26.1 AI Podcast

International tour continues with a stop in Singapore with a Korean managing partner of a venture fund subsidiary of a Japanese ecommerce and fintech giant. Our 21st episode of our 2nd season is your most globalized episode ever. Saemin Ahn is an investor in prior guest Kenny Daniel's startup Algorithmia. For AI founders, here's a lesson on making sure your SEO is well done. Saemin contacted Kenny and his fellow founder Diego Oppenheimer through the Algorithmia website's contact form. Going seven years strong since our guest founded Rakuten Ventures, learn about the great AI companies in the portfolio. AI startup founders, learn what Rakuten Ventures is looking for in AI investments this year. Venture general partners, learn how Rakuten Ventures's managing partner closes deals without meeting 65% of their founders before writing first checks. 

Our 26.1 AI Podcast's global tour continues with a visit with Chris Loy founder of London startup Datasine. Datasine applies machine learning to help companies talk with their customers more meaningfully and at scale. From Datasine's website, "We use machine learning, psychology and cutting edge tech to understand people and the content that appeals to them, and to help our users revolutionise how they engage with their customers at massive scale."

Chris shares his personal journey of starting out at Oxford as a student of general physics, moving later as part of a combined bachelors and masters program into astrophysics and particle physics. After working in general programming jobs, Chris started the transition to becoming an expert in machine learning with a degree from University College London with a MSc degree in machine learning.

Brian and Don host Just One Giant Lab founder Leo Blondel. JOGL melds open source software practices with scientific research. Members can treat their research projects like software engineers commit code. Also community spin up groups for research projects like an OpenCovid19 group. From the JOGL website, "[This is] a JOGL program that develops open-source and low-cost tools and methodologies that are safe and easy to use in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. The OpenCovid19 program is powered by a global community of 4000+ volunteers and experts who create solutions to better prevent, detect, and treat COVID-19, and to help forecast the pandemic’s evolution." Brian and Don learn from Leo that Montpellier is France's tech capital. The city is home to many of America's tech giants' offices. 

Our 30th episode is our first international exploration visiting with Phaze Ventures's Managing Partner Masoud Al -- Rawahi. Headquartered in Muscat, Oman, Masoud and his partners are building up a tech ecosystem from scratch. They are determined to chart the path forward for an economy tethered solidly to the current carbon economy. Learn about the bits and bots opportunities for making traditional oil business cleaner. One pain point technologists are solving is a better solution for handling wastewater. Phaze Ventures and Masoud have secured a partnership with Oman's largest firm and employer, Petroleum Development Oman. Through this partnership, entrepreneurs gain access to a gusher of data flowing from devices connected to delivering carbon products to the world. Oman invites the world's innovators to investigate the blue ocean opportunities available in a market catching up to the world's more developed startup centers. 

Dr. Beverly Wright talks about how she stays connected to Universities and Institutes. She explains how Corporate America can connect better with schools and activate the students for purposes of gaining insight into organization's data and promoting recruiting brand awareness amongst students. Dr. Wright brings over twenty years of research, analytics, and insights experience from corporate, consulting and academia.  

Don Miner speaks candidly about his AI firm being acquired by 110k headcount Atos. He joins our host Brian Ray as a colleague. Dr. Miner was an early adopter of big data and grew into the AI space. Today, he continues to innovate yet still finds time to pay it forward, teaching his passion topics at University of Maryland, Baltimore County.