The internet is not the first attempt at organizing the world’s knowledge, but it is perhaps the most successful one. The technology was like a spark that became wildfire. People stored their data on floppy drives, CDs, pen drives, and hard drives—but more and more data came pouring in. The numbers of Google’s googol became less of an exaggeration and perhaps more of an underestimation. Soon the question arose, ‘Where to store all this data?’

Data centers came into being because local PCs and servers simply couldn’t keep up with the storage demands anymore. Huge, offsite, and recognizable as a ‘cloud,’ they became the epicenters of the world’s data. One of the hosts of such a modern library in Alexandria is Telehouse. A leading European provider of the colocation data center, offering global connectivity and reach to its customers.

Sami Slim is the CEO of Telehouse France. He is an expert on global carrier-grade telecommunications infrastructure and has worked with virtually every major carrier around the world. He has significant experience in infrastructure architecture, design, sales, negotiation, acquisition, and implementation on a global basis. Passionate about free and open internet, Sami is leading Telehouse France and, therefore, Europe to become the world’s digital backbone for data hosting.

Sami Slim shares his wisdom with CIOLook readers in an exclusive interview:

Brief our audience about your journey as a business leader until your current position at Telehouse France. What challenges have you had to overcome to reach where you are today?

I graduated from Telecom SudParis in 2010 and began working for Telehouse as a technical sales engineer. Before joining Telehouse Europe Strategy Department in 2013, I was at the heart of Telehouse’s data center and connectivity growth in France for three years.

In 2014, I took over as head of the France sales department before being promoted to Deputy Director in charge of Marketing and Sales. My mission as CEO was to accelerate Telehouse’s growth by assisting the Group’s customers and prospects in improving their interconnection capabilities.

I bring to Telehouse a passion for a free, neutral, and open Internet. My deep knowledge of the IT market and proximity to the Internet players contribute to consolidating Telehouse’s results and earn me the renewal of the Group’s confidence.

In the ever-evolving modern industry, almost every company and organization requires a transformative vision to strive toward gaining exponential progress in the business arena.

A transformative vision provides an edge to enhance organizational operations along with administration, resulting in the continual of pushing the organization towards scaling its success. Hence, the vision needs to be in sync with the integrated knowledge of not only industry norms but also virtues gained through extensive first-hand problem-solving opportunities.

Evelyn Miralles, Business Associate for Aegis Aerospace Inc, is the perfect embodiment of a staunch transformative leader whose vision notably apprehends the insights for technology foresight, bifurcating her association from the rest.

With over 30 years of extensive experience in roles, as an executive leader and a pioneer in computer technologies, Evelyn has a successful record of creating partnerships and generating initiatives that lead to innovative solutions and services, benefiting the growing diverse and digitally connected world.

In her current position as a consultant, she is providing her expertise in building internal teams, competitive products and services, considering new market trends and requirements, and including technology foresight and coaching.

We at CIO Look got an opportunity to interview Evelyn in which she shared insights into her journey in the Aerospace Industry as well as her transition into a business leader.

Technology has embarked humanity on a path of exponential growth, undisputed evolution, and progress. It continues to provide solutions to realms of human life and enhance its quality. However, adjourning innovations to bring constant reformations in technological developments becomes necessary when you need to tackle never-ending difficulties, especially when technology is actively assisting in abridging the typical obstacles.

At such time, we need trailblazers who take up the initiative that remodels the technological reformations in order to introduce ecological backup in daily advancements. Naeem Farooqi, Founder of FleetZero, is a reformer who leads a zero-emission mobility team that focuses on solving challenges and delivering roadmaps for fleet electrification. Naeem concentrates on creating a center of excellence in support asset management, economic analysis, as well as charging and fueling infrastructure for both electric and hydrogen vehicle adoption.

FleetZero is a global start-up in consulting and engineering across the fleet energy transition, helping to unlock solutions to some of the world’s most critical transportation decarbonization challenges.

Naeem has been in the transportation industry for a long time; through his expertise, he comprehends that overseeing ecological supervision is high time. In an interview with CIOLook, Naeem walked us through his journey along with the significance of FleetZero in the ever-evolving modern transportation sector.

There are several definitions of transformational leadership, each more majestic than the previous. But in the simplest terms, we think of transformational leadership as a style of managing that inspires people and drives positive change in innovative and sometimes even profound ways.

Today, transformational leadership is prevalent in the world’s most progressive companies. Management at these companies could have been content with their already enviable market positions. Instead, transformational leadership pushed them to excel in areas beyond their core businesses. At the helm were leaders who chose to identify new market opportunities and increase the sustainability of their market domination.

In her core business roles over the last number of years, Victoria Pelletier—Founding Director of Olive Ltd—has been a successful leader in leading teams and practices focused on creating purpose-driven organizations, positive workplace culture, and human-centred leadership to drive strong engagement, business transformation and strong stakeholder performance.

In fact, she is relentless and maniacal about not losing focus on culture and leadership as she transforms distinct businesses – this is the key differentiator to long-term organizational success.

CIOLook embraced the opportunity to interview Victoria, where she shared valuable facts highlighting her odyssey and professional tenure in the modern-day business arena.

In today’s modern industry, the use of technology has been resulting in enhancing the working procedure in the traditional operational methods. The outcome of this development is the exponential progress that we observe in the diverse sectors of the industry.

The use of evolving technology like AR, VR and robotics has been redefining the ways people work. It is undoubtedly a matter of fact that technology has been assisting humans to go beyond the limits and enable innovations in distinct sectors. This has been a perpetual innovation that is simplifying things so far, and it is a result of the spark of the innovators who developed new ways to enhance traditional working methods and blend them with reliability.

And as a result, essential sectors like disaster management are embracing these technologies to improve emergency management. This is where Susumu Matsuda excels as a tech-inspiring stalwart who, with his awe-inspiring skillset and abstracted vision of pursuing “safety and security” for humans, established a VR business on his own. He devised a RiMM (Risk Management Method) that enables the development of VR applications in a brief period, and in 2012, he developed the essential software of the RiMM development tool.

Today under his visionary leadership, Santoku Corporation Co., Ltd. stimulates the essential intuition of human beings by concretely showing the dangers that exist in various workplaces by combining VR technology and mechatronics technology. 

Let’s indulge in Susumu’s odyssey of perpetual advancements.

Embracing the Path of Developments

Susumu Matsuda majored in mechanical engineering at university and was researching feedback control theory and operational maneuver control of automobiles. After that, he studied the architecture of CPU at an electronics manufacturer and participated in the machine control of semiconductor manufacturing equipment and the development of vision processing functions.

However, after witnessing the 11^th of September 2001 terrorist attacks in the United States, he decided to move to his current company with the aim of pursuing “safety and security” for humans and the earth and launching a VR business on his own.

The initial purpose is to commercialize real-time interaction using VR. Real-time processing of 3D data requires high-performance graphics hardware. Therefore, initially, He focuses on the research field and provides services.

The need for the use of VR in the field of training emerged in 2007, and the development of accident response training simulators for the purpose of safe railway operation, security simulators for nuclear power plants, and decommissioning simulators for nuclear power plants. He continued to search for valid fields of VR application.

However, the development period and cost of the training simulator increase, and at the same time, the simple generation of derivative scenarios is required, which suffers from the development cost and mass production side. He specialized in accumulated safety and reassurance and aimed for efficient sensation generation through an intuitive operation.

Automation is the name of the game. It lowers costs, increases productivity, automates all repetitive tasks, and frees up human capital for tasks that require more creative thinking and innovation. Businesses are intrigued and clamoring for the latest tech to gain an advantage over their competitors.

Providing the best inventory in the market is Hyper-Botz with technologies that can enable organizations to ‘hire’ a digital worker that performs faster, better, and cheaper.

Hiren Kotak, its CEO, is an IPA (Intelligent Process Automation) enthusiast. He envisions a world where humans can work like humans instead of doing robotic work. Highly result-driven and a creative problem solver, Hiren designs large-scale solutions to deliver significant business value – transforming businesses and customer experiences.

On the hunt for tech leaders who are changing the game, Insights Success came across Hiren Kotak. We interviewed him about what drew him to the automation industry, his goals for Hyper-Botz, and his views on the tech industry’s future.   

Below are the highlights of the interview:

Brief our audience about your journey as a business leader until your current position at Hyper-Botz. What challenges have you had to overcome to reach where you are today? 

About seven years ago, as a result of my passion for helping my company grow cost-efficiently, I decided to explore Robotic Process Automation (RPA), a new technology for automating our manual operational and administrative processes. RPA enables faster, low-cost, high-return, non-invasive, low-code no-code automation.

As an RPA enthusiast, I decided to further my career in this field and educate, advise, and help others establish their automation initiatives and manage them effectively to achieve desired results. For that, initially, I joined some well-known technology service providers.

With my MBA training, strategic mindset, and business background, I contributed significantly to the overall business performance of these companies while helping our clients with automation solutions and establishing well-managed programs.

After building significant experience as an automation consultant and a professional services vendor, I finally decided to establish my own company to help organizations of all sizes reap the benefits of Intelligent Business Process Automation.

We don’t ask for directions anymore or memorize the route to get anywhere. If stranded in an unknown place without access to the internet, we would inevitably get lost for hours – leading us to wonder – how did people do this before? The emergence of technologies like Machine Learning, Artificial Intelligence, Big Data, and others have brought advancements that make life unfathomable without them. Such are the AI solutions that Sonny Patel, SVP of Product & Engineering, Conversational Intelligence at LivePerson wants to deliver to people.

Sonny is an established tech executive who believes in building products that have a far-reaching impact. She loves working with teams that consistently raise the bar with their results, and she leads a 200+ global, crossfunctional team consisting of developers, product managers, TPMs, QA & UI/UX professionals across ten different time zones who do just that. Currently, she is pushing the boundaries of human and digital conversations at LivePerson, with the aim of creating the world’s best AI-powered conversational platform that helps brands initiate and maintain warm, empathetic, and long-lasting relationships with their customers.

In an exclusive interview with CIOLook, Sonny Patel shared her STEM journey, her mission to create AI solutions that change the world, and what she wishes to change about the IT field.

Below are the highlights of the interview:

Brief our audience about your journey as a business leader up to your current position at LivePerson. What challenges have you had to overcome to reach where you are today?

I have been fascinated with computers ever since I got one as a present in the 90s, and this sparked the curiosity that led me to pursue both an undergraduate and a graduate degree in Computer Science and ultimately turn it into a lifelong career. Over the past two decades, I have had the opportunity to learn and grow at some of the world’s best technology companies: Dell, Microsoft, Amazon and now LivePerson. It has been an amazing privilege to be trained by the very best.

If Artificial Intelligence is the future, its creators must be multifarious in all aspects. This ensures that the responsibility fulfilled by the AI considers a roundabout perspective rather than a monotonous attitude. Reinforcing the strategy of enabling assortment in the industry demands the active participation of innovators to embrace the opportunities and stand out at the helm of advancements.

However, there are many exemplary women leaders at the forefront of AI today. It is a matter of fact that women have always provided a different perspective and approach, and they have established themselves substantially in enhancing the algorithms, particularly in the AI industry. They also serve as role models for future generations of AI leaders, ensuring innovations and a comprehensive AI community.

One such coherent personality is Shaily Verma, Director of Digital and Data at DAMAC Group. Shaily is a high-impact & result-driven internationally acclaimed thought leader with a solid track record of orchestrating growth and leading strategic digital initiatives.

She enables robust business transformations through futuristic AI-driven solutions in the field of digital commerce & blockchain; Shaily possesses a multi-geography experience, having led assignments across EMEA, the United States, and India.

Shaily believes in positive impact-based working models and has created AI-enabled micro experiences. With 16 years of experience in tech, she is focused on developing digital strategy and data analytics for businesses, with a primary focus on Customer centricity. She has been developing strong digital center of excellence teams that keep up with the fast paced, ever-changing environment and deliver high quality solutions through data science, digital technology implementations, and AI.

Shaily defines herself as a ‘Thought Leader of ‘Digital analytics for impact’.’ She has worked with Martech/Adtech/CRM/data activation strategy/business strategy/product strategy/ consumer insights. She is actively assisting in the development of high-impact data products & data science teams that are operationalizing actionable insights to improve business processes.

Behind every excelling business, there are exceptional minds indulged in its progress, ensuring that the organization’s vision and mission are accomplished. With what comes off as business prospects, from building the market presence of products to driving growth and expansion in competitive markets, all the aspects of a flourishing business are salvaged by the league of ingenious leaders.

Sandeep Sethi is among the exemplary leaders who possess solid entrepreneurial insight in driving global business growth by planning and executing strategic commercial and distribution plans and creating international channel expansion plans for development.

Sandeep Sethi is known for managing multiple functions with proven success in establishing annual product line revenue and gross margin plans, meeting revenue & gross margin objectives, and managing product life cycles to achieve organizational country objectives. He holds a significant track record of success in turning around emerging markets, including India & Africa, with a distinguished record of growth in the International Channels across Southeast Asia & Africa.

CIOLook had the privilege to interview Sandeep, in which he disclosed his dynamic principles for a prosperous business.

Below are the highlights of the interview:

Brief our audience about your journey as a business leader until your current position at Interactive Printer Solutions (IPS). What challenges have you had to overcome to reach where you are today?

I had a very humble beginning at IPS when I joined as a Customer Service Manager in 1999. I had little experience backing me up, but I had a huge passion and a “never say die” attitude to grow. Over the years, I managed several roles, from Marketing Head to Sales Director to Global Channel Director, before I became the Managing Director & Partner in IPS business in 2019.