Canada’s Summit for Applied AI

TBA

TBA

From 2018 to 2026, Manuela Veloso was the founder and Head of JPMorganChase AI Research & Herbert A. Simon University Professor Emerita at Carnegie Mellon University, where she was faculty in the Computer Science Department and then Head of the Machine Learning Department.

Veloso has a licenciatura degree in Electrical Engineering and an M.Sc. in Electrical and Computer Engineering from Instituto Superior Técnico, Lisbon, an M.A. in Computer Science from Boston University, and a Ph.D. in Computer Science from Carnegie Mellon University. Veloso has Doctorate Honoris Causa degrees from the Örebro University, Sweden, the Instituto Universitário de Lisboa (ISCTE), Portugal, the Université de Bordeaux, France, and the Universidade Católica of Portugal.

She served as president of the Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence (AAAI), and she is co-founder and a Past President of the RoboCup Federation. She is a fellow of main professional organizations in her area, namely AAAI, IEEE, AAAS, and ACM. She is the recipient of the ACM/SIGART Autonomous Agents Research Award, the Einstein Chair of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, an NSF Career Award, and the Allen Newell Medal for Excellence in Research. Veloso is a member of the National Academy of Engineering with a citation “for contributions to artificial intelligence and its applications in robotics and the financial services industry.” She is also a member of the Academy of Sciences of Portugal.

Her research interests are in AI, including Autonomous Robots, Multiagent Systems, Continual Learning Agents, and AI in Finance. For further details, see www.cs.cmu.edu/~mmv.

Freddy Lecue is a Managing Director and Head of Frontier AI Model Methodology at Wells Fargo, where he architects and scales Generative AI, agentic AI, and advanced machine learning models for enterprise production, while balancing performance, latency, cost, and risk.

He leads the firm’s AI research agenda, elevates modeling standards through targeted training, and establishes best-practice frameworks to enhance robustness, scalability, and model validation. Freddy also drives AI-enabled transformation across the end-to-end model lifecycle, including development, documentation, testing, and validation.

Prior to Wells Fargo, he held senior AI leadership roles at JPMorgan Chase, Thales Canada, Accenture Ireland, and IBM Ireland. He holds a Ph.D. in Computer Science and is based in New York City.

Armando Benitez is the Chief Data & Analytics Officer (CDAO) and Head of AI at BMO Capital Markets. He leads a team of engineers, strategists, and AI professionals who create end-to-end solutions at the intersection of Finance and Technology.

As CDAO, Armando shapes the strategic vision for data and analytics, integrating AI into business processes to drive innovation and improve decision-making. His leadership promotes data-driven insights and aligns technological initiatives with business goals.

Armando joined BMO’s ETF desk in 2016 after working on data products for fraud detection and recommender systems at Paytm. With a background in High Energy Physics, he brings a unique perspective to the team.

Dr. Mamdani is Clinical Lead – Artificial Intelligence at Ontario Health and Director of the University of Toronto Temerty Faculty of Medicine Centre for Artificial Intelligence Research and Education in Medicine (T-CAIREM). Previously, Dr. Mamdani was Vice President of Data Science and Advanced Analytics at Unity Health Toronto where his team deployed over 50 AI solutions to improve patient outcomes and hospital efficiency. Dr. Mamdani is also Professor in the Department of Medicine of the Temerty Faculty of Medicine, the Leslie Dan Faculty of Pharmacy, and the Institute of Health Policy, Management and Evaluation of the Dalla Lana School of Public Health. He is also an Affiliate Scientist at IC/ES and a Faculty Affiliate of the Vector Institute. In 2024, Dr. Mamdani’s team received the national Solventum Health Care Innovation Team Award by the Canadian College of Health Leaders. Also in 2024, Dr. Mamdani was named international AI Leader of the Year by AIMed. Previously, Dr. Mamdani was named among Canada’s Top 40 under 40. He has published over 600 studies in peer-reviewed medical journals. Dr. Mamdani obtained a Doctor of Pharmacy degree (PharmD) from the University of Michigan (Ann Arbor) and completed a fellowship in pharmacoeconomics and outcomes research at the Detroit Medical Center. During his fellowship, Dr. Mamdani obtained a Master of Arts degree in Economics from Wayne State University with a concentration in econometric theory. He then completed a Master of Public Health degree from Harvard University with a concentration in quantitative methods.

Prof. Steven Waslander is a leading authority on autonomous robotics, including self-driving cars and multirotor drones. He received his B.Sc.E.in 1998 from Queen’s University, his M.S. in 2002 and his Ph.D. in 2007, both from Stanford University in Aeronautics and Astronautics. He was recruited to the University of Waterloo from Stanford in 2008, where he led the Autonomoose project, the first self-driving car to be tested on public roads by a Canadian university. In 2018, he joined the University of Toronto Institute for Aerospace Studies (UTIAS), and founded the Toronto Robotics and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory (TRAILab).