For most people, travel is a luxury, something to be done while relaxing and soaking in the sun. For others like Vivek Agrawal, it is seen as a way to broaden horizons and learn through immersion within different cultures. International living has given Vivek a greater understanding of people and helped define his burgeoning career in the tech industry.
From a young age, the 33-year-old San Francisco resident has been sure of one thing, "The better I understand people, the more productive I can be." This ethos began during Vivek's time at A. T. Kearney, where he was constantly traveling for over three years worth of management consulting work. This early contact with those whose approach was different than his own only fueled in him the desire to explore the world.
It was at this stage that Vivek sought something different. He was young and eager to help affect change. This led the then 27-year-old to Rwanda and The Clinton Foundation for a memorable year-and-a-half sojourn, which further cemented in him the desire to understand different cultures.
"I have been exposed to the best humanity has to offer as well as the worst. These experiences make me attuned in filtering out the noise and focus on people," he says, pointing to one of his strengths as a coordinator. It is Vivek's unique understanding of different points of view that allows him to remain unbiased and focus on the important details of a given project.
Vivek has taken his international experience with him to Scale AI, where he is currently employed as a strategic product manager. His job placed him leading the development of the Auto-RAG application Scale AI, which is currently developing. "I led the vision for what this application would look like," says Vivek, who was in charge of much more than just the appearance.
RAG, which stands for Retrieval Augmented Generation, is a hot-button topic in the Generative AI world right now. It represents the next step in AI learning; as Vivek puts it, "The Auto-RAG application has the ability to automatically evaluate multiple model configurations simultaneously." By taking the shackles off of the previous AI models and allowing the programs themselves to learn, Auto-RAG is taking AI even further into the future.
"The capability was not available before, which presented a major bottleneck for most enterprises to experiment with and adopt LLM-based applications," starts Vivek, explaining how modern technology needs to undergo constant improvement. Continuing, he says, "However, with Auto-RAG, most large enterprises can now build hyper-optimized applications within hours." The potential of RAG applications, like the one produced by Vivek at Scale AI, represents a future increase in productivity.
AI is only in its infancy at its current stage. There are many iterations and speed bumps along the way until full optimization and integration into business practices. Vivek foresees multiple steps along the way; he forecasts the first steps, saying, "agentic workflows and multimodal models will usher in the next revolution in terms of making businesses more efficient."
"We are just scratching the surface in terms of image, audio, and video generation beyond text prompts alone," states the 33-year-old. For Vivek, the question is not about the ability of the technology but rather its availability and ease of use. "The current rate of enterprise adoption of AI is extremely slow," he says, believing that the integration of AI into business will help to optimize production and increase efficiency.
Vivek is excited that the focus has turned back to AI thanks to the latest LLM technology. "AI has been around for more than a decade now, and it goes way beyond just LLMs," says the San Francisco resident.
We are only scratching the surface of the potential of this technology. "It is important," Vivek says, "to continue investing capital into LLMs and AI as a whole, to see it adopted to its highest potential." His work at Scale AI, which leads the development of Auto-RAG systems, is part of a crucial push towards raising the efficiency of generative AI, which will ultimately lead to smoother integration.
Despite being at the forefront of the AI revolution, Vivek still yearns to see the world. "Travel has been an integral part of my life throughout my journey," he says. The tech guru states one of his overarching goals, "I would like to continue pursuing opportunities to learn about AI deployment in different parts of the world."
Vivek's sense of adventure has led him to foreign lands and to the pinnacle of the tech industry. He looks forward to the challenges presented in the United States market. "I feel like because the US is such a mature market in terms of data and capital flow, it can become difficult to build perspective as to what is really required for global AI adoption," Vivek uses these thoughts as further motivation to expand his horizons and learn as holistically as possible.
Some individuals are driven by a desire for knowledge, and one of those individuals is Vivek Agrawal. It is this drive that has taken him all over the world, learning about different cultures and ways of thinking. His unique vision has helped him to achieve lofty goals in his personal life and promises an exciting future. The future of AI is in good hands with people like Vivek, individuals who want to share their knowledge with the world and who are always open to learning through cultural immersion.
