The AI Forum NZ has appointed Megan Tapsell as chair and Louise Taylor as deputy chair. Emma Naji recently took over as executive director.
Kiwi business women are leading the drive of one of New Zealand’s most significant technologies, artificial intelligence (AI), into 2020.
The AI Forum of New Zealand has just appointed one of ANZ bank’s heads of technology, Megan Tapsell, as its chair, along with Simpson Grierson tech lawyer Louise Taylor as its deputy chair.
Emma Naji, a computer scientist with a 20-year, tech-focused entrepreneurial career, recently took over from Ben Reid as the executive director of the AI Forum.
Very few New Zealand businesses or Kiwi tech organisations have three women leading its governance and management, which in itself is a major milestone.
Tapsell has family connections with the first Māori Speaker of the House, the late Sir Peter Tapsell.
She is a major advocate for the role of Māori in all aspects of New Zealand and previously sat as an advisory board member of the Māori health tech business Navilluso Medical, fronted by Tracy and Lance O’Sullivan, who was the 2014 New Zealander of the year.
“With the world in a constant state of change due to the rapid advancement of technology, it is important that our industry leaders also consider the ethical impacts on our people, both in our workplaces and our community,” Tapsell said.
The AI Forum’s new deputy chair Louise Taylor is a senior technology lawyer in the commercial group at Simpson Grierson. She specialises in new and emerging technologies and has spoken and written widely on AI, fog/cloud, IoT, drones, quantum computing and other tech trends.
AI Forum executive director Emma Naji said this female-led driving force bodes very well for the future of the AI Forum organisation.
Tapsell and Naji acknowledged the tremendous efforts of the outgoing and inaugural executive director Ben Reid and chair Stu Christie, who stepped aside because of other business commitments. Both indicated their intent to step down a number of months ago to facilitate orderly succession.
Naji said the AI Forum has recently released a series of five research reports covering areas such as AI in financial services, agriculture and health. They have outlined issues stressing New Zealand urgently needs to focus more on achieving an AI-enabled future, particularly in relation to investment, research, skills and talent, ethics and regulation and trusted data.
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