Alex Smola

Alex Smola is the co-founder and CEO of Boson AI, a company focused on developing scalable models for machine learning. He has a deep background inartificial intelligence(AI) and machine learning, having previously held several prominent positions. Before founding Boson AI in 2023, Smola was the VP and Distinguished Scientist atAmazon Web Services(AWS), where he led efforts to make AI more accessible to developers. He contributed to the development of Amazon AI services like Amazon Lex,Polly, and Rekognition, and was involved with the Apache MXNet project.

Smola began his academic career by earning a Master’s degree in Physics from theUniversity of Technology in Munichand later received a PhD in Computer Science from the Technische Universität Berlin. His early career included roles at the Fraunhofer Berlin (formerly GMD) andAT&T Research. From 2000 to 2008, he worked at the Australian National University and NICTA (National ICT Australia), where he served as Senior Principal Researcher and Program Leader.

Smola also held roles at Yahoo Research, where he was a Principal Research Scientist from 2008 to 2012, and Google, where he was a Visiting Scientist from 2012 to 2015. In 2015, he co-founded Marianas Labs, further advancing his focus on machine learning and data analysis. From 2013 to 2017, Smola was a professor atCarnegie Mellon University, helping to grow its well-known machine learning department.

Throughout his career, Smola has authored over250 academic papersand written or edited six books, including "Learning with Kernels" and "Dive into Deep Learning." His research spans deep learning, kernel methods, statistical modelling, and scalable algorithms. At AWS, he initiated a large internship program and frequently spoke about machine learning scalability. Outside of work, Smola enjoys coffee, playing the piano, and travelling for speaking engagements.