How to Build your AI Startup
Many CMU alumni work at the cutting edge of AI and are intrigued with building an AI Startup. As part of the CMU T&E Startup School event series, this panel discussion provides a future founder a guide to successfully building your AI-based startup.
Agenda:
5:00-6:00 pm PDT: Panel Discussion + Q&A
We will explore few key themes on building your AI startup and will be excited to address questions from the Audience!
Experience starting an AI-based startup the first time and the journey!
Differences between building a Software 1.0 & Software 2.0 (AI-based) startup
Founder-Market Fit: Finding the right opportunity for your AI Startup
Solving the data challenge for AI-based startups
Advice to founders based on what the startups could have done better
About the Panel Speakers:
Ashutosh Saxena, (https://www.linkedin.com/in/saxenaashutosh/) is the Founder & CEO of Caspar.AI. Prior to founding Caspar.AI, Ash co-founded Katapult, which was listed publicly on NASDAQ this year. Previously, he was a Microsoft Faculty Fellow, the Founder & Director of the RoboBrain project at Stanford, Assistant Professor of CS at Cornell, Chief Scientist at Holopad, Co-founder & CTO of ZunaVision. He holds a Ph.D. in Machine Learning from Stanford, advised by Professor Andrew Ng.
Prasad Chalasani, (https://www.linkedin.com/in/pchalasani/) is the Co-Founder & CEO of XaiPient. Prior to co-founding Xaipient, he was a Chief Scientist at MediaMath and Senior Research Director at Yahoo! Labs. Previously, he was a Quantitative Strategist and Vice President at Goldman Sachs, Portfolio Manager at WorldQuant, Quant Analyst at HBK Investments, and a Postdoc at Los Alamos National Laboratory. Prasad holds a Ph.D. in Computer Science with a focus on Machine Learning from Carnegie Mellon.
The Panel Discussion will be moderated by:
Jason Franklin Ph.D., (https://www.linkedin.com/in/jason-franklin/) is the CEO & Founding Managing Director of WV Ventures, a $100M VC joint venture between Advocate Aurora Health, Foxconn, Johnson Controls, and Northwestern Mutual. Dr. Franklin is an award-winning computer scientist and holds the 2012 Allen Newell Award (named after one of Artificial Intelligence’s founding fathers), a highly-cited researcher (2k+, H:10), co-inventor of FAWN (flash-storage array technology), and deep tech entrepreneur turned venture capitalist. He invests in companies building the future of enterprise technology. Prior to his career in venture capital, Dr. Franklin worked as a research scientist and visiting lecturer in the Computer Science Department at Stanford University where he co-led a DARPA-sponsored cyber-security research project with $4MM in funding. He co-founded and served as CEO of a mobile security startup, Stamp Labs, that commercialized research developed while at Stanford in conjunction with two Stanford professors. He received a Ph.D. in Computer Science from Carnegie Mellon University where he published more than a dozen papers in top tier conferences, was awarded multiple best paper awards and top fellowships including the DHS Fellowship and the NSF Graduate Fellowship, received more than two thousand peer citations, and co-invented technology that led to the commercialization of enterprise-grade flash storage clusters and contributed to the creation of billions of dollars of enterprise value including numerous successful startups. He graduated with top honors with a double major in Computer Science and Mathematics and a minor in business from the University of Wisconsin-Madison.