Dr. Dembo is a successful academician, an entrepreneur and a consultant to some of the world’s largest corporations and banks. He has had a distinguished academic research career as a professor of Operations Research and Computer Science at Yale University and as well as a visiting professor at MIT. He was the Founder and CEO of Algorithmics Incorporated growing it mostly organically to become the key supplier of Enterprise Risk Systems to 70% of the top hundred world banks and four out of five of the top insurers. He is the Founder and CEO of riskthinking.AI, the globe’s first company to develop an enterprise-grade platform for the measurement of climate financial risk.

Excerpts from an interview with Dr. Dembo:

Conception of riskthinking

Climate Change is the key challenge of our times. It affects our world, every country, all facets of society, observes Ron. “Riskthinking.ai has charted out an ambitious vision to provide the infrastructure to change the way our markets price companies including the costs associated with future changes in climate. This will have an immensely positive effect on mitigating climate risk. The ability to make a huge impact is what drove me.”

AI technology- challenges galore

“As with any new technology, there are risks and benefits. We use AI for good but are cognizant of how it might be misused. In our case, this is less likely but to avoid any misuse we constantly curate our AI with human input.”

riskthinking AI solutions

riskthinking.AI has been touted as the first company to develop a true, full, enterprise platform for computing and managing climate risk. It covers the entire world and oceans in over 33 billion points on earth. “Our AI has been used to seek out and develop the derived data to do so and incorporates the latest science, read and analyzed by a suite of Machine Learning models” adds Ron. He says that it covers all aspects of banking and insurance that are prone to climate risk and is unique. It will help financial institutions, countries and municipalities worldwide to prepare for and manage their climate risk exposure.

Leadership traits

“I believe that none of us know it all and I always seek critique of my decisions. I am a risk taker but also know that taking a risk is only one side of a coin – managing risk is equally important. My style is to take input and then set the course of action. I prefer to fail quickly. The buck stops with me and I know when to ‘get off the pot’”. Citing that culture is a very important factor at the workplace, this entrepreneur adds that it becomes important to surround oneself with people who are smart contributors, fun to be with and work collaboratively.

“Passionate about what I am doing, intense, goal-oriented, love to make an impact, detailed, love good design and aesthetics, enthralled when I make a new discovery and love working with bright people collaboratively to create groundbreaking, innovative new products”.

Words of advice

“Just do it. If you don’t fail sometimes, you are not pushing enough. Take smaller steps so failure is less dramatic, and you can fail and recover quickly” he tells young entrepreneurs.

Observes Ron that, not unlike any startup, getting the right team together and growing and nurturing it is how you prepare for winning. It is an iterative process so don’t fuss if you don’t have it perfect. Create a blue-chip firm, always striving for a high level of honesty and integrity, with no grey areas. Root out people who do not comply. “It is the speed with which we have accomplished what we have. The worldwide recognition we have achieved and the quality of what we have built are testaments to a truly motivated team. We have brought data scientists, climate scientists, AI experts, and financial engineers together to produce what is the most comprehensive solution available, in a short space of time”. They work as a cross-disciplinary team collaboratively. The key is the team members respect each other for what they bring to the table – and that is the secret sauce.”

The Success mantras

“Love what you do – it makes the hard times more bearable. Know what you don’t know, hire people who know what they don’t know, be involved with all aspects of the business in detail, delegate, don’t abdicate.”