The effective application of AI and data can be truly transformational. It can help enterprises smash the competition, create massive internal productivity gains and win customers. However, there are a number of challenges that are holding us back today. Central among them is the application of AI to legacy environments, which may create short-term efficiencies but lack a truly transformational impact. AI, automation, and analytics also have tremendous potential when applied together to solve business problems, yet many are implementing these technologies in a piecemeal way. Finally, enterprises often face a lack of stakeholder buy-in for AI, over-investment in the customer-facing front end, and a lack of incentives for third-party service providers to drive change and to help their clients go "straight to digital". This roundtable will examine the Why?, What? and How? when it comes to applying AI and data to drive transformational change.

This event is supported by NIIT Technologies.

Moderators:

Elena Christopher, SVP Research, HFS Research

Elena Christopher leads HFS’ coverage of automation with an emphasis on robotic process automation (RPA) helping to identify and articulate the value proposition for this important change agent and its intersection with other emerging value levers.

As a complement to her change agent focus, she drives the industry-specific research agenda for HFS, digging into the major trends impacting each in-scope industry and the implications for business process and IT services. Elena’s industry coverage specialty is Banking and Financial Services.

Reetika Fleming, Research VP, HFS Research

Reetika leads coverage for smart analytics, insurance, and finance & accounting at HFS Research. She studies the broad use of data and analytics within enterprises, with a research focus on emerging strategies to institutionalize machine learning and other AI techniques. Her research extends into the impact of digital business models, IoT, Smart Analytics, and AI on business process services for insurance specifically, and finance and accounting broadly.

Industry Expert:

Sudhir Singh, CEO, NIIT Technologies

Sudhir is the Chief Executive Officer of NIIT Technologies and serves on the company’s Board of Directors. He joined NIIT Technologies in May 2017 and brings experience across Unilever (Hindustan Lever), Infosys and Genpact to bear on his current role at NIIT Technologies. He has 24 years of industry experience with an exceptional track record of execution, driving robust revenue and margin growth simultaneously, executing business turnarounds and orchestrating successful acquisitions.

Keynote speaker: JoAnn Stonier, Chief Data Officer, Mastercard

JoAnn C. Stonier serves as chief data officer for Mastercard, charged with delivering on both the promise and protections of data. She oversees the curation, maintenance and management of the company’s strong data assets as Mastercard increasingly looks to deepen the value it can provide its merchant, banking and government customers and cardholders through its analytics capabilities.

Reinforcing the critical imperative of putting consumers and their privacy at the center of the data strategy at Mastercard, JoAnn previously served as the company’s chief information governance & chief privacy officer. In that role she was responsible for worldwide privacy and information governance as well as leading regulatory engagement in this area.

Prior to joining Mastercard in 2008, JoAnn was the chief privacy officer for American Express. She also held various roles with the company, including chief operating officer, American Express Tax & Business Services; vice president, acquisition integration; and vice president & assistant to the chairman. JoAnn has worked at Waldenbooks, Inc., PepsiCo and started her career as an auditor for PriceWaterhouse Coopers.

JoAnn often speaks on the need for balancing data innovation and privacy, and has been recognized as an innovative leader in data and privacy by the Aspen Institute, the United Nations and the Information Governance Initiative. JoAnn was instrumental in the creation of Trūata, a trust co-founded by Mastercard and IBM that offers a new approach to handling data anonymization in order to meet the data protection standard established by the EU-General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). JoAnn currently serves on the Trūata board.

In addition to her work at Mastercard, JoAnn is an adjunct professor at Pratt Institute, where she teaches business strategy and international business in the Design Management Master’s program; she has served on the boards of the International Association of Privacy Professionals, the Center for Information Policy Leadership and the Information Accountability Foundation.

JoAnn received her Juris Doctorate from St. John’s University and her Bachelor of Science degree from St. Francis College. She holds memberships in the Bar of the State of New York and the Bar of the State of New Jersey. She is based in Purchase, N.Y.

About HFS roundtables

HFS roundtables are “invitation only,” intimate gatherings of senior executives from Global 2000 Enterprises. As these events are private and operate under Chatham House rules, delegates are able to be candid and upfront with ideas, which means far more interesting and valuable discussion.

When you join us for your first event you will be made part of an exclusive club of peers, which means you can make better connections and be the first to get hold of the most forward thinking HFS insights.

Note: These events are available to senior executives only. Registering for this event without a personal invite from our team puts you on a waiting list for approval to attend. You will be notified promptly if approved.

HFS Research is a "Future Business Operations" analyst firm that introduced the world to terms such as "RPA" (Robotic Process Automation) in 2012 and more recently “Digital One Office.” Learn more via our website www.hfsresearch.com and our events site www.hfsevents.com

Watch JoAnn Stonier highlight the Mastercard approach to AI from a recent HFS NYC roundtable