Xuedong "X.D." Huang

CTO

Zoom

Xuedong (X.D.) Huang is the chief technology officer at Zoom, where he leads the AI strategy and services for the company. Xuedong is a renowned technology leader who has been instrumental in bringing speech recognition and AI to the mass market. He has led groundbreaking milestones in speech recognition, machine translation, natural language understanding, and computer vision.

 

Prior to joining Zoom in 2023, he worked at Microsoft, where he served as Azure AI CTO and technical fellow. He began Microsoft’s speech technology group in 1993 and led Microsoft’s AI teams to achieve several of the industry’s first human parity milestones in speech recognition, machine translation, natural language understanding, and computer vision. He is an inventor with over 170 U.S. patents and has authored over 100 papers and two books. He is an IEEE and ACM Fellow, an elected member of the National Academy of Engineering and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and received the IEEE Bose Industrial Leader Award in 2023.

 

Xuedong received his Ph.D. from the University of Edinburgh in 1989 (sponsored by the British ORS and Edinburgh University Scholarship), his M.S. from Tsinghua University in 1984, and his B.S. from Hunan University in 1982.

Xuedong "X.D." Huang

CTO

Zoom

Xuedong (X.D.) Huang is the chief technology officer at Zoom, where he leads the AI strategy and services for the company. Xuedong is a renowned technology leader who has been instrumental in bringing speech recognition and AI to the mass market. He has led groundbreaking milestones in speech recognition, machine translation, natural language understanding, and computer vision.

 

Prior to joining Zoom in 2023, he worked at Microsoft, where he served as Azure AI CTO and technical fellow. He began Microsoft’s speech technology group in 1993 and led Microsoft’s AI teams to achieve several of the industry’s first human parity milestones in speech recognition, machine translation, natural language understanding, and computer vision. He is an inventor with over 170 U.S. patents and has authored over 100 papers and two books. He is an IEEE and ACM Fellow, an elected member of the National Academy of Engineering and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and received the IEEE Bose Industrial Leader Award in 2023.

 

Xuedong received his Ph.D. from the University of Edinburgh in 1989 (sponsored by the British ORS and Edinburgh University Scholarship), his M.S. from Tsinghua University in 1984, and his B.S. from Hunan University in 1982.

Sohrab Rahimi

Partner

McKinsey & Company

Sohrab helps organizations use AI to reinvent themselves and accelerate growth by creating new opportunities through reshaping their operations. He leads McKinsey’s North America Data Science Guild, with a dual focus on innovation and the cultivation of a culture of excellence.

 

He works across industries, applying deep technical expertise in AI/GenAI and optimization methods. His primary focus is on conversational and voice-enabled AI products, where he has helped organizations enhance workforce management and operational excellence. His experience spans telecommunications, energy and utilities, life sciences, financial services, insurance, and healthcare.

In addition to his client work, Sohrab has long been involved in AI research, having authored more than ten peer-reviewed machine learning publications. Additionally, he holds two patents in the field.

Steve Kirton

Angel Investor

VANE