Ajay Agrawal

Co-Founder & Director

Ajay Agrawal co-founded Sanctuary in 2018 and serves as a director on our board. He is a scholar of the economics of machine intelligence and the commercialization of science. Ajay is a co-author of “Prediction Machines: The Simple Economics of Artificial Intelligence” (Harvard Business Press, 2018) co-editor of “The Economics of Artificial Intelligence: An Agenda” (University of Chicago Press, 2019), and co-author of "Power & Prediction: The Disruptive economics of Artificial Intelligence" (Harvard Business Press, 2022).

Ajay is the founder of the Creative Destruction Lab (CDL) and co-founder of Next AI, both not-for-profit programs dedicated to supporting entrepreneurs in transforming their science projects into scalable, financeable businesses; graduates of these programs have generated over $20B in equity value. Ajay has served on the U.S. National Academies Committee on Science and Innovation Leadership for the 21st Century, on the International Advisory Committee for the National Institute for Information and Communications Technology, Japan’s sole R&D agency specializing in ICT, and on the Advisory Board of Carnegie Mellon University's Block Center for Technology and Society.

Ajay was appointed to the Order of Canada in 2022 for his contributions as a scholar, mentor, and entrepreneur. His work has been recognized for enhancing Canada’s productivity and prosperity through innovation and entrepreneurship. He has also been listed as one of the 50 Most Powerful People in Canadian Business by the Globe and Mail.