Vancouver AI Connect vol. 6 - presented by RBC Borealis
Vancouver AI Connect invites the AI and Machine Learning (ML) community to this exciting evening with leading industry experts. This edition will feature a keynote speakers Handol Kim, CEO, Variational AI for a talk on 'Applying AI for drug discovery' and Cornelius Van Heerden, Data Analytics Expert, Google Cloud for a talk on 'Grounding SAS in Reality, breaking through human technical debt' and Ruizhi Deng, Machine Learning Researcher, RBC Borealis for a talk on "ATOM: RBC's proprietary AI Foundation Model for Financial Services". These experts will share industry insights and their latest research. The event will also include opportunities for networking over light refreshment.
Don't miss this chance to expand your knowledge and connect with the AI community!
Agenda:
5:30pm: Doors Open
5:35pm - 5:40pm: Opening Remarks
5:45pm - 6:35pm: Talks
6:35pm - 7:10pm: Panel Discussion
7:10pm - 8:00pm: Networking & Refreshments
Speaker Info
Handol Kim is Co-Founder & CEO of Variational AI. Founded in 2019 and based in Vancouver, Variational AI has developed Enki, a proprietary foundation model for small molecule drug discovery. He has 25 years of leadership experience across software, semiconductors, and machine learning in Silicon Valley, Asia Pacific and Canada.
Cornelius van Heerden is a Data Analytics Expert at Google Cloud, specializing in architecting the "post-dashboard data era" for enterprise AI. A vocal advocate for replacing traditional physical data pipelines with robust semantic models, Cornelius helps organizations ground their Generative AI and agentic systems in business-ready data. Through his popular technical writing and work with tools like BigQuery, Looker, and Dataplex, he bridges the gap between complex data engineering and strategic AI outcomes.
Ruizhi Deng, is a member of the ATOM foundation model team at RBC Borealis, which he joined in 2023. He holds a PhD in Computing Science from Simon Fraser University. At RBC Borealis, Ruizhi has worked on event sequence modeling and embedding within the ATOM team, and currently focuses on building generative and agentic AI capabilities on top of the ATOM foundation model.