterprise data management. With more than thirteen years of experience in  data utilization and emerging technologies within the UN’s peace and security  pillar, Avishan has been instrumental in initiatives such as peacekeeping  digital transformation, enhancing peacekeeping situational awareness program,  data-informed evaluations, and knowledge management. Her previous work at the  UN Department of Safety and Security, managing global security databases,  showcases her skillful application of data and technology to further the UN's  peace and security agenda. Her efforts in implementation of the UN  Secretary-General’s vision for UN 2.0, reflecting her deep commitment to  using data and digital innovation to achieve the organization’s objectives.      When growing up in Tehran during the Iran-Iraq war, Avishan witnessed  firsthand the positive impact of the United Nations Security Council  resolution that called for an immediate ceasefire. From then on, she dreamed  of being part of this Mecca of peace and doing her part to harmonize  multilateralism around the globe.

Avishan holds an MS in Information Management Engineering, an MA in Middle  Eastern Studies, and a BS in Computer Software Engineering. Her experience as  an impact fellow at Singularity University at NASA Ames Research Center in  California's Silicon Valley highlights her dedication to technological  innovation for global impact. As a recognized leader in the UN's digital  transformation and a nominated STEM role model by the United Nations Office  of Information Communication Technology, Avishan is a strong advocate for  diversity in ICT.

Dilawar Syed comes to SBA from the State Department where he championed American businesses as Special Representative for Commercial & Business Affairs.  As the State Department’s top commercial diplomat, Deputy Administrator Syed advocated for U.S. companies to compete and win abroad and helped ensure U.S. competitiveness in markets across the globe.  In this role, he mobilized the private sector to support the people of Ukraine in the wake of Russia’s invasion and advocated for commercial deals in strategic sectors such as aviation and defense, energy, and technology.

Before joining the Biden Administration, Syed was CEO at Lumiata, an AI healthcare company focused on reducing healthcare costs and improving patient outcomes.  Previously, Syed was President at the software company Freshworks. Earlier in his career, Syed oversaw business operations for Yahoo!’s platforms and infrastructure and was a product manager at Siebel Systems and SAP.

Dilawar Syed has driven civic efforts at the federal, state, and local level focusing on economic growth and entrepreneurship.  As the founding Chair of the California Entrepreneurship Task Force with the Governor’s Office of Business and Economic Development, Syed promoted inclusive entrepreneurship.  He served on President Obama’s White House Commission on Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders (AAPIs) and chaired the White House Initiative on AAPIs’ Economic Growth Committee.  In that role, Syed led the administration’s engagement with small businesses across the U.S. after the passage of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009.  In 2020, Syed was tapped by San Jose, California Mayor Sam Liccardo to help lead Silicon Valley’s pandemic economic recovery as a member of the Silicon Valley Recovery Roundtable.

Syed holds an M.B.A. from The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania and earned a B.A. in Economics and Computer Science from The University of Texas at Austin.

‍

Helena Fu is the Director of the Office of Critical and Emerging Technologies. She previously served as Director for Technology and National Security at the White House National Security Council, where she was responsible for advancing strategic technology cooperation with allies and partners. She has previously served as Director of International Science and Technology Cooperation and Trusted Research for the Office of Science at the Department of Energy, and at the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, where she was responsible for leading development of research security policy, culminating in National Security Presidential Memorandum on United States Government-Supported Research and Development National Security Policy (NSPM-33). From 2012-2018 Helena served at the U.S. Embassy in Beijing, first as a Deputy Director and later as Energy Attaché and Director of the Department of Energy China Office, where she was responsible for leading a team to advance U.S. security and economic interests in energy, science and technology, and nuclear security and nonproliferation. Before government service, Helena managed award-winning environmental planning projects across Asia at AECOM, and supported Federal and State environmental, energy, and transportation policy and programs at ICF International. Helena holds a Master’s degree in Environmental and Natural Resource Policy from the Harvard Kennedy School and a B.S. in Urban Studies and Planning from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Janet Haven is the executive director of Data & Society. She has worked at the intersection of technology policy, governance, and accountability for more than twenty years, both domestically and internationally. Her career has spanned technology start-ups, philanthropic institutions, non-profit organizations and government roles in leadership and board capacities. Janet is a member of the National Artificial Intelligence Advisory Committee (NAIAC), which advises the president on a range of issues related to artificial intelligence.

She writes and speaks regularly on matters related to technology and society, federal AI research and development, and AI governance and policy. Before joining Data & Society, Janet spent more than a decade at the Open Society Foundations leading a global grantmaking program on technology, accountability, and human rights. She holds an MA from the University of Virginia and a BA from Amherst College.

Jeff Alstott is the founding director of the Center for Technology and Security Policy (TASP), senior information scientist and professor of policy analysis at RAND. He is an expert at the National Science Foundation, where he directs a program on assessing and predicting R&D investment returns. His government service includes time at the White House as Assistant Director for Technology Competition and Risks at the Office of Science and Technology Policy and Director for Technology and National Security at the National Security Council, as well as in the Intelligence Community as a program manager at IARPA, with a portfolio that included artificial intelligence, analytic methods, biosecurity, and science and technology forecasting. He has worked in academia for the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Singapore University of Technology and Design, the World Bank, and the University of Chicago. Alstott's published research covers animal behavior, computational neuroscience, complex networks, design science, statistical methods, and science and technology forecasting. He obtained his doctorate studying complex networks at the University of Cambridge, and his MBA and bachelor's degrees from Indiana University.

‍

Dr. Jennifer Rochlis has spent her career bridging science, technology, and the human element, striving to bring this synergistic approach to her clients.  She is the co-founder, President and CEO of Advancing Frontiers, a consulting company providing spaceflight integration services.  Prior to that she was the Vice President for Products and Solution Architecture at Teledyne FLIR, where she focused on uncrewed systems for aerospace and defense, integrating advanced technologies such as Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning to enhance overall performance and human-machine interactions. During her 20 years at NASA, she held roles including Division Chief in the Human Health and Performance Directorate, Branch Chief in the Engineering Directorate, and Associate Director Human Resources. She received her B.A. in Physics at Mount Holyoke College, her M.S. and Ph.D. in Aeronautics and Astronautics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

She has authored numerous publications and book chapters in the areas of human factors engineering, human-machine teaming, automation and telerobotics, bioastronautics, and human systems integration - including the agency-wide NASA Human Systems Integration Practitioner’s Guide.  With 15 years of non-profit board and advisory experience, she is also a STEM career mentor, and an active speaker in the areas of human-centered design, leadership and the integration of humans with emerging technologies.

Dr. Rochlis is also an entrepreneur running her own coaching company that provides integrative coaching for individuals and teams, guiding them toward both personal and professional advancement.

‍

Joseph B. Keller is a neuroscientist-turned-policy researcher with experience across academia, government, and civil society. His research interests encompass emerging technologies and their policy implications for governance, security, and the environment. Most recently, he served as a visiting fellow at the Brookings Institution, affiliated with the AI & Emerging Technology Initiative. Prior to this, Joseph held positions as a senior director of congressional and federal relations for the American Psychological Association, as a AAAS Science and Technology Policy Fellow at the National Science Foundation, and as an executive search consultant in the civic sector. He earned a bachelor's degree from the University of Maryland, Baltimore County, a master's degree from Boston University, and a doctorate in cognitive science from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and is an adjunct faculty member at Georgetown University where he co-leads a class he developed on the global governance of AI.

Arun Saigal is the CEO and Co-Founder of Thunkable, the no-code platform to build powerful, native mobile apps. Thunkable has over 4m users who have built over 10m apps in 184 countries. Named to Forbes 30 Under 30, Arun is an established leader and visionary in the no-code and mobile development space. He holds an S.B. and M.Eng from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and has held a variety of leading roles at technology companies, including Quizlet, Khan Academy, and Google. Thunkable has raised over $40M to date from leading investors such as Owl Ventures, Lightspeed, NEA, SV Angel, PJC and others.In his free time, Arun practices his musical talents; playing viola, mridangam, beatboxing, and rapping. He also conducts orchestras and plays in several San Francisco-based music groups.

-

Mohamed Salah is a seasoned technology executive with over 20 years of experience. He is currently the CTO of American Financing, a national mortgage lending bank, driving their technology innovation and transformation strategy. Prior to joining American Financing, Mohamed was the CTO of Dentsu Creative group, and held various leadership positions in the management consulting and digital agencies space

Songyee Yoon is a visionary leader, and investor and author in the AI and gamingindustry, with over 20 years of experience in developing and executing innovativestrategies for global online game companies. After graduating from the Korea AdvancedInstitute of Science and Technology, Songyee went on to earn her Ph.D. from MIT inComputational Neuroscience. Her strong belief in the concept of “play” as a crucible forinnovation eventually led her to NCSOFT, a leading global video game developer andpublisher, where she served as president and chief strategy officer. In this role, she ledthe AI transformation of the company, applying AI for game development and variousaspects of business operations. She also oversaw the company's growth from a 350-person company to a global organization across seven countries in Asia, Europe, andNorth America, driving strategic initiatives in monetization, marketing, branding,business development, licensing, ESG, and education. Songyee brings a unique lens tobridging countries’ approaches to technology and ethics and is an involved figure in theinternational business community.

While a member of South Korea’s PresidentialAdvisory Council for Science and Technology, Songyee served under two presidents.She is a member of the MIT Corporation and served as an advisory board member ofthe Center for Asia Pacific Policy, where she continued to explore social impacts of AI,equity and ethical sides of technology. She also serves on the board of trustees for theCarnegie Endowment for International Peace and the Asian Art Museum. She wasnamed a Young Global Leader by the World Economic Forum, elected member of theNational Academy of Engineering of Korea, and one of the 50 Women to Watch inBusiness by the Wall Street Journal. Songyee’s latest book, Push Play, explores thesignificance of play on innovation, drawing lessons from games, medicine, humanresources and other industries.

Sudhanshu is pursuing his MBA at Harvard Business School. Previously, he studied CS at MIT, worked as a PM at Uber, and as an early-stage investor at Sequoia Capital India

Whitney T. Espich was named CEO of the MIT Alumni Association in August 2017.

Prior to this role, she served as Executive Director of Communications, Events, and Donor Relations in MIT's Resource Development group, playing a significant role in launching the public phase of the MIT Campaign for a Better World. Before joining MIT, Whitney worked in Harvard University’s Central Alumni Affairs and Development Office, first as Director of University Development Communications Initiatives and then as Senior Director of Strategic Marketing and Communications. Earlier in her career, she held communications and management positions at Harvard’s Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study, Citigate Cunningham, the Thomas Jefferson Foundation (Monticello), and Mary Baldwin College.

Whitney serves on the board of the Council of Alumni Association Executives (CAAE). Originally from Virginia, Whitney holds a BA from Indiana University-Bloomington, an M.A. from the University of Virginia, and an M.Phil. from St. Andrews University in Scotland.

‍