Global Speakers

Day Two Chairman

With more than 17 years of working experience, from Clinical and Informatics background, it allows me to improve my engagement and understanding of workflow better. On top of that, I have taken on Secretary in Health Informatics Technical Committee(HITC) to assist  with the innovation and standardization in HealthCare premise. With that, it improves oneself to present in many platform include HIMSS conference , IBS conference and etc.  With my current role in Academic Informatics Office (AIO) provides clinical input on translational research and the care continuum in NUHS, and support clinical research analytics. At the same time, I am working on Next Generation Electronics Medical Record Project with our staff and technology partners on the design, development and implementation of informatics projects, as well as provide guidance on clinical systems for patient care.

Topic:

AI in Action: Case Study of How AI is Helping Doctors Predict Outcomes of Patients Effectively

Dr. Sebastian Wedeniwski joined Standard Chartered Bank in April 2017 as Chief Technology Strategist. In this role, he is instrumental in defining and implementing the Bank’s digital and innovation agenda. Sebastian joined the Bank from IBM where he was an IBM Distinguished Engineer and the Chief Technology Officer for IBM’s global Industrial Sector. In 1998, he joined the IBM Research & Development Laboratory Germany after he founded two software development companies. Sebastian was from 2014 to 2016 on an IBM International Assignment in Japan.

Sebastian is a mathematician and computer scientist by background, he graduated both in Mathematics (Cryptography) and Computing Science (Computational Mathematics) in 1997 and received his Doctorate Degree in Mathematics (Number Theory) from the University of Tübingen in 2001. Sebastian has published multiple books and owns several patents.

Sebastian enjoys running marathons in his leisure time. He is married and has two daughters and three sons.

Topic:

Opening Address: The AI-First Enterprise: How Automated Machine Learning Is Used To Transform the Enterprise

Day One Chairman

Jake Saunders, Managing Director and Vice President, Asia-Pacific & Advisory Services, leads ABI Research’s Asia-Pacific research division. He devotes attention to the Asian market’s mobile operator strategic positioning, infrastructure vendors, mobile device vendors and chipset manufacturers.

Jake’s background comprises more than 20 years of telecoms consulting expertise and a proven track record of operations management. Prior to joining ABI Research, Jake was a Research Director at Concise Insight, a leading UK-based wireless market research company. He also previously served as Director of the Strategis Group’s European office.

Jake holds an M.Sc. in Technology Management from the University of Manchester.

Jagan is the Head of Data science for Machine learning and Maps at Grab. He is also the data science lead for the Geo group, which looks after anything related to Maps, POIs, navigation and travel time estimations.

Prior to joining Grab, Jagan was a research scientist and post-doctoral researcher at the Advanced Digital Sciences Center (ADSC, a research unit of University of Illinois Urbana Champaign in Singapore) in the “semantic video analysis” and “multi-modal analysis” research groups. He received his PhD from Ecole Polytechnique Federale de Lausanne (EPFL), Switzerland in 2012. His PhD research was on Bayesian graphical models, inference techniques and their applications to large scale video analysis and visual surveillance. The prototypes he developed for video surveillance were successfully tested in several busy metro stations in Paris, Rome and Torino, and commercialized later.

Jagan has co-authored more than 30 articles that were published in top-tier computer vision and pattern recognition conferences and journals. He continues to serves as a technical program committee member for several top-tier conferences in computer vision and machine learning and as reviewer for several premier IEEE journals.

Topic:

KEYNOTE TOPIC: Grab’s Transformational AI Lab in Singapore: How Grab is Using AI to Build its Future Business Platform

Eric joined EasyMile in January 2016.

He is the Head of Deep Learning in EasyMile, a company specialized in autonomous vehicles and headquartered in France. The team is focusing on environment perception, such as on-road obstacle detection.

He first acted as a project manager in charge of R&D related projects in Singapore, promoting the driverless technology on key deployments.

Before joining EasyMile, Eric worked in the financial industry, first as a financial engineer, then as an expert in portfolio optimization and risk analysis.

Eric enjoys trekking in his free time, especially in his native island of La Reunion.

Topic:

AI for Perception and Tracking. Use-case and Methodology

Dr. Bajpai is a physician, trained in Internal Medicine, Diabetes and Endocrinology with an experience of more than 25 years. He is currently the Global Medical Head for Disease Management and Stakeholder Engagement with Sanofi Emerging Markets Diabetes & CV, based in Singapore.

His areas of expertise include multi-stakeholder scientific engagement activities, clinical development, regulatory affairs, drug safety, integrated care, patient-centric ecosystem, life cycle management and policy and advocacy.

Dr. Bajpai is also on the editorial board of international journals, a designated SME for physician education and Director for healthcare, education and social service non-profits. He is an invited expert speaker at various national and international scientific forums as well as delivers seminars on ‘Patient-centricity’, ‘Living with Diabetes’ and is a Mindfulness coach, for the HCPs and diverse audience.

Topic:

AI and Machine Learning- Contributing Across the Spectrum of Healthcare

Sudhir Pandar has 18 years of industry exposure, 14 of them in business intelligence, automation and visual analytics experience across technology and BFSI domains, his focus is on fundamentally one thing: Enhancing visual, analytical, & automated digital data MI/BI/“systems” for optimized insights & decision making.

He transformed 5000+ manual reports in last 1 and half decade, spanning across 6 industries (dotcom, mobile, technology, advertising, offshoring, banking) into an end-to-end digital, automated and interactive dashboard solution for a large multinationals for US, ME, Canada, and South East Asia Pacific regions, totaling 40+ individual countries.

His interests are reading, science fiction, medical thrillers, renewable and alternative energies, development of third world economy and pollution control among other topics. Hobbies include running, cycling, cooking, electronic gadgets, sports apparel and writing articles.

Industries specialized in: Dotcom, Technology, Mobile, BPO/KPO Outsourcing/Offshoring, Banking and Financial, Ad Agency, Digital Marketing, Business Intelligence Tools, Visual Analytics.

Topic:

Data Analytics and Data Analytics based  on AI Models

Topic:

Building the AI Systems of the Future: Trends in new AI Systems

Kevin is a data science leader who honed his craft in marketing and customer analytics over the past 15 years in some of the world’s largest marketing services companies.

He has wide experience consulting with businesses to devise data-driven solutions in the areas of customer segmentation and personalization, digital journeys and advertising optimization, marketing attribution, sales response forecasting and pricing analytics.

Currently he is helping bring NTUC Link’s digital transformation to the next level, applying advanced analytics to boost customer engagement for its Plus! loyalty program.

Kevin has been voted among the top speakers at various training events, and has spoken on data science on national TV.

Topic:

AI for Customer Experience and E-Commerce: How ML is Helping NTUC Link Transform a Legacy Loyalty Program into Omni-Channel Personalized Customer Experiences

Jiin Joo co-founded Garuda Robotics in 2014, a leading cloud robotics startup aimed at developing end-to-end drone data solutions for businesses in South East Asia. Jiin Joo comes from a diverse background consisting of 16 years of software development, technology scouting, business development, government service and telecommunications. In his current role, he leads the software engineering, field computing, cloud operations, GIS and data analytics teams, and is responsible for private cloud implementations of their flagship software suite, Garuda Plex, to help large enterprises build a drone operations team, and extend the IT department’s capabilities to handle the demands of managing and analyzing drone data.

Topic:

Augmenting Drones with AI

Nadia Magnenat Thalmann is Professor and Director of the Institute for Media Innovation, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore. She is also the Founder and Director of the MIRALab, an interdisciplinary lab in Human Computer Animation, University of Geneva, Switzerland. Her research domains are Social Robots, mixed realities and medical simulation. In Singapore, she has developed the robot Nadine alike of herself that is able to speak, recognize people and gestures, express mood and emotions, and remember actions. All over her career, she has received several artistic and scientific Awards, among them the 2012 Humboldt Research Award and two Doctor Honoris Causa (from University of Hanover in Germany and from the University of Ottawa in Canada). She is Editor-in-Chief of the Journal The Visual Computer (Springer-Verlag) and is a Member of the Swiss Academy of Engineering Sciences.

Topic:

The Intersect of Artificial Intelligence with Robotics: Latest Advances

Topic:

Panel: Getting Ready for AI: How to Integrate AI into Your Existing Infrastructure

Niyati is a HR professional with a degree in Electronics and Communications engineering and an MBA in Human resources. She has a rich diversity of experience across Human Resource verticals as well as across multiple countries she has lived and worked in.

She has been the recipient of many prestigious laurels in the industry and was recently recognized as India’s one of Top 40 under 40 HR leaders in Jan 2019. In 2016, she was also awarded the Emerging HR Leader of India by People Matters Business Magazine.

In her portfolio at AirAsia, she manages the Total Rewards Center of Excellence for 22,000 employees based all over the Region along with her team. Prior to that, she has worked in the FMCG industry with Mondelez International, managing the critical C&B projects for the Asia, Middle East and Africa Region for 23 markets.

A large part of her career has been Strategic HR business partnering before she moved to Rewards – As the HR Business lead for R&D and Procurement for Asia Pacific for Mondelez International and multiple other roles.

She has lived and worked in Singapore, India and now Malaysia and has expertise in  Organisation design and Restructuring | Large & Difficult Change Management | Compensation & Benefits | Business Partnering with Leaders | Cross cultural management.

Topic:

Roundtable Discussion 3: Air Asia Case Study:  Achieving Transformative Business Outcomes via AI

Daniel Sparing, Ph.D. is a Machine Learning Specialist with Google Cloud, helping organizations build large-scale predictive models that create impact. Daniel has more than 10 years of research and global consulting experience in artificial intelligence and mathematical optimization, across a wide range of industries including finance, telecom, transportation and logistics.

Topic:

Transforming Businesses with Artificial Intelligence

Lisandro Tapia was born in Quilmes (Buenos Aires), Argentina. After his study in classic literature at the University of Buenos Aires , he discovered his passion for digital arts and cutting-edge technology for real-time graphics. Having worked with leading media companies such as ARTEAR, Russia Today and Mediacorp, he has extensive experience in devising and implementing winning graphical and technical solutions for real-time graphics as he progressed through various motion design and technical roles. Career spans Argentina, Russia and Singapore.

In his current positional Mediacorp, Lisandro is responsible for enhancing production of real-time graphics through application of cutting edge technologies. He continuously deepens his professional knowledge through numerous educations including his current course on Machine Learning with Stanford University.

In his free time he loves to see movies, read comics and play football. One of his adventures was travelling on a Trans-Siberian train.  He is married and has two daughters.

Topic:

AI In Broadcasting: Different Usages In The Industry

Jason Sosa previously founded a New York City venture-backed computer vision and machine learning company which sold in 2015, EIR/advisor to $20m VC fund, founder of Blackbox AI.

International speaker on the Future of Work and The Coming Transhuman Era, Forbes Contributing Writer – Singularity University Global Summit, Women in Tech Keynote, Inman Connect Keynote, ICO CROWD, TEDx, MIT Enterprise Forum, NYC Meetup, Detroit Regional Chamber, as just a few examples. Also featured as an entrepreneur in the New York Times, Wired, Fast Company, Bloomberg, Techcrunch, and Top 25 NYC startup Business Insider.

Topic:

Org 2.0 – Collaborative AI Governance for the Future of Work

Dr. Lua Eng Keong is currently the Director of Intelligent Computing Labs at the Infocomm Media Development Authority (IMDA) of the Singapore Public Service.

He has over 25 years of leading global efforts in info-communications and deep tech innovation. His proven areas of expertise include Secured Distributed Networking (AI analytics and cybersecurity), commercializing Future Intelligent Systems (FIS) for businesses, and the implementation of future-proof strategies. He was formerly the Chief Technology Officer of I Squared Capital, a private equity firm focusing on global infrastructure investments and managing over 13 billion USD in assets. His R&D and international industry track record include NEC Laboratories, NTT Laboratories, Carnegie Mellon University’s CyLab, Microsoft Research, Intel Research, and Hewlett-Packard Consulting. His stint at NTT Laboratories also resulted in the granting of seven intellectual property (IP) patents which were translated into products and services utilized by multinational businesses.

He was awarded his Ph.D. in Computer Science from the University of Cambridge (UK), supervised by Professor Jon Crowcroft and Professor Timothy G. Griffin and funded in entirety by a Microsoft Research Fellowship, a Cambridge-MIT Research Grant, and the UK’s Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) e-Science award. He also attained his MSc (with Distinction) degree in Telecommunications from University College London (UK), where he was supervised by Professor Sir John O’Reilly and funded by a postgraduate scholarship granted by the Singapore Ministry of Education. He was also the inaugural recipient of the Australian government’s Australia Asia Awards, given to promising Asian scholars for scholarly activities and collaborative exchange.

To date, Dr. Lua’s published papers have garnered close to 3000 peer citations (according to Google Scholar). He has also he co-authored a book published by Morgan Kaufmann titled “Peer-to-Peer Networking and Applications” which frequently appears on reading lists for postgraduate students and fellow industry technologists.

Topic:

A Human and Machine Collaborative Future for Research, Innovation and Enterprise (RIE)

Michal is Head of Data at GOGOVAN, responsible for leading data science, data engineering and data analytics. Previously he worked in data teams of PwC, NaturalMotion and Zynga. He founded Artificial Intelligence Oxford and Quantified Self Oxford meetup groups. In his free time he likes to read, run and play with Quantified Self data.

Topic:

Data-Driven Approaches in a Technology Start-Up

Girish has 18+ years of multi-faceted experience in the IT industry starting from database engineering, customer support, solution architecture design and implementation, technical pre sales to leading international teams in complex large scale engagements. He is a globally recognized thought-leader in the industry in the areas of Data / Big Data, prescriptive and predictive analytics, and insights visualization with effective story telling skills.

He has significant experience in asset creation and reuse having 15 filed patents, 16 published disclosures and more than 20 publications in renowned international journals. Currently as an Technology Director for Retail Data Analytics part of the CIO office responsible for managing large Complex data science and Analytics solution implementations globally for the bank.

Topic:

AI for Banking and Financial Services

Victor has over 25 years’ leadership experience in investments, insurance, and healthcare. He has led, turned around and transformed several businesses – including three failed start-ups in real-time dynamic pricing, digital asset management, and interactive advertising. He is an independent director at Capital World Limited and Director and Investment Committee Chairman at Singapore Chinese Orchestra Company.

Victor has held previous CEO roles in health financing at two leading Singapore private healthcare groups, stockbroking, investment banking, wealth management and private banking combined with digital entrepreneurial pursuits drive Victor’s vision to integrate investments, insurance, and healthcare into data-driven personal wealth management.

He is awarded the Public Service Medal in 2009 and the Public Service Star in 2016 by the President of the Republic of Singapore.

Topic:

The Artificially Intelligent Fund – What Works

Lian Jye Su, Principal Analyst at ABI Research, is responsible for orchestrating research relating to robotics, artificial intelligence, and machine learning. He leads research in emerging and key trends in these industries, deep-diving into advancements in key components, regional dynamics in robotics and AI adoptions, and their future impacts and implications.

Prior to joining ABI Research, Lian Jye worked in several healthcare organizations, in both the technical and business domain. He held various roles in quality management, operation reviews, and market research analysis. Lian Jye earned a B.Sc. in Life Sciences from the National University of Singapore. He then completed his Master in Business Administration at Melbourne Business School in Australia, with a dedicated specialization in market research and business strategy.

Topic:

Advanced AI Experience from Abroad, with Many Case Studies and Latest AI Innovations

Romain Rouquier joined the South China Morning Post in January, 2019 as Associate Director of the Data Analytics team.

Priot to SCMP, Romain has been working 10 years as data analyst and data scientist in the financial industry before founding a tech company focusing on offline to online marketing. More recently Romain was co-heading the Hong Kong branch of Maltem Consulting, a boutique consulting firm specialized in digital transformation, where he created and developed the data practice.

Romain holds a master degree in financial engineering from ESSEC Business Schools (France and Singapore), and a master degree in computer science, specialized in data mining and data warehousing from the University of Technology of Compiègne (France).

Topic:

Utilizing Data in the Newsroom Amidst an Aggressive Digital Transformation at a Century-Old Paper

Juliana Chua is the head of digital transformation at NTUC Income (INCOME), Singapore’s largest composite insurer, serving the protection, savings and investment needs of more than two million customers and total assets of more than $36 billion in management. She has a background in international business management (INSEAD); IP Law (NUS Law); computer science (Loughborough, UK); and leads the programme to digitise INCOME’s core businesses with the adoption of design thinking and agile methodology.

Juliana has worked across continents in the US, China, Japan, India, UK and Singapore and is an inventor of six patents/applications and designs for upstream innovation. Before INCOME, she was the director of the IP office of Singapore for IPOS International where she forayed into the US, China, Japan and Singapore markets for strategic partnerships.

Juliana also previously served the world’s No.1 innovation leader – IBM UK; Asia’s leading IP law firm – Spruson & Ferguson; Singapore’s largest technology office – Exploit Technologies of A*STAR; and the Japan MNC – Nitto Denko, as well as launched two start-ups into markets worldwide.

Topic:

Moving AI Off Your Product Roadmap and Into Your Products

Kat Agres is the Principal Investigator of the Music Cognition group at the Institute of High Performance Computing, A*STAR, and is an Adjunct Assistant Professor at the National University of Singapore (NUS). Kat received her PhD in Psychology from Cornell University, and completed her postdoctoral work at Queen Mary University of London, where she investigated music perception and computational creativity. She has played cello professionally, and served as the senior research scientist for a London-based company at the intersection of music technology and well-being. Kat has presented her work at international workshops and conferences in over 15 countries, and has received numerous grants to support her research. Her work explores an interdisciplinary range of topics in music cognition, AI & music, computational simulation of music perception, and  MedTech applications of music for healthcare.

Topic:

The Use and Implications of AI for Creative Fields Such As Music

Praveen Lala has seventeen years of vast experience in various industries and global locations in GE, prior to his current role as Energy Practice, Services Director for GE Digital. Having had a broad hands on digital, financial, operational and ‘Change Agent’ experience, Praveen is a firm believer in digital transformation and focused on customer value delivery and outcomes. With more than 15 years experience in APAC, Praveen understands the cultural complexity and rules of business in the region.

Throughout his career, Praveen has focused on customer delight as his main priority and believes in breaking down internal silos to exceed customer expectations. Working across various functions, he understands criticality of People, process and technology to drive digital changes. Prior to his current role, Praveen was services director for GE Oil & Gas, APAC /MENAT and global Billing Quality initiative for Power(Schenectady). He has repeatedly proved his ability as a team player and also leading diverse cross-cultural teams.

As a key member to the GE Digital team, Praveen continuously keeps customer focus and strategic growth as top of his agenda. In his digital role, his team has delivered close to ~15 implementations across APAC and millions in additional customer value. Customers look at him as a key facilitator across their organizations to develop sustainable roadmaps for digital innovation.

Praveen holds a Bachelor of Engineering (with Honors) in Electronics Engineering from Birla Institute of Technology, India and MBA from Indian Institute of Management(IIM), Ahmedabad. He actively plays tennis and goes for a run/walk to keep healthy.

Apart from distinguishing himself as a leader in his successful career path, Praveen also strongly practices work-life balance. He lives in Singapore with his wife Pooja, and two young kids Prinaka (9) and Priyank (7)

Topics:

• Roundtable Discussion 1: AI for Power Generation, Transmission, Distribution and Renewables
• Operationalizing Machine Learning: How to Ensure Value-Driven Deployment

Topic:

How AI can be in the Risk and Compliance Domain

Vince Kasten heads Robotic Process Automation and Artificial Intelligence in the Regional Customer Journey team at Prudential Asia.

He came to Prudential from IBM, where he was an Executive Partner in Global Business Services, and the Cognitive Solutions Leader, advising Insurance and Wealth Management clients on the transformational application of cognitive computing and advanced analytics. He has been a leader in applying Cognitive Computing and evidence-based decisioning to improve customer experience, increase revenue, improve efficiency, and control risk, and has implemented cognitive automation solutions on three continents.

Former affiliations including KPMG Consulting / BearingPoint where he was Partner leading global transformation for Insurance and Banking, Unisys where he was Managing Partner for Global Transformation.

Vince is a co-author of the books Get It Done! A Blueprint for Business Execution and The Jericho Principle, both derived from his global work creating comprehensive transformation programs for private and public sector clients. He holds three U.S. Patents, is a frequent speaker and panelist, having authored or co-authored numerous papers and articles on wide ranging business and technology topics, is a Certified Information Systems Auditor, and holds an M.S. in Computer Science from Columbia University in New York.

Topic:

Operationalising AI