297: Silvio Savarese, EVP Salesforce, From Ivory Tower to Corporate Labs: The Real Challenges of AI Development

Silvio Savarese is a pioneer and AI research lead with the AI research team at Salesforce, one of the largest and most influential enterprise software companies globally. Before joining Salesforce in 2021 as Executive Vice President and Chief Scientist, Silvio spent nearly 11 years in academia at Stanford, where his research focused on robotics, machine learning, and language models. At Salesforce, his team has developed AI tools like CodeGen, which assists with coding using conversational AI, and Merlion, which enhances system availability by detecting potential failures through time series intelligence. Silvio's team is also working on conversational AI for personalized summaries. He is a strong advocate for practicing AI responsibly, contributing to Salesforce's advocacy on AI trust, safety, privacy, and security.

In this conversation:

• Silvio's journey from academia to industry and the challenges he faced during this transition.
• We explore the differences between working in academia and leading an AI research team at Salesforce.
• Silvio shares insights on how his background in robotics informs his current work with AI for enterprise software.
• We delve into the ethical considerations and responsible practices in AI development at Salesforce.
• Silvio explains the three pillars of AI research at Salesforce: foundational research, product incubation, and product innovation.
• We examine the trade-offs between using large language models versus smaller models in AI applications, including their environmental impact and potential risks.

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