Generative AI Success Stories

Schedule

The time frames are only estimates and may vary according to how the class is progressing.

Jon Hassell: Introduction (5 minutes) - 8:00am PT | 11:00am ET | 3:00pm UTC/GMT

• Jon Hassell welcomes you to Generative AI Success Stories.

Tim O’Reilly: Keynote (10 minutes) - 8:05am PT | 11:05am ET | 3:05pm UTC/GMT

• Tim O’Reilly is the founder, CEO, and chairman of O'Reilly Media, the company that has been providing the picks and shovels of learning to the Silicon Valley gold rush for more than 40 years. The company has a history of convening conversations that reshape the computer industry. If you've heard the term “open source software,” “web 2.0,” “the Maker movement,” “government as a platform,” or “the WTF economy,” he's had a hand in framing each of those big ideas. Tim is also a partner at early stage venture firm O'Reilly AlphaTech Ventures (OATV) and on the boards of Code for America, PeerJ, Civis Analytics, and PopVox. He’s the author of many technical books published by O'Reilly, and most recently WTF? What's the Future and Why It's Up to Us (Harper Business, 2017). He’s working on a new book about why we need to rethink antitrust in the era of internet-scale platforms.

Alan Flower and Tim O’Reilly: A Discussion of AI in Business (25 minutes) - 8:15am PT | 11:15am ET | 3:15pm UTC/GMT

• Alan Flower discusses stories from the field and how his customers have benefitted from—and are using everyday—generative AI technologies across industry verticals. As head of a vibrant consulting practice at HCLtech, Alan has seen hundreds of business problems and used various tools and techniques in the generative AI toolshed to improve productivity, quality, and velocity. Join Tim O’Reilly and Alan in a rich discussion of how generative AI is being used in production to solve real business challenges and create added value.
• Alan Flower heads the HCLTech Cloud Native & AI Labs business and is also its CTO for cloud native. His combination of in-depth engineering credibility and hands-on experience leading global technology organizations gives him a unique perspective on the application of modern AI and cloud-enabled services to accelerate market success. As an entrepreneur and technologist who has brought over 250 technology solutions to market, he’s passionate about driving the creation of innovative products and services and using technology to support business transformation. Alan leads HCLTech corporate participation in open source communities such as the Linux Foundation, and he’s a Governing Board Director of the Cloud Native Computing Foundation and a Fellow of the British Computer Society who mentors the career development of technology leaders.

Eran Yahav: SDLC 3.0—How Generative AI Is Transforming Software Development (25 minutes) - 8:40am PT | 11:40am ET | 3:40pm UTC/GMT

• Of all of the applications of artificial intelligence today, generative AI is proving to be the most disruptive and transformative. And its most mature and widely adopted use case is in AI-powered software development tools. Join Eran Yahav to learn how AI is radically remaking the way software is built and maintained. He discusses how AI is accelerating and simplifying the creation of code, tests, and documentation, the role of AI in maintenance, refactoring, and modernization of applications, and how code quality, performance, and security can be maintained or improved with the use of AI. He also shares the business impact of AI coding assistants.
• Eran Yahav is CTO and one of the originators of the AI coding assistant category at Tabnine, as well as a professor of computer science at the Technion, Israel. His research interests include program synthesis, machine learning for code, program analysis, and program verification. Eran loves long-distance running, and while he has not won any medals yet, he has suffered heat stroke at least once trying.
• Break (5 minutes)

Merrin Kurian and Shivang Shah: Transforming the World of Consumer and Small Business Finance with Generative AI (25 minutes) - 9:10am PT | 12:10pm ET | 4:10pm UTC/GMT

• Intuit has accelerated AI innovation at scale to deliver personalized experiences to millions of consumer and small business customers with TurboTax, Credit Karma, QuickBooks, and Mailchimp. Over the past 18 months, the company has supercharged its financial technology platform with generative AI to deliver game-changing new experiences that instill the trust and confidence its customers count on. Merrin Kurian and Shivang Shah provide key insights into the company’s strategy for mobilizing its global tech organization—software developers, machine learning engineers, data scientists, and product managers—to build GenAI-powered fintech products with speed at scale. They provide a peek behind Intuit’s GenAI operating system (GenOS), and real-world Mailchimp application examples for driving business growth and expansion at small and medium-size companies.
• Merrin Kurian is a principal engineer and AI platform architect responsible for GenOS—Intuit’s proprietary operating system for generative AI app development—and the machine learning platform for developing and serving classical AI models. Merrin has led several technology transformations, including Intuit’s public cloud adoption of Quickbooks Online and Intuit’s first no-code model development and serving solution. She earned master’s degrees in computer science and in business administration from the Birla Institute of Science and Technology, Pilani.
• Shivang Shah is responsible for the end-to-end technology strategy and architecture of Intuit Mailchimp, where he combines his passions for data, reusable capabilities, and building platforms to direct the building of innovative solutions for Mailchimp’s customers. Previously, Shivang was a Distinguished Engineer with the QuickBooks Online team and has also served in technology roles at leading brands like Gap Inc., TOTVS Labs, and IBM. He has a computer science degree from San Jose State University.

Susan Emerson: Unleashing Trapped Value—Salesforce's Generative AI in Action (25 minutes) - 9:35am PT | 12:35pm ET | 4:35pm UTC/GMT

• Explore the transformative potential of Salesforce's generative AI technology. Whether you're a seasoned Salesforce user or new to AI-driven solutions, you’ll learn how GenAI enhances customer interactions, boosts productivity, and drives revenue growth as Susan Emerson shares dynamic use cases spanning domains such as sales, service, marketing, and more. You’ll also gain valuable insights into the tangible business value of generative AI and practical strategies for implementation. Discover how to break down barriers, streamline workflows, and unlock untapped opportunities within your organization.
• Susan Emerson leads Salesforce’s generative AI global GTM and customer engagement. A foundational team member who launched and brought CRM Analytics and Einstein AI products to market, she’s held a number of global leadership positions in distribution, product, marketing, and industry solutions for CRM Analytics, data, and AI, and works with customers and partners on strategies to leverage and gain value from Salesforce analytics and AI technologies.
• Break (5 minutes)

Ethan Mollick and Tim O’Reilly: Living and Working with AI (25 minutes) - 10:05am PT | 1:05pm ET | 5:05pm UTC/GMT

• Join Tim O’Reilly and Ethan Mollick for an engaging 30-minute Q&A session as they explore the groundbreaking concepts presented in Mollick’s recently published book, Co-Intelligence: Living and Working with AI. Tim and Ethan explore AI as a force for good for the everyday end user, how to live with and harness its capabilities to improve productivity and capability, and, perhaps most importantly, how not to be misled by it. This wide-ranging discussion, grounded in real-world examples, sheds light on how all workers can ensure we master the skills necessary to fully engage with AI as it grows in prevalence in all walks of life.
• Ethan Mollick is an author and associate professor at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, where he studies and teaches innovation and entrepreneurship and examines the effects of artificial intelligence on work and education. His academic papers have been published in top management journals and his research has been covered by CNN, The New York Times, and other leading publications. He also leads Wharton Interactive, an effort to democratize education using games, simulations, and AI. Ethan received his PhD and MBA from MIT’s Sloan School of Management and his bachelor’s degree from Harvard University.

Carmen Vetere: Making Marketing More Productive with AI (10 minutes) 10:30am PT | 1:30pm ET | 5:30pm UTC/GMT

• Marketing teams are making use of generative AI in their marketing and sales programs to drive greater productivity and efficiency. At O'Reilly, we've put GenAI to work in enhancing sales development productivity through the use of conversational assistants that automatically draft and respond to emails to and from prospects. O’Reilly’s chief marketing officer Carmen Vetere shares O'Reilly's experience using generative AI tools in marketing—actual wins and results, what the comp[any has learned, and what the road map looks like for AI-driven marketing.
• Carmen Vetere is chief marketing officer for O’Reilly. He oversees O'Reilly’s demand generation activities, engagement marketing for its platform users, sales enablement support, brand development, and creative execution. His professional experience has focused on leveraging marketing as a tool for helping high-growth brands unlock their potential. Previously, Carmen held marketing strategy roles at CVS Health, Gazelle, and Virgin Money. On video calls you can often hear his French bulldog, Auggie, snoring.

Luke Harries: How AI Audio is Transforming Media and Creating New Markets—From Dubbing to AI Agents (25 minutes) 10:40am PT | 1:40pm ET | 5:40pm UTC/GMT

• In the past year, AI-generated audio has achieved a breakthrough, becoming indistinguishable from human speech. This has sparked a Cambrian explosion of AI audio applications. Luke Harries outlines the technologies driving this transformation, including multilingual text-to-speech, voice cloning, and dubbing. He discusses how these advancements are transforming industries such as journalism, entertainment, and AI customer support and offers practical insights on integrating these tools into your business through existing products or building on the API.
• Luke Harries leads growth at ElevenLabs, a unicorn that has built the most advanced audio AI foundation models and products. With over a million users and clients like The New York Times, HarperCollins, and Perplexity AI, ElevenLabs is the leader in audio AI. An engineer by background, he started his career in machine learning research at Microsoft and cofounded a Y Combinator-backed health startup. He holds a bachelor's degree in natural sciences from Cambridge University and a master’s in computer science from University College London.

Jon Hassell: Closing Remarks (5 minutes) - 11:05am PT | 2:05pm ET | 6:05pm UTC/GMT

• Jon Hassell closes out today’s event.