BC NA December 2020

for the future by embracing digital
transformation. “Once upon a time in
the industrial age, you had to make
trade-offs between speed, accuracy,
and cost,” says Kanaan. “In the digital
age, thanks to machine learning, artificial
intelligence or any of the number
of other automation techniques that
are part of digital transformation, you
can now do all three at once. For the
Department of the Air Force, it’s about
being more accurate, delivering better
logistics, working on humanitarian
aid missions while also saving the
taxpayer dollars and making sure that
we are good stewards of that money.”
Kanaan views the collaboration
that has enabled the accelerator as
key to its success. “I can’t emphasize
enough how grateful we are to MIT,
to academia, to industry for being a
part of this conversation and to our
airmen and workforce for wanting
to have the dialogue. What makes us
special is that, while we are certain
to make mistakes along the way, we
hold a dialogue afterwards. It’s all
about diving in.”
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EXECUTIVE PROFILE:
Michael Kanaan
Title: Director of Operations
Location: United States
Industry: Academia and Defense
Captain Michael Kanaan is the Director of Operations to the USAF-
MIT Artificial Intelligence Accelerator and the former co-chair of
artificial intelligence for the U.S. Air Force. He was named to the
Forbes “30 Under 30” list and received the US Government’s 68th
Arthur S. Flemming Award (an honor shared by past recipients Neil
Armstrong, Robert Gates, and Elizabeth Dole). Kanaan is a graduate of
the US Air Force Academy and previously led a National Intelligence
Campaign for Operation Inherent Resolve in Syria and Iraq.
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