Co-founder CEO & AI Governance Director, equitably.ai & Chief Commercial Officer & Director of AI, AI First Trading
Companies
John Paul Danaee is Co-founder, CEO and AI Governance Director of equitably.ai along with Chief Commercial Officer and Director of AI at AI First Trading, equitably.ai’s sister company, innovation lab, where he leads the team to push the boundaries of an AI first approach to commercialisation of leading edge AI by investing – AI use cases, AI talent, and working capital – together with partner clients.
His deep Artificial Intelligence (AI), automation and technology expertise have been honed for more than a decade at equitably.ai, AI First Trading, HSBC and NCR Corporation, across a wide range of functions with a specialisation at the intersection of AI and quality. He is completing his MSc in AI and Data Science and is a frequent writer, researcher, speaker and trainer on quality AI (see insights). He has published a feature article in Quality Week on the application of professional quality competencies to the enterprise deployment of AI, leads the AI Networking Group at the Chartered Quality Institute and a member of AI Steering Group at the Investment Management.
John Paul, career at NCR Corporation (now NCR Atleos) has given him a unique insight into the impact of new technology and data on companies. The experience businesses need to today to navigate AI. NCR, founded in Dayton, Ohio in 1884, was one of the pioneers of business technology, alongside IBM and the BUNCH (Burroughs, UNIVAC, NCR, Control Data and Honeywell). NCR’s founder trained Thomas J. Watson Sr., who went on to lead the company that became IBM and during John Paul’s time at NCR the company owned Teradata, a pioneer of massively parallel databases that helped scale data warehousing to a reported first terabyte-scale system at Wal-Mart in 1992 and was part of AT&T where John Paul had the opportunity of learning from the pioneering AT&T Bell Labs.
His investment and banking expertise includes roles covering company stock exchange listings (IPOs) and private equity in the HSBC Group and KPMG. He has a master’s in finance and investments, has conducted research into mid-market private equity at Bayes Business School, City University of London, supported by the British Private Equity & Venture Capital Association (BVCA) and conducted academic research into the growth of smaller companies during his economics honours degree at the University of Sydney, Australia.
His performance improvement, programme and project management expertise have been gained through some 20 enterprise-wide improvement projects and initiatives in companies, including private equity portfolio companies, HSBC Group and NCR Corporation internationally. He practises agile principles, is certified in LEAN Six Sigma as a Master Black Belt coach and has been admitted as a Chartered Quality Professional by the Chartered Quality Institute based on the Institute’s professional competency.
John Paul’s professional marketing expertise is recognised through admission as a Chartered Marketer by the Chartered Institute of Marketing (CIM)- based on the Institute’s professional marketing competencies, and a Certified Practising Marketer (CPM) by the Australian Marketing Institute (AMI). His leadership, board influence, commitment to lifelong learning and long-standing contributions to the marketing profession are recognised by having been awarded the highest grade of Fellow by the Chartered Institute of Marketing and the Australian Marketing Institute. He has a master’s degree in commerce, majoring in marketing from UNSW, Australia.
John Paul believes impactful and responsible AI comes from depth of understanding technology, performance improvement and the relevant business context (industry, function, organisation type, etc.). He leverages his 30+ years of experience in these domains to maximise return on investment (ROI) from AI while minimising risks. He is a proponent of more equitable access to AI and has led his firm to be selected as a founding partner of the UN AI for Good AI Skills Coalition.
The breadth of John Paul’s experience includes functional expertise across strategy, marketing, product management, operations, performance improvement, finance and risk across industries, including investment management, financial services, education, technology, media, and manufacturing internationally (UK, Australia, US, Europe, etc.). Both in large corporations and smaller entrepreneurial companies and startups.
John Paul is married and the father of two. He is a member of the Third Order of the Society of St. Francis (TSSF). He enjoys rowing at his local rowing club and attending Taekwondo with his two daughters.