The speed with which AI has hit the trends and got whole industries reconsidering themselves, trying to predict or shape the way they inevitably will be disrupted, is amazing. The research community foresees changes of degrees comparable with the adaption of the Internet and publications that prove that idea appear frequently. At the same time, the future of AI and corresponding industry is still full of uncertainty, so there is no surprise that tech giants desperately search how they can leverage the upcoming technology by seeking for experience and special talents.
It was Summer of 2013 in New York, and Matthew Zeiler, a soon to be Ph.D. in artificial intelligence at New York University, was one of such talents. One may consider his student loans to be paid when Google, Microsoft and Apple come knocking his door and Mike Zuckerberg tries to get in touch to set a meeting. They say, “no man is an island”. Well, it seemed like something Matthew Zeiler never heard of, when instead of playing it safe and accepting one of the multiple offerings, he decided to run his own company – Clarifai.
For years since being founded, Clarifai competes with giants of tech industry and lands multinationals as Unilever, BuzzFeed, Ubisoft as clients. The AI solutions provided by the Matthew Zeiler’s startup are considered to be on par with what costed Google and Microsoft billions in acquisitions and other AI investments. Matthew Zeiler started on his own, hosting servers in his flat and opening the platform for the third-party developers. In 2017, Clarifai employs 55 bright minds and steals some of the best Google’s people. And it is understandable.
AI is a dynamic industry, and just like IT has paved the way for some startups into global leaders, the new industry of AI is predicted to do the same. Staying agile is key and constant challenge is an important driver for an ambitious group of software engineers to lead the community to the new high-tech industry order.
Would you have the courage of Matthew to reject all the offers and start from scratch? How do you see the role of startups in modern and dynamic industries?
Hi Nikita,
Nice blog to read and a very interesting guy to follow, I did not know him yet. If I did not know how fine Matthew is doing right now, I would have considered him crazy for rejecting those offers! Most people – especially in our field of studies – can only dream of working at one of those giants. But it seems that he made the right decision, since I guess that most people would love to run their own business too. Besides the financial benefits it is great to create something entirely new. Let’s be honest; how awesome would it be to invent the next Facebook or Google?! And given his capabilities and current job, I think that those big companies would hire him instantly if clarifai would not work out in the end.