Jay van Zyl

Innovator and entrepreneur in the world of intelligent technology innovation. Currently involved in a number of projects that focus on artificial intelligence and how the human-social dimension is used to produce more reliable predictions through computational social science. Machine learning is used in a number of situations that require effective use of data with supervised and unsupervised related algorithms. Including human behavior, where re-enforcement learning and inference get used, is pushing us into a new realm of research.

The last 20 years: working at the cusp of innovative technology and business models in product design and delivery. Interested in mega-waves of change and how humans transform themselves through cycles of innovation and intelligence. Spent the first half of my career caring about the “how” of innovation, leading up to the completion of my PhD in 2001. The influence of digital and technological inventions on the human, lifted my focus to the “why” humans innovate. Now the focus is to build prediction models that can be deployed into realtime systems.

Adjunct faculty at the Gordon Institute of Business Science and California State University.

“Built to Thrive, making your mark in a connected world” was published in 2011 focuses on the social aspects of innovation. The “Process Innovation Imperative” book focuses on innovation in product companies originally published in 2003.

Working with the the “Innovation for Jobs” community in Silicon Valley as the lead analytics partner based at the Stanford Research Institute.