percipient.ai Leadership

Balan Ayyar is the Founder and Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of percipient.ai, a Silicon-Valley based artificial intelligence, machine learning, and computer vision firm focused on intelligence and national security missions. He is a seasoned CEO and retired USAF General Officer. Before founding percipient.ai, Balan was the CEO of a $100M+ Government Services IT firm. His last role in the profession of arms was as the Commanding General of the Combined Joint Interagency Task Force 435, in Kabul, Afghanistan. He has served in four combatant commands, as the Military Assistant to the Secretary of Defense and in the White House as a White House Fellow. He is a Member of the Council on Foreign Relations.

As a proven technology, management, & business leader for 20+ years, Raj brings a unique combination of creative leadership, entrepreneurial success, management discipline, execution excellence, and global experience in how product, development, and Ops teams build technology products on a rhythm for commercial success.

His career spans from building successful start-ups to scaling and streamlining large team operations facing explosive growth, incl., setting up global operations in various geos. Raj understands what it takes to organize creative teams of scientists, engineers, product managers, and designers to bring together the right ingredients to deliver market-ready products on a predictable rhythm.

Currently, Raj is a CPO@percipient. He is also advising several companies.

At Microsoft, he led the maps organization, responsible for data and imagery acquisition and creation, and maps services to end-users and businesses for desktops/mobiles. Under his leadership the team created assets that prompted Uber’s acquisition.

His early stints at Google included teaming with its senior execs and both the founders to establish a disciplined execution process for its exploding global engineering teams and projects across 50+ engineering centers worldwide. Later, Raj headed creation of Google-owned Maps by establishing a large global infrastructure (managing a cross-geo team of |4,000) for all countries mapped by Google. Crowd-sourcing integration further leveraged users' local knowledge power, making Google maps now the most used resource globally. This is typically how Raj scales a nascent technology idea, establishes a deep infrastructure, and then delivers on a predictable rhythm to lead global markets.

Raj’s extensive technology background, his deep experience in product development, his successes in meeting GTM timelines, his network, and setting up scalable ops uniquely qualify him to take on challenges high-growth technology company may face.

Experienced leader in research and development roles, with a penchant for hands on development. In recent years I have mostly focused on problems where machine learning and computer vision is needed to accelerate image based information gathering efforts traditionally done manually, such as in mapping and intelligence gathering. This combines powerful and intuitive tools with seamless integration of state of the art machine learning and computer vision techniques. I'm currently in charge of the full technology stack of Percipient.Ai, which includes a horizontally scalable and flexible ML inference platform supporting multiple ML frameworks and capable of processing various types of data, including live video, geospatial imagery and still images, Spark based distributed query engine, web based UI and several supporting back-end micro-services. Specialties: Deep Neural Nets, MxNet, ML/CV + human workflows, machine learning, computer vision, 3D reconsturction, SLAM, sensors (accelerometers, gyros, magnetometers), 3D point cloud processing, gaze tracking, software development.

Steve is a long-time Chief Financial Officer, having served as a CFO for multiple technology companies and investment funds over the past 20 years. Steve served as the CFO for a publicly traded company on the NASDAQ. He has also served in company board of director positions chairing Audit Committees including being a member of the Board of Visitors at George Mason University serving as Chairman of the Audit Committee.

Balan Ayyar is the Founder and Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of percipient.ai, a Silicon-Valley based artificial intelligence, machine learning, and computer vision firm focused on intelligence and national security missions. He is a seasoned CEO and retired USAF General Officer. Before founding percipient.ai, Balan was the CEO of a $100M+ Government Services IT firm. His last role in the profession of arms was as the Commanding General of the Combined Joint Interagency Task Force 435, in Kabul, Afghanistan. He has served in four combatant commands, as the Military Assistant to the Secretary of Defense and in the White House as a White House Fellow. He is a Member of the Council on Foreign Relations.

As a proven technology, management, & business leader for 20+ years, Raj brings a unique combination of creative leadership, entrepreneurial success, management discipline, execution excellence, and global experience in how product, development, and Ops teams build technology products on a rhythm for commercial success.

His career spans from building successful start-ups to scaling and streamlining large team operations facing explosive growth, incl., setting up global operations in various geos. Raj understands what it takes to organize creative teams of scientists, engineers, product managers, and designers to bring together the right ingredients to deliver market-ready products on a predictable rhythm.

Currently, Raj is a CPO@percipient. He is also advising several companies.

At Microsoft, he led the maps organization, responsible for data and imagery acquisition and creation, and maps services to end-users and businesses for desktops/mobiles. Under his leadership the team created assets that prompted Uber’s acquisition.

His early stints at Google included teaming with its senior execs and both the founders to establish a disciplined execution process for its exploding global engineering teams and projects across 50+ engineering centers worldwide. Later, Raj headed creation of Google-owned Maps by establishing a large global infrastructure (managing a cross-geo team of |4,000) for all countries mapped by Google. Crowd-sourcing integration further leveraged users' local knowledge power, making Google maps now the most used resource globally. This is typically how Raj scales a nascent technology idea, establishes a deep infrastructure, and then delivers on a predictable rhythm to lead global markets.

Raj’s extensive technology background, his deep experience in product development, his successes in meeting GTM timelines, his network, and setting up scalable ops uniquely qualify him to take on challenges high-growth technology company may face.

Experienced leader in research and development roles, with a penchant for hands on development. In recent years I have mostly focused on problems where machine learning and computer vision is needed to accelerate image based information gathering efforts traditionally done manually, such as in mapping and intelligence gathering. This combines powerful and intuitive tools with seamless integration of state of the art machine learning and computer vision techniques. I'm currently in charge of the full technology stack of Percipient.Ai, which includes a horizontally scalable and flexible ML inference platform supporting multiple ML frameworks and capable of processing various types of data, including live video, geospatial imagery and still images, Spark based distributed query engine, web based UI and several supporting back-end micro-services. Specialties: Deep Neural Nets, MxNet, ML/CV + human workflows, machine learning, computer vision, 3D reconsturction, SLAM, sensors (accelerometers, gyros, magnetometers), 3D point cloud processing, gaze tracking, software development.

Steve is a long-time Chief Financial Officer, having served as a CFO for multiple technology companies and investment funds over the past 20 years. Steve served as the CFO for a publicly traded company on the NASDAQ. He has also served in company board of director positions chairing Audit Committees including being a member of the Board of Visitors at George Mason University serving as Chairman of the Audit Committee.