Kes Sampanthar

About Kes Sampanthar

Most people discovered AI in the last five years. I was working on a PhD in it 35 years ago. I was conducting AI research, building a neural network chess game. Unfortunately, I was too early and lost funding since everyone thought it was a dead end. Most of the field moved on. I didn\'t. There were maybe a handful of us still reading Yann LeCun\'s papers, still convinced that understanding how machines learn and how humans learn were the same problem. Just approached from different ends. The question I couldn\'t let go of was this: if AI gets better at knowledge, what does that leave for humans? I spent the next three decades trying to answer it. I went from think tanks and research labs to startups and consulting. I built KPMG\'s Global Innovation Lab from a handful of people into a global team. I worked on transformation programs inside some of the world\'s largest organisations. Most recently, I was an Senior MD at BCG, where I focused on building Responsible AI and Purposeful Innovation. And everywhere I went, I saw the same thing. Companies were automating the parts of work they could measure, while people were told to \"adapt\" with no real help in figuring out what they still had that no model could touch. The judgment, intuition and pattern recognition built over a career. That stuff is real. It\'s just invisible, because no one ever taught you to name it or train it deliberately. That\'s what Centaurian AI exists to change. We build tools that help you find that part of yourself and develop it on purpose. Cognitive assessments that surface how you actually think. Thinking frameworks that make your reasoning visible. Games are built on how the brain genuinely builds mastery. Not productivity hacks. Not prompt courses. The real thing underneath all of it. We\'ve been building this for the largest companies in the world. Now we want to reach as many people as possible. The ones who need it most, right now, before they get automated away. We call it becoming un-BOT-able. We\'re on the side of humans. If that\'s the side you\'re on too, this is for you.

Experience

1. CEO & Cofounder

   Centaurian Ai

   Sep 2025 — Present · Saratoga Springs, NY, US

   A next-generation AI venture focused on augmentation, not automation. Still under wraps, but we’re assembling the tools that will change how people learn, decide, and lead.

Education

• Newcastle University

  Computer Science with Artificial Intelligence

  1989 — 1994

Skills

• Information Architecture
• Entrepreneurship
• Cloud Computing
• Product Management
• Saas
• Product Development
• Digital Strategy
• Agile Methodologies
• Mobile Devices
• Management
• Business Development
• Project Management
• Leadership
• Digital Media
• Thought Leadership
• Professional Services
• Branding & Identity
• Lead Generation
• Innovation
• Enterprise Software
• Consumer Research
• Enterprise Architecture
• Information Technology Strategy
• Sales Management
• Behavioral Design
• Services Marketing
• Strategic Partnerships
• Ethnographic Research
• Mobile Applications
• Strategy
• E-Commerce
• Usability
• Business Analysis
• Game Design
• Consulting
• User Experience
• Ethnography
• Software Development
• Architecture
• Start-Ups