Tom Gruber led the team that designed Siri, the Apple AI Assistant, and is currently leading Humanistic.ai, which advises companies and organizations on the use of AI to serve human needs. He is a designer, entrepreneur, and AI thought leader who uses technology to augment human intelligence. He was cofounder, CTO and head of design for Siri, which created the first intelligent assistant for everyone. At Apple, Tom led the Advanced Development Group, which developed new capabilities to bring intelligence to the interface for current and future products.

Throughout his career, Tom has explored the intersection of AI and the UI between humans and computers. In the 1980’s he built AI models for communication prosthesis systems that gave voices to the speechless, and interfaces for experts to build their own expert systems. At Stanford University he developed the first interactive documents on the web that generated natural language answers in response to questions about how things work. His AI research, particularly ontology engineering, helped lay the groundwork for semantic information sharing and the Semantic Web.

He has created several products and companies that support human collaboration and knowledge sharing. He invented HyperMail, the widely used open-source application that turns email conversations into collective memories on the Web. He was founder and CTO of Intraspect Software, which pioneered the space of Collaborative Knowledge Management — software that helps large communities of professionals contribute to and learn from a collective body of knowledge. He designed and built RealTravel, a collective knowledge system where millions of travelers from around the world share their experiences.

Tom promotes the philosophy of Humanistic AI, which he presented in a popular TED talk. He was a founding board member of the Partnership on AI to Benefit People and Society and advocates for the Center for Humane Technology. Tom has served as in an advisory role with many companies including LinkedIn, Internet Archive, SocialText, Powerset, Mindjet, Radar Networks, and Goldman Sachs.  He currently advises companies and organizations that use AI to have a positive impact on humanity, including leaders in Assistive Neurotech, Mental Health Care, Intelligent Customer Interaction, and Predictive Assistance.

For more information, see https://tomgruber.org/about-tom/