RESEARCHER. TECHNOLOGIST. ENTREPRENEUR.
Emergence at the intersection of disruption and prosperity.
“AI’s impact ON HUMANITY IS NOTHING
SHORT OF MYTHICAL. AN inquiry INTO ITS UNDERPINNINGS
WILL NOT ONLY ENABLE US to transform,but to transcend.”
- Nikos Acuña -
About Nikos
Nikos Acuña is an award-winning author, researcher, entrepreneur, and speaker. With decades of experience in tech and AI, his work spans a wide variety of topics—media theory, design, computer science, futurism, and tech philosophy.
His writings, lectures, and keynotes explore AI’s mythological impact on humanity, how to navigate an increasingly complex digital landscape, govern data responsibly, and how humanity can flourish through universal intelligence.
His unique ability as technology practitioner, researcher, business executive, and author provides an illuminating perspective on the future of humanity, business, and society, while restoring visionary ideals of technology’s promise to serve people—not for people to serve algorithmic systems powered by machines.
Regarded as a luminary in all things digital, artificial intelligence, and human-machine symbiosis, Nikos is focused on solutions to achieve abundance and prosperity while accelerating human flourishing in the age of AI.
Nikos is the co-founder of DialIN—a new super app and media platform re-imagining the web. He is also the co-founder of Lyrical—an AI powered semantic engine and an innovation lab for building AI systems of the future. Nikos also drives AI commercialization initiatives for Domo, a data experience platform.
Prior to DialIN and Lyrical, Nikos pioneered advanced machine learning products at Rocket Fuel as director of innovation through the IPO in 2013, the acquisition of X+1 in 2014, Sizmek’s acquisition of Rocket Fuel in 2017, and its sale to Amazon in 2019—with GTMs that drove over $100m in revenues.
Nikos led cross-functional data science, engineering, product, and operations teams globally while extracting insights from 500b daily marketing observations. He became the managing director of the Rocket Fuel Institute, the company’s AI innovation lab, where his passion as a researcher crystallized into his ethos on data sovereignty and leveraging technology transformation as a means for prosperity.
He is the author of over a dozen research papers on AI and cross-industry data transformation. He also wrote several books, including Mindshare, which received Foreword Magazine’s Book of the Year Award and the USA Best Book Award.
His current research explores emergent properties across quantum mechanics, AI, and cognitive neuroscience.
Nikos is from San Francisco and currently lives in Chicago.
Speaking
Nikos explores the implications of ai on the future of humanity
Why should Nikos speak at your event? Nikos has a truly unique perspective on AI as an emergent entity from an interdisciplinary perspective. Few speakers can explore AI like a modern mosaic and across a vast sprectrum of critical lenses—from a technical and pragmatic perspective in building AI and data applications for enterprises, from a macro-economic view to transform societies through universal intelligence, from a cultural and spiritual take on AGI and the singularity, and from a humanistic perspective that focuses on building AI systems with an ethical and principled ethos.
WHY AI NEEDS A HEART
The future of humanity is now on the precipice, with evolutionary technologies like large language models and ChatGPT, generative AI, and advanced deep learning. Collective fears are hinged upon AI overlords emerging, humanity’s dignity being depleted, and losing the battle of profit over ethics. But this challenge can be solved the same way it was created—but with a much more audacious goal… giving AI a heart. This keynote explores the underlying attributes of emotion, abundance, and love, and how to bridge the technical with the spiritual in order for humanity to thrive in the age of AI. Giving AI a heart means unlocking dimensions around what makes us more than human—a transcendent function that will emerge through our awareness and empathy for one another.
HUMAN-MACHINE SYMBIOSIS: how technology transforms us
The supercomputers in our pockets now have more power than the best communication device only the U.S. president had just 30 years ago. This digital transformation impacts business at a macroscopic scale, rewiring our brains and changing our experiences in ways we have yet to fathom. The interaction between humanity and technology looks beyond the horizon into the cosmological exploration of human potential, when it is augmented by the very tools that have emerged from our imaginations. This keynote explores how AI will impact the future of work, healthcare, economies, and society as a whole. Let Nikos reveal the intrinsic properties of our symbiotic connection to technology, showing how businesses and individuals can leverage exponential thinking to build intelligent solutions that enable us to exceed our limitations, do the unthinkable, and achieve the impossible.
SOLVING THE AI ALIGNMENT PROBLEM
In today's rapidly evolving technological landscape, the AI alignment problem stands as one of the most pressing and intricate challenges we face. This keynote delves deep into the heart of ensuring that artificial intelligence operates in harmony with human values and intentions. We will explore cutting-edge strategies and methodologies that researchers and innovators are employing to bridge the gap between machine learning objectives and human-centric goals. Join Nikos as he journeys through the complexities of AI behavior, the potential pitfalls of misalignment, and the promising solutions that aim to shape a future where AI not only augments human capabilities but also resonates with our deepest ethical and moral convictions.
SYMBIOSIS.
Creator
What does the future hold? Nikos is on a quest to explore innovation that occurs at the intersection of AI, emerging technology, and experiences in his video series and podcast, Symbiosis. Watch these thought-provoking investigations as Nikos probes the questions that help us understand and reveal what we are destined to become.
Executive Producer
AI Academy is a series and in-person workshop that educates audiences about the latest AI tools like generative AI, large-language models (LLMs), and Deep Learning in an intuitive, approachable way. From the very basic definitions to the nuts and bolts of how AI works, this series is a foundational primer for general users aiming to learn more about how AI platforms like ChatGPT, MidJourney, Stable Diffusion, Runway, Jasper, and more can transform the future of work, and your business.
HUMAN FLOURISHING IN THE AGE OF AI
In an era dominated by algorithms that often compromise both personalization and privacy, the advent of meaningful AI promises to redefine our digital experiences and transform the entire world. This next-gen AI doesn't just gather data; it understands deeper context, adapts in real-time, and focuses on what is meaningful for every user at the highest possible resolution. Beyond personal utility, universal intelligence has the potential to transform economic systems, drive equitable wealth distribution and optimized resource allocation through hyper-efficient automation.
This presentation provides a kaleidoscopic snapshot of exponential change, technology transformation, and human-machine symbiosis. It’s a rally-cry for executives, practitioners, and policy-makers on implementing AI with intent and purpose, while achieving technical fluency in a cognitive world:
How digital transformation and accelerating change impacts business at a cosmological scale
How to build an infrastructure for AI-powered experiences
Deconstructing and differentiating AI, DSML, generative AI and the entire AI lexicon
How to create value in a world of real time interaction and dynamic intelligence
How to focus on human flourishing through meaningful, universal AI
AI-ENABLED BUSINESS TRANSFORMATION
Artificial intelligence is sweeping the globe at an unprecedented pace and scale, and every business must focus on how to AI-enable their company, achieve deeper insights, and deliver consistent outcomes that scale. All this, while maintaining the rate of innovation at lightning speed and agility. If only you had a blueprint. Nikos delves into best practices from over a decade of experience in building and deploying advanced AI data products globally, across industries and a variety of use cases:
From getting started with AI no matter how large or small your organization
Creating a proper AI stack and architecture using the latest cloud-based tools and generative large-language models
Deploying AI models, productionizing ML, and running model ops across large scale enterprises
Mastering AI security, governance, and data integrity
Creating conversational systems that are personalized, flexible, and automated
mindshare
Told in a rich, lyrical style, Mindshare is a portrait of the modern creative mind and a narrative of its process, a practical guide, and a plea for ambition that captures the imagination by exploring the dynamic nature of creativity and innovation as a multifaceted, integrated craft and the creation of consciousness.
additional writing
Symbiosis
The Definitive Field Guide for AI-Powered Marketing
The Predictive Business
A 7 Part Book on Cross-Industry Digital Transformation
For more information, please contact Nikos at n@nikosacuna.com.
