Accelerate Into The Future

Azita Arvani is a strategic leader who pushes for innovation-led growth that delivers customer value. Arvani is recognized for her deployment of the latest digital technologies, such as cloud, AI, 5G, IoT, and AR/VR, to create new markets and revenue streams, develop new products and capabilities, forge partnerships, and build global teams. She has deep experience in both Fortune 500 companies and startups. She is an evangelist of true digital transformation.

Arvani is on the Board of Directors of the Tennant Company (NYSE: TNC) with a focus on innovation agenda and serves on the Compensation and Governance Committees. Previously, she was Head of Innovation Partner & Venture Management at Nokia, where she led the company’s leading-edge global team to leverage external innovation for driving growth and optimizing internal R&D serving Nokia business groups and internal functions.

Azita is also the founder of Arvani Group Strategy Consulting, where she worked in close collaboration with global companies, startups, and investors, helping create profitable businesses.

Secretary Robert O. Work is the Distinguished Senior Fellow for Defense and National Security at the Center for a New American Security and the owner of TeamWork, LLC, which specializes in national security affairs and the future of warfare.

Secretary Work previously served as the Deputy Secretary of Defense, where he was responsible for overseeing the day-to-day business of the Pentagon and developing the Department’s $600 billion defense program. He is widely credited for his work with leaders in the Department and the intelligence community on the “Third Offset Strategy,” which aimed to restore U.S. conventional overmatch over its strategic rivals and adversaries. He was twice awarded the DoD’s Distinguished Public Service Award, and has also received the National Intelligence Distinguished Public Service Award, and the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Joint Distinguished Civilian Service Award.

Prior to serving as Deputy Secretary, Secretary Work spent one year as CEO of the CNAS, after serving as Undersecretary of the Navy from 2009–2013 in the first Obama administration. He was twice awarded the Department of the Navy’s Distinguished Civilian Service Award.

Amir Husain is a serial entrepreneur, inventor, and author based in Austin, Texas. He was a finalist for the Ernst & Young Entrepreneur Of The Year 2018 Award, has been named Austin’s Top Technology Entrepreneur of the Year, and received the Austin Under 40 Technology and Science Award. Husain is the founder and CEO of SparkCognition, an award-winning artificial intelligence company.

Since its founding in 2013, SparkCognition has received widespread recognition, including the 2017 CNBC Disruptor 50, being named the fastest-growing company in Central Texas by Austin Business Journal in 2017, and ranking on the CB Insights AI 100 list in both 2017 and 2018.

Husain is a prolific inventor with 27 U.S. patents awarded and over 40 pending applications. His work has been featured in outlets such as Foreign Policy, Fox Business News, and Proceedings from the U.S. Naval Institute. His book “The Sentient Machine: The Coming Age of Artificial Intelligence” was published in 2017.

Husain served as a founding member of the Board of Advisors for IBM Watson and serves on the Board of Advisors for The University of Texas at Austin Department of Computer Science. He is also a member of the Council on Foreign Relations and the Center for a New American Security Task Force on Artificial Intelligence and National Security.

Admiral Inman served in the U.S. Navy from November 1951 to July 1982, when he retired with the permanent rank of Admiral. While on active duty he served as Director of Naval Intelligence, Vice Director of the Defense Intelligence Agency, Director of the National Security Agency, and Deputy Director of Central Intelligence. After retirement from the Navy, he was Chairman and CEO of the Microelectronics and Computer Technology Corporation (MCC) in Austin, Texas for four years. He was also Chairman, President, and CEO of Westmark Systems, Inc., a privately-owned electronics industry holding company, for three years. Admiral Inman also served as Chairman of the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas from 1987 through 1990.

Admiral Inman’s primary business activity since 1990 has been investing in startup technology companies. He is a Managing Director of Limestone Capital Advisors and serves as a Trustee of the California Institute of Technology. He is an elected Fellow of the National Academy of Public Administration. Admiral Inman has also held a number of high-level positions in academia, and holds honorary Doctoral degrees from the Claremont Graduate University, the National Intelligence University, and Southwestern University.

Dr. Clay Johnston is the inaugural Dean of Dell Medical School and Vice President for Medical Affairs at The University of Texas at Austin. His vision is to create a new model for academic medicine that accelerates innovation to improve health and reduce inefficiencies in health care. That includes building a vital, inclusive health ecosystem to support new and innovative models of education, care, research, and community impact—all with a focus on improving health locally as a model for accelerating change nationally. He is also a neurologist, specializing in stroke care and research.

Previously, Dr. Johnston was Associate Vice Chancellor for Research at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF). He also directed the Clinical and Translational Science Institute and founded the UCSF Center for Healthcare Value to engage faculty and trainees in improving the quality of care while also lowering costs.

Dr. Johnston has authored more than 300 publications in scientific journals and has won several national awards for his research and teaching. In particular, he has published extensively on the prevention and treatment of stroke and transient ischemic attack.

Peter Warren Singer is Strategist at New America and an editor at Popular Science magazine. He has been named by the Smithsonian as one of the nation’s 100 leading innovators, by Defense News as one of the 100 most influential people in defense issues, by Foreign Policy to their Top 100 Global Thinkers List, as an official “Mad Scientist” for the U.S. Army’s Training and Doctrine Command, and by Onalytica social media data analysis as one of the most influential voices in the world on cybersecurity and robotics.

Singer’s award-winning books include Corporate Warriors: The Rise of the Privatized Military Industry, Children at War, Wired for War: The Robotics Revolution and Conflict in the 21st Century, Cybersecurity and Cyberwar: What Everyone Needs to Know, and Ghost Fleet: A Novel of the Next World War. His latest book is LikeWar, which explores how social media interacts with war and politics.

His past work includes serving at the Office of the Secretary of Defense, Harvard University, and as the founding director of the Center for 21st Century Security and Intelligence at Brookings.

Charles Toups leads Boeing’s Disruptive Computing & Networks organization, is developing computing and communications solutions for advanced commercial and government aerospace applications. To accomplish this, Toups leverages core technologies in quantum communications, computing and sensing, neuromorphic brain-inspired processing, high-performance computing, and advanced networking.

Toups’s organization works closely with Boeing Research & Technology, Information Technology & Data Analytics, Boeing HorizonX, the company’s business units, Hughes Research Laboratory, university research partners, government research institutions, and other companies on research development projects involving secure communications, artificial intelligence, and complex system optimization.

Previously, Toups led Boeing Research & Technology, the company’s advanced central research and development unit, as well as Boeing’s Development Program Excellence enterprise initiative to drive productivity and growth. Toups has held a variety of engineering and business management roles of increasing responsibility during his career, including leading the Network and Tactical Systems division in Boeing’s Defense, Space & Security business unit.

As the CEO and Publisher of GigaOm, Reese leads the company in their mission to help business leaders understand the implications of emerging technologies and their impacts on business, media, and society. Both a futurist and optimist, Byron Reese believes we are approaching a Fourth Age for humanity that promises to be infinitely better than anything we have seen before.

Reese’s newest book, “The Fourth Age: Smart Robots, Conscious Computers, and the Future of Humanity,” is described as “entertaining and engaging” by the New York Times, was named this year on JP Morgan’s Summer Reading List and is a Gary’s Book Club pick for CES 2019. Reese also produces and hosts GigaOm’s podcasts Voices in AI and The AI Minute and is also the author of “Infinite Progress: How Technology and the Internet Will End Ignorance, Disease, Hunger, Poverty, and War.” As a lifelong entrepreneur with multiple IPOs and successful exits under his belt, Byron also frequently speaks to business audiences on how to excel in the world of tomorrow, and how to deploy technology successfully.

Jamie Montgomery is a Founder and Managing Director of March Capital Partners. Previously, he was the founder and Chief Executive Officer of Montgomery & Co., a well-known Los Angeles-based investment bank where he advised and financed hundreds of leading technology companies over a 25-year period. He is the founder of The Montgomery Summit, an annual conference that attracts over 1,000 global entrepreneurs, investors, and corporate executives to Santa Monica. Montgomery currently serves on the Board of Directors of Descartes Labs and Foghorn and is a Board Observer at Crowdstrike, Forter, and Earnin. Montgomery also had two successful exits at March Capital: the IPO of RUBI and the sale of Telesign to BICS.

Montgomery focuses on identifying disruptive technology companies and providing capital at a critical inflection point. In addition to serving on the Advisory Board of the Rady School of Business at the University of California San Diego, he actively supports programs for innovation and entrepreneurship at the University of California San Diego, Claremont McKenna College, the University of Southern California, and Chapman University.

Refik Anadol (b. 1985, Istanbul, Turkey) is a media artist, director, and pioneer in the aesthetics of machine intelligence. His body of work locates creativity at the intersection of humans and machines. In taking the data that flows around us as his primary material and the neural network of a computerized mind as his collaborator, Anadol paints with a thinking brush, offering us radical visualizations of our digitized memories and expanding the possibilities of architecture, narrative, and the body in motion. Anadol’s site-specific parametric data sculptures, live audio/visual performances, and immersive installations take many forms, while offering a dramatic rethinking of the physical world, our relationship to time and space, and the creative potential of machines.

Dr. Heather Berlin is a cognitive neuroscientist and Professor of Psychiatry at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai. She explores the neural basis of impulsive and compulsive psychiatric and neurological disorders with the aim of developing novel treatments. She is also interested in the brain basis of consciousness, dynamic unconscious processes, and creativity.

Dr. Berlin is passionate about science communication and education. She hosts “Startalk All-Stars” with Neil DeGrasse Tyson, and hosted the PBS series “Science Goes to the Movies,” and the Discovery Channel series “Superhuman Showdown.” She is also a committee member of the National Academy of Sciences’ Science and Entertainment Exchange, and The New York Times series “TimesTalks.” She has made numerous media appearances including on the BBC, History Channel, Netflix, National Geographic, and TEDx, and was featured in the documentary film “Bill Nye: Science Guy.”

Ramachander has over 25 years of experience in software, big data analytics, management consulting, ICT, and the Green Economy, and has spent the last 12 years building and implementing software solutions in energy efficiency, environmental sustainability, and carbon reduction.

In his role as Chief Digital Officer of Hitachi Europe, Ramachander is responsible for driving Hitachi’s social innovation strategy in Europe, the Middle East, and Africa across several verticals, including energy, electric vehicles, video analytics and public safety, and smart cities, with a focus on IoT, big data analytics, and AI. Since starting at Hitachi, he has developed and delivered unique IoT- and AI-based propositions in energy efficiency for both the public and private sectors, and is now driving a major campaign to bring advanced analytics to the energy sector.

A two-time Chair of the University of Texas Computer Science Department, Dr. Bruce Porter serves as SparkCognition’s Chief Science Officer, where he leads the company’s many R&D initiatives.

Currently, as University Professor, Dr. Porter research focuses on machine reading, a technology that holds tremendous potential for capturing knowledge for automated inference, question answering, explanation generation, and other AI capabilities.

Dr. Porter also directs UT’s Knowledge Systems Research Group, an AI organization with the goal to develop methods to build knowledgeable computers. He has won the Best Paper Award at the National Conference on Artificial Intelligence, the College of Natural Sciences Teaching Excellence Award, the National Science Foundation’s Presidential Young Investigator Award, and the President’s Associates Teaching Excellence Award.

Selected Awards & Honors:

Best Paper Award, National Conference on Artificial Intelligence (AAAI)
Recipient of the President’s Associates Teaching Excellence Award by the University of Texas at Austin
Recipient of a Presidential Young Investigator Award by the National Science Foundation

General Tony Thomas recently retired after three years as the Commanding General for U.S. Special Operations Command (SOCOM). As the commander of SOCOM, he oversaw 85,000 troops and civilians deployed in over 100 countries.

During Gen. Thomas’s 39-year career, he had more combat deployments than any other senior officer. He is the only officer to have commanded a squadron at Delta Force and a battalion of the 75th Ranger regiment. Since 2001, he deployed every year to Afghanistan or Iraq.

Gen. Thomas previously commanded the Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC), the elite counterterrorism unit that conducts the nation’s most dangerous missions. He has a long tenure in JSOC—in May 2011, he was the deputy commander and key planner of the mission that killed Osama bin Laden.

In his last two roles leading globally deployed forces, Gen. Thomas increased the focus on cyber and information operations. He was one of the military’s earliest and staunchest advocates for applied AI on the battlefield and was the first senior officer to appoint a Chief Data Officer to bring private sector solutions to the command.

The rise of AI-enabled cyberattacks is expected to cause an explosion of network penetrations, personal data thefts, and an epidemic-level spread of intelligent computer viruses as well as fake forensic evidence. Ironically, our best hope to defend against AI-enabled hacking is by using AI. Will AI enhance cybersecurity or make it more difficult to create robust defenses for cyberinfrastructure? In his talk, Dr. Roman Yampolskiy will discuss the paradox that AI will bring for cybersecurity and how cybersecurity experts can prepare to address impact from AI.