Jerry Kaplan
Boards are being asked to make consequential bets on generative AI without a stable read on what the technology can actually do, what it cannot, and what its deployment will mean for the workforce. Most executive briefings collapse into either hype or alarm. Leaders need a sober technical interpreter who can separate marketing from mechanism, and tell them which decisions matter now.
Jerry Kaplan is a Stanford lecturer, four-time Silicon Valley founder and Oxford University Press author who helps senior leaders read artificial intelligence as a business and policy question, not a product launch.
Full Profile
Why organisations work with Jerry Kaplan
- He has built the technology he now teaches. Two of his four startups went public, his team at GO Corporation produced the first commercial tablet operating system, and he co-founded the first internet auction site five months before eBay.
- He teaches the social and economic impact of AI at Stanford and writes the Oxford University Press primers that policymakers and boards actually cite. That sits between technical depth and decision-grade clarity.
- His framing of AI’s labour market consequences in Humans Need Not Apply was selected by The Economist as a top ten science and technology book of 2015, well before generative AI made the question urgent.
- He approaches AI as a question of competitive advantage, regulation, and capital allocation, not as a feature roadmap. Boards leave with a sharper view of what they are actually deciding.
Biography highlights
- Adjunct Lecturer, Stanford University (Ford Dorsey Master’s in International Policy; Department of Computer Science)
- Fellow, Centre for Legal Informatics, Stanford Law School
- Founding CEO, GO Corporation (PenPoint OS, tablet computing)
- Co-founder, Onsale Inc., the first internet auction site (IPO 1997)
- Author, Generative Artificial Intelligence: What Everyone Needs to Know (Oxford University Press, 2024) and Humans Need Not Apply (Yale University Press, 2015), an Economist top ten book
- PhD in Computer and Information Science, University of Pennsylvania; inventor on more than a dozen patents; over twenty peer-reviewed papers across ACM and IEEE journals
Biography
Tablet computing, online auctions, expert systems, and one of the first commercial personal information managers were all built in Silicon Valley before most people had heard of them. Kaplan was inside each of those stories. He was founding CEO of GO Corporation, the company whose PenPoint operating system anticipated the iPad by two decades, and he co-founded Onsale, the first internet auction site, five months before eBay.
That operating history is the reason his current work on artificial intelligence is taken seriously by board-level audiences. He teaches the social and economic impact of AI at Stanford and is a Fellow at the Centre for Legal Informatics at Stanford Law School. The Oxford University Press primers he writes, including Generative Artificial Intelligence: What Everyone Needs to Know, are designed for readers who need to decide, not just to understand.
His 2015 book Humans Need Not Apply, published by Yale University Press and named one of The Economist’s top ten science and technology books that year, argued that AI’s labour market effects would arrive faster than most institutions were preparing for. The argument has aged unusually well. It now reads as a brief on the question every executive committee is asking about generative systems.
The combination of a working technologist, a serial founder with two IPOs, and a current Stanford lecturer is rare. Kaplan uses it to translate AI from a procurement conversation into a strategic one, and to tell senior audiences where they are exposed.
Key speaking topics
- Generative AI and the executive agenda
- AI and the future of work
- AI regulation and public policy
- Competitive advantage in an AI-led economy
- Industry-specific AI disruption
- AI risks, dangers, and safety
- Silicon Valley entrepreneurship and innovation
Ideal for
- Boards and executive committees weighing capital allocation to AI
- C-suite leaders setting AI strategy, governance, and workforce policy
- Policy and regulatory audiences confronting AI rules and competition
- Industry leadership offsites in financial services, technology, healthcare, and professional services
Audience outcomes
- A working mental model of what generative AI can and cannot do, stripped of vendor framing
- A sharper read on where AI will reshape the workforce and on which timelines
- A view of the regulatory and geopolitical pressures shaping AI competition
- Specific questions a board should be asking management about its AI exposure
- A historical perspective on technology adoption cycles, from someone who has run several
Talks
A customised session that maps where AI is reshaping value, cost, and competition in a specific sector.
Key takeaways:
- Where AI is being deployed in the sector today, and where it is hype
- The job categories and capabilities most exposed to automation
- The decisions leaders should be making now to position for advantage
A direct read on what generative AI will and will not do, and how leaders should respond.
Key takeaways:
- A grounded view of AI capability, separated from speculation
- The labour market shifts already underway and those still ahead
- How organisations and individuals can prepare credibly
An executive-level briefing on AI as a force in competition, inequality, and geopolitics.
Key takeaways:
- Where AI will tilt national and corporate competitive advantage
- The inequality and labour market consequences leaders should plan for
- The geopolitical and regulatory pressures shaping the AI race
Videos
Testimonials
Books
Fees
| EUR | GBP | USD | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Home Country | €12000 to €40000 | £10,001 - £35,000 | $15000 - $50000 |
| Asia Pacific | €12000 to €40000 | £10,001 - £35,000 | $15000 - $50000 |
| Europe | €12000 to €40000 | £10,001 - £35,000 | $15000 - $50000 |
| Middle East & Africa | €12000 to €40000 | £10,001 - £35,000 | $15000 - $50000 |
| South America | €12000 to €40000 | £10,001 - £35,000 | $15000 - $50000 |
| United Kingdom | €12000 to €40000 | £10,001 - £35,000 | $15000 - $50000 |
| US East Coast | €12000 to €40000 | £10,001 - £35,000 | $15000 - $50000 |
| US West Coast | €12000 to €40000 | £10,001 - £35,000 | $15000 - $50000 |
| Virtual | Under €12000 | Under £10,000 | Under $15000 |