As AI systems evolve to become more autonomous, adaptive, and embedded, a critical question emerges:
The MIT Sloan Management Review Middle East’s AI Research Forum is the region’s premier platform for exploring the breakthroughs, strategies, and economic impact of AI.
The inaugural meeting of the forum will spotlight Agentic AI, which represents a transformative leap from task-specific tools to proactive agents capable of reasoning, learning, and acting with intent.
The forum on Agentic AI will bring together leading researchers, academic pioneers, and technology experts. Together, they will turn cutting-edge research into actionable insights—empowering leaders to drive innovation, enhance efficiency, and create lasting value.
2023 Summit Attendee
Assistant Professor,
MIT Computer Science & AI Lab
Professor and Chair in Digital Economy
QUT Business School
Founding Director of the Institute for Data, Systems, and Society & Professor
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Associate Professor of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science,
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Group Director of Engineering
London Stock Exchange Group (LSEG)
Chief Executive Officer
Alef Education
Group Director of Engineering
London Stock Exchange Group (LSEG)
Group Director of Engineering
London Stock Exchange Group (LSEG)
8:30
Abbie Lundberg, Editor in Chief, MIT SMR
Elizabeth Heichler, Editorial Director, MIT SMR
Tim Kraska
Associate Professor of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science,
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
The rise of autonomous AI demands a fundamental rethinking of leadership competencies and styles. This session addresses the evolving role of leaders managing hybrid human-AI teams, emphasizing new responsibilities around ethical AI culture-building, governance, and decision rights.
Geoffrey Alphonso
Chief Executive Officer,
Alef Education
Marek Kowalkiewicz
Professor and Chair in Digital Economy,
QUT Business School
Abbie Lundberg, Editor in Chief, MIT SMR
Elizabeth Heichler, Editorial Director, MIT SMR
Abbie Lundberg, Editor in Chief, MIT SMR
Elizabeth Heichler, Editorial Director, MIT SMR
As AI systems transition from reactive tools to autonomous agents capable of initiating complex actions, organizations face profound shifts in how control and responsibility are shared. This session explores the evolving concept of agency within AI, highlighting challenges in trusting machines to act independently and the ripple effects on accountability and oversight.
Autonomous AI agents fundamentally alter how teams operate by contributing independent, intelligent action alongside humans. This session investigates how organizations can foster productive human-AI collaboration by leveraging the complementary strengths of human creativity and machine autonomy.
Dr. Dirk Jungnickel
SVP of Enterprise & Analytics & Intelligence,
Emirates
Srimanth Rudraraju
Group Director of Engineering,
London Stock Exchange Group (LSEG)
Paul Potgieter
Director – Technology and Platforms,
NEOM
Dylan Hadfield-Menell,
Assistant Professor,
MIT Computer Science & AI Lab
Munther Dahleh,
Founding Director of the MIT Institute for Data, Systems, and Society & Professor,
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Autonomous AI agents face specific security challenges such as adversarial manipulation, data breaches, and operational interruptions. Implementing robust safeguards like anomaly detection, secure data pipelines, and fail-safe protocols is critical to maintaining system integrity. Embedding security and resilience throughout the AI lifecycle ensures mission-critical applications remain trustworthy and operational under adverse conditions.
Paul Potgieter is shaping how digital systems and intelligent infrastructure accelerate NEOM’s ambition to build a cognitive, adaptive city. His focus is on embedding scalable digital platforms that power new economic models and drive differentiated value in an era of AI-native urban development.
Awad Ahmed Ali El-Sidiq is driving the transformation of energy infrastructure through AI-powered analytics at ADNOC Distribution. With over 15 years of experience across enterprise data systems and large-scale AI implementations, he has pioneered advanced machine learning use cases in the oil and gas sector that deliver tangible business outcomes. His work enables data to operate as an intelligent asset—powering faster, more adaptive decision-making across the organization. Recognized globally for his leadership in enterprise AI and database architecture, he continues to push the boundaries of what AI can achieve in one of the world’s most vital industries.
Dr. Dirk Jungnickel leads Enterprise Data & Analytics at Emirates Group, overseeing the organization’s AI, data science, and business intelligence capabilities.
With a background in theoretical physics and over two decades in senior roles across industries, he brings a systems-level perspective to the design and governance of enterprise AI.
His work focuses on scaling data-driven decision-making while ensuring alignment, transparency, and operational impact.
Srimanth is a senior technology leader and currently serves as the Director of Engineering for Data & Analytics at the London Stock Exchange Group (LSEG).
With a distinguished career across leading financial institutions including HSBC, JP Morgan, and Lloyds Banking Group, he brings deep expertise in data strategy, large-scale cloud transformation, and building high-performing engineering organisations.
Srimanth is known for driving innovation in complex, regulated environments and is passionate about creating inclusive, future-ready data platforms that deliver real business impact.
Geoffrey Alphonso is the CEO of Alef Education and a transformational leader in the EdTech sector.
With over 20 years of global experience across North America, Australia, and the Middle East, he has led Alef’s growth into an AI-powered education platform reaching hundreds of thousands of students across multiple countries.
Geoffrey is passionate about using emerging technologies to shape the future of learning and sits on advisory boards focused on expanding digital access in underserved communities. He holds an MBA from London Business School.
Jithin George designs and builds agentic AI systems that operate with autonomy, context awareness, and real-time decision-making capabilities.
His work focuses on creating AI agents that can reason, act, and adapt across complex environments—bridging the gap between intent and execution in enterprise and developer workflows.
Munjal Shah is the co-founder and CEO of Hippocratic AI, a company building the first safety-focused large language model for healthcare.
A serial entrepreneur with a track record in AI and machine learning, he has founded and led multiple startups at the intersection of technology and healthcare, with previous ventures acquired by Google and Alibaba.
Marek Kowalkiewicz is Professor and Chair in Digital Economy at QUT Business School and a leading voice on the intersection of AI, business, and society.
Recognized by Thinkers360 as one of the Top 100 Global AI Thought Leaders, he is the author of The Economy of Algorithms: AI and the Rise of the Digital Minions, winner of the 2024 Australian Business Book Award in Technology.
Marek previously led innovation teams in Silicon Valley, established SAP’s Machine Learning Lab in Singapore, and held research appointments at Microsoft Research Asia.
His current work focuses on how algorithmic systems shape decision-making, redefine value creation, and challenge traditional notions of agency in business leadership.
Dr. Fatma Tarlaci is an engineering leader with a decade of expertise in AI. Formerly, she served as CTO and VP of Engineering at startups, where she led the development and deployment of robust AI solutions and led high-impact engineering teams.
As a technical advisor, she helps startups navigate AI adoption and productization, while also training the next generation of AI engineers and data scientists as an Adjunct Assistant Professor in Computer Science at UT Austin.
She recently stepped into the role of Chief AI Officer at SOAR AI, where she combines strategic leadership with hands-on development and helps guide the technical direction of their AI initiatives.
Munther A. Dahleh is the William A. Coolidge Professor of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science at MIT and the founding director of the MIT Institute for Data, Systems, and Society (IDSS).
His research explores decision-making under uncertainty, networked systems, and the economics of data, drawing on fields from control theory to distributed learning.
He leads cross-disciplinary efforts at MIT to understand how data and algorithms shape complex systems, from financial and power networks to social and neural systems.
Anirudh Narayan focuses on accelerating the adoption of agentic AI by bridging technical innovation with real-world application.
With a background in growth strategy and data-driven product development, he works at the intersection of AI deployment and business transformation, enabling organizations to unlock new forms of scale and autonomy through intelligent agents.
Dylan Hadfield-Menell is a leading researcher in AI alignment and directs the Algorithmic Alignment Group at MIT CSAIL. His work focuses on ensuring that agentic AI systems behave in ways that reflect human goals, values, and oversight, particularly in multi-agent and human-AI contexts.
As a Schmidt Sciences AI2050 Fellow, he is advancing methods to support the safe, beneficial, and trustworthy deployment of AI in the real world.
Tim Kraska is an Associate Professor at MIT CSAIL and founding co-director of the Data System and AI Lab (DSAIL). His research explores how machine learning can transform the foundations of data systems—improving performance, adaptability, and user interaction.
From rethinking core components with learned models to building intelligent interfaces for data science, his work enables more autonomous, accessible, and trustworthy AI systems at scale.
