MachineVantage appoints Dr. Rajan Srikanth as President of its India operations

MachineVantage, a global leader which is pioneering the combination of advanced neuroscience with artificial intelligence systems, announced that it has appointed Dr. Rajan Srikanth as President of its India operations.

Through its Indian headquarters in Chennai, MachineVantage www.machinevantage.com offers businesses proprietary neuroscience-based artificial intelligence and machine learning systems to power innovations in marketing and product development. The firm, with its worldwide headquarters in Silicon Valley, has major multinational clients in the U.S., Europe, Latin America and the Asia/Pacific region.

Dr. Srikanth joins the firm from his previous role as Chairman and Managing Director of SmartKapital, a venture funding and advisory services firm he founded in 2008. The company works with senior management in a range of businesses, helping guide them through critical growth stages and strategic development processes.

"As we continue to grow our partnerships with many of India's finest companies, MachineVantage is adding a highly-regarded leader in Dr. Srikanth," said Dr. A. K. Pradeep, founder and CEO of MachineVantage. "The breadth of his professional background, the depth of his knowledge and capabilities, and his first-hand experience with leading companies across a wide variety of categories enables MachineVantage to bring even more value to our clients. I am proud that he is our new President in India."

MachineVantage specializes in applying highly sophisticated neuroscientific methodologies combined with the technological power of Machine Learning and Artificial Intelligence to capture the non-conscious drivers of consumer behavior. The firm notes that "95% of daily decisions are made in the non-conscious, so it is critical for Indian companies to understand and leverage that knowledge to improve the effectiveness of their marketing and new product development processes." MachineVantage deploys semantic analysis customized and modified by core learnings from the science of human behavior, to extract actionable information from a large corpus of unstructured and semi-structured data.

Applying neuro-based AI and ML systems to isolate and analyze the unique non-conscious inputs that impact consumers, MachineVantage delivers unique, expansive, and insight-rich windows into the key drivers of consumer perceptions and behaviors.

The MachineVantage team pioneered the application of Neuroscience to the field of global Marketing Research, which broke new ground in developing advanced learnings and insights into the core non-conscious influences of consumer attitudes and actions. The team is now pioneering the application of powerful, proprietary AI and ML technologies to Product and Marketing Innovation. Dr. Pradeep is the co-author of a fast-selling new book on the topic, "AI For Marketing And Product Innovation" https://www.amazon.in/dp/1119484065.

Dr. Srikanth's international career has included consulting with Fortune 500 companies in fields ranging from energy, defense, technology, healthcare, financial services, manufacturing, and retail, among others. Prior to forming SmartKapital, he served as worldwide Partner and President of Mercer Consulting , Asia. His earlier roles include leadership positions with Accenture, where he was Executive Partner and Global Lead for the firm's organizational change strategy practice, as well as similar roles with KPMG Peat Marwick and Bain & Company.

"The founding team of MachineVantage have been the pioneers for 'going where no one has gone before' in marketing, and this time is no different," said Dr. Srikanth. "In a market that is jaded with high decibel, high contrast messaging that literally is trying to shout its way into your attention, MachineVantage brings a breath-takingly novel approach. Our proven methods work the non-conscious to deliver subtle but sure results for our clients. I am excited to be part of what will clearly be the next revolution in marketing."

In addition to serving on the boards of several charitable organizations such as United Way of India, where he was a founding member, Dr. Srikanth has also been Trustee of the Alumni Charitable Trust of IITM and a director of the IIT Madras Incubation Cell. He earned his Ph.D from the Stern School of Business at New York University, and a B.Tech degree from the Indian Institute of Technology in Madras. He has taught at the Walter A. Haas School of Business at the University of California, Berkeley.

(With inputs from agencies.)