ccl.aiThe people leading kairos across capital, the lab, and the studio.
kairos is led by entrepreneurs, executives, and academic research leaders whose careers have spanned category‑defining companies and frontier AI research. They don’t sponsor from a distance — they head the Cognitive Computing Lab, sit on the investment committee at kairos vc, and pair with founders building inside kairos ai.
Pradeep Javangula
Veteran of search, machine learning, and AI who has repeatedly transformed breakthrough research into category‑defining products. After shaping the Java Virtual Machine at Sun Microsystems, Pradeep founded and sold two startups — iLeverage (real‑time personalization) to e.Piphany and Tumri (dynamic ad‑creative optimization) to Adobe, where he later steered AI/ML for Adobe Experience Cloud and Sensei. As Chief AI Officer & Partner at Symphony AI, he incubated eight B2B AI unicorns across a $1B fund. He went on to lead enterprise‑scale AI portfolios at Workday, Oscar Health (through its 2021 IPO), and most recently ServiceNow.
Pradeep earned a dual degree in Mathematics & Engineering from BITS Pilani and pursued a PhD in Algebraic Number Theory at Oklahoma State University. He holds 20+ patents spanning high‑performance messaging, search, personalization engines, agentic AI automation, mobility, UX, and advertising infrastructure.
Dr. Stuart Evans
Board member, educator, author, and longtime expert on dynamic high‑tech ventures. As a Distinguished Service Professor and Director of Carnegie Mellon’s Integrated Innovation Institute on the Silicon Valley campus, Stuart leads coursework for the M.S. in Software Management and the M.S. in Technology Ventures. He also directs the CMU‑Emirates iLab, a partnership between CMU’s III and Emirates Airlines for innovative education and research specialized for the airline industry.
Stuart’s career spans the Silicon Valley tech ecosystem at large. He has conducted research at SRI International and the Stanford Graduate School of Business, consulted with Bain & Company, invested at Sand Hill Venture Group, and served in executive management at Shugart Corporation, a Xerox subsidiary. Prior to Silicon Valley, he taught at Cambridge University’s Judge Business School.
Nick van Terheyden, MD
A digital‑health leader and physician‑turned‑technologist whose career sits at the intersection of medicine and computing. A graduate of the Royal Free Hospital School of Medicine, University of London, Nick practiced as an emergency‑room physician in London and Australia before transitioning into healthcare technology. He has served as Chief Medical Officer at Dell and held executive roles at Nuance and Philips, where he helped pioneer voice‑driven clinical workflows and electronic health records.
Nick hosts the long‑running radio show and podcast Dr Nick: The Incrementalist, has delivered 200+ keynotes on health and technology, and consistently appears in the #DigitalHealth Power 100. At kairos he leads our healthcare thesis — pairing with founders, opening doors at health systems and payers, and ensuring the lab’s clinical agents earn the trust of the people they sit beside.
Rick Rhodes
A seasoned financial‑services operator whose career spans capital markets, alternative investments, and operational restructuring across the middle market. Rick is the Managing Principal of Chamaeleo Capital Management, where he advises companies on finance, operations, turnaround, restructuring, and insolvency — with deep expertise in managed futures, derivatives, and commodities.
At kairos, Rick anchors the financial‑services thesis. His relationships across banks, RIAs, capital‑ markets desks, and alternative‑asset platforms give the studio a direct line into the regulators, counterparties, and operating environments where our explainable‑FinReg agents must earn their seat at the table.
Every founder, fellow, and engineer is paired one‑to‑one.
Founders coming through kairos ai are matched with an executive‑in‑residence and a lab researcher whose work intersects their charter. Cognitive Lab fellows are paired with a senior industry operator. Pairs meet weekly for technical reviews, career conversations, and the sort of “what should I be reading?” guidance that compounds. We track the relationship; we expect it to grow into collaboration — and, often, into the next venture.