Adrian Gonzalez, Product Manager in Montreal, QC, Canada
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Adrian Gonzalez

Verified Expert  in Product Management

Product Manager

Location
Montreal, QC, Canada
Toptal Member Since
July 27, 2020

With an engineering degree, two master's degrees, including an MBA, and the ability to speak four languages, Adrian has delivered as a PM in North America, LATAM, and Europe on multiple innovation initiatives, including software development., AI strategy, project delivery, blockchain, geolocation, Agile implementation, etc. Adrian has extensive experience in technical and business roles and has worked in several industries: telecom, cloud-native, supply chain, retail, fintech, and IT.

Project Highlights

AI/NLP-based Tool for the Rapid Distribution of Essential COVID-19 Goods
Designed an accelerated 10-week product implementation (during COVID-19), led a team of data scientists, engineers, and developers, presented results to 20+ executive stakeholders, and prepared a successful federal funding submission ($0.5 million).
Interim CTO | Fintech
Advised on the product strategy, assessed and prioritized the product backlog, helped scale the teams based on development workload, and aided the client in their hiring efforts for the next CTO.
Port Logistics Optimization Tool
Designed the solution and led a team of 10+ business and technical resources, prepared the submission and obtained federal funding ($2.7 million), validated the tool with stakeholders, and managed 20+ CXO and technical-level clients.

Expertise

Work Experience

AI Strategist — Generative AI Sales Enablement

2023 - PRESENT
CONFIDENTIAL
  • Contributed to the generative AI sales enablement strategy of the company.
  • Created business assets for sales activities related to AI and generative AI.
  • Led client-facing discussions for generative AI project discussions.

Generative AI, LLM, and NLP Consultant

2023 - PRESENT
Alquimia Venture Capital SL
  • Designed generative AI architectures with Azure OpenAI Service.
  • Created an implementation roadmap for technical teams.
  • Generated all related documentation for generative AI systems, including prompt engineering details.

Principal Cloud, Data, and AI Specialist

2022 - PRESENT
Microsoft
  • Created advanced roadmaps for private and public sector clients for their big data and AI implementations.
  • Designed AI-enabled architectures for specific use cases based on machine learning, deep learning, generative AI, and other data technologies.
  • Trained executive and technical clients and partners on AI/ML, big data, Azure OpenAI ChatGPT, and other technologies.

University Lecturer — AI Project Management and Ethics

2019 - PRESENT
HEC Montreal
  • Designed and led an AI program for small-to-medium enterprises.
  • Developed new workshops on AI ethics and product management.
  • Coordinated groups of lecturers and course content.

Mentor | Learning Facilitator — AI and Blockchain Strategy

2018 - PRESENT
MIT Sloan | GetSmarter
  • Facilitated, mentored, and reviewed over 1,000 projects for implementation of AI and blockchain strategies.
  • Taught the course, "Artificial Intelligence: Implications for Business Strategy" (MIT Sloan and MIT CSAIL).
  • Taught the course, "Blockchain Technologies: Business Innovation and Application" (MIT Sloan).

University Lecturer — Big Data

2018 - PRESENT
Concordia University
  • Trained and mentored more than 150 students during the last two years and implemented online and in-person training programs.
  • Facilitated workshops: "AI Design Thinking," "Data Integration & ETL," "The Art of AI Consulting," "Data & AI Project Management," "IoT-5G Mobile Communications," "Developing a Winning AI Strategy," "Deciphering Legal & Ethical Aspects of AI," etc.
  • Designed two new classes: "Introduction to Big Data Business Cases and Data Collection" and "Introduction to Excel for Data Analysis."

Head of AI Customer Success

2021 - 2022
Peritus.ai
  • Analyzed customer data to improve customer onboarding and experience.
  • Developed new strategic partnerships in Quebec, Canada, and the US.
  • Held product demonstrations for B2B clients and collected user feedback.
  • Designed quarterly roadmaps and detailed technical release plans.
  • Aided in product design, mockups, and product development.

Interim Chief Technology Officer

2020 - 2021
Fortesza
  • Managed of a 15-member technical team (back-end, front-end, infra, UX, data and QA).
  • Defined of a transversal plan for multi-cloud infrastructure, security, DevOps, and data management.
  • Implemented new internal and external technical support processes and systems.
  • Designed a career plan and evaluation system for technical members.

Senior AI Consultant | Product Owner

2019 - 2020
IVADO Labs
  • Led technical teams of more than 15 members consisting of data scientists, software developers, UI developers, subject matter experts (SME), and data engineers.
  • Managed over 30 business stakeholders, SVP, and VP-level clients (including former management consulting profiles).
  • Delivered three projects for transportation and telecom clients (over 2 million CAD) based on ML and optimization.
  • Delivered one COVID-19 project for supply chain fast-tracking of critical cargo based on AI-NLP techniques.
  • Submitted three successful SCALE AI (Canadian AI Supercluster) applications for the AI project.
  • Defined technical and strategic roadmaps for the blueprint, pilot, and MVP projects and related business cases.
  • Produced high-quality reports for analysis of scientific approach, data assessment, and infrastructure requirements.
  • Delivered several knowledge transfer sessions for AI and agile project management.

Senior AI and Machine Learning Consultant

2018 - 2020
CGI
  • Created a new "AI for Telecommunications" practice.
  • Implemented an AI strategy, developed a training plan, and defined the AI project approach and a list of potential use cases.
  • Worked with more than ten director and VP-level executives for business development and prospection activities (over 2 million projects).
  • Architected and defined five pilot projects with internal and client teams for a proof-of-concept implementation.
  • Defined technical and strategic roadmaps for the AI practice and its related projects.

Co-founder | Head of Technology and Product

2018 - 2019
SmartBonds (Self-employed)
  • Co-founded an early-stage blockchain startup for the underwriting and trading of financial bonds.
  • Managed a team of ten collaborators and performed individual interviews for new hires.
  • Prospected more than 20 banking executives for partnership development and idea validation before and during implementation.
  • Developed a vast network of connections with investors and startup incubators.
  • Created product specifications and roadmap for the MVP development, including architecture, technologies, and data sources.

Data Project Director | Technical Presales

2015 - 2017
Dhatim
  • Managed six new clients in Argentina, Brazil, Peru, Mexico, Colombia, and Ecuador (more than €2 million/year in projects).
  • Managed more than 20 business stakeholders and presented projects to C-suite and direction-level clients.
  • Worked with the main two telecommunication operators in Latin America to develop new SaaS solutions for value-added services, energy markets, and content industry (online music services).
  • Performed data analysis, collection, OCR, integration (ETL), modeling, and SQL management and visualization.
  • Collected technical requirements with customers and created the business cases for new products.

Telecommunications Consultant | Business Manager

2013 - 2015
Davidson Consulting
  • Generated more than 50 leads (cold call) and opened three new accounts during the first six months of the subsidiary.
  • Conducted market research and created supporting documents (proposals) for sales activities.
  • Provided technical training to clients and consultants (3G networks, Linux systems, and so on).
  • Implemented 4G/LTE software-based tools for equipment validation and simulation.

IT Project Manager | Software Developer

2011 - 2012
TIC Consulting Services (TCS Spain)
  • Managed several IT development projects with a team of five developers.
  • Planned and managed resources, customer relationships, product design, and delivery.
  • Created technical documentation and professional training for customers.

AI/NLP-based Tool for the Rapid Distribution of Essential COVID-19 Goods

https://www.port-montreal.com/en/the-port-of-montreal/news/news/cargo2ai-launch

Designed an accelerated 10-week product implementation (during COVID-19), led a team of data scientists, engineers, and developers, presented results to 20+ executive stakeholders, and prepared a successful federal funding submission ($0.5 million).

I ideated and led the development of an AI-enabled solution with a dashboard to exhibit views on incoming critical cargo, and predict the estimated time to arrival (ETA) to enable fast cargo movements in and out the Port of Montreal, based on natural language processing (NLP) techniques for cargo identification at the container level.

I then validated this solution with several supply chain stakeholders, who are already using it as a single source of information at both tactical and operational levels, to track and fast-track critical cargo until its departure from the port.

RESULTS:
We reduced the dwell time 83% (~three days to less than 12 hours or next working day) for critical cargo. 136,000 10-foot containers (TEU) analyzed per month equals ~38 million metric tons of goods per year with an estimated $2.6 billion impact on the Canadian economy.

Interim CTO | Fintech

http://www.fortesza.com

Advised on the product strategy, assessed and prioritized the product backlog, helped scale the teams based on development workload, and aided the client in their hiring efforts for the next CTO.

Client: The client was a Panama fintech startup creating a platform for investors and startups seeking investors to connect.

Mandate: I served as a fractional CTO to advise the team in product strategy, advising on how to scale the technology teams and increase the velocity of the release cycles.

Geolocated (via Map-based SaaS) Retail Strategy for a Confidential Coffee Company

https://www.geoblink.com

Led strategic and technical activities for a map-based retail project; performed customer segmentation and analyzed the best location for retailers; collected and analyzed data (e.g., Nielsen, pedestrian, transactions per product category, and more).

The project goal was to use data from a confidential coffee company to add new layers of intelligence to an existing geo-located platform. The combination of this and other data sources allowed the retail company to optimize its real estate and store opening strategy based on best potential locations (e.g., higher coffee consumption per postal code, higher pedestrian traffic per area).
I worked with both product strategy and data science teams to combine, analyze, and integrate available data sources. I also prepared and presented a series of strategic recommendations for the retail company.

Port Logistics Optimization Tool

https://www.scaleai.ca/project/port-logistics-optimization-tool/

Designed the solution and led a team of 10+ business and technical resources, prepared the submission and obtained federal funding ($2.7 million), validated the tool with stakeholders, and managed 20+ CXO and technical-level clients.

This supply chain project goal was to develop a "multi-day container flow optimization for port logistics" use case in order to enhance the overall efficiency of the port authority's operations by adopting an AI-powered supply chain solution.

Concretely, this project focused on optimizing rail operations and related dwell times at Montreal port authority, providing shared and advanced visibility to all stakeholders such as port, rail, and terminal operators, and enabling data-driven decision-making, prediction, and scenario analyses.

Reducing Installation and Repair Times for Telecommunication Customers

http://www.scaleai.ca/project/reducing-installation-and-repair-times-for-telecommunication-customers

Managed the product backlog with 20+ data scientists/engineers from four different teams; delivered a solution that generated $3 million in annual cost savings based on a 3% improvement in telecom technician efficiency; obtained $200,000 in funding.

Bell Canada employs 5,000+ field technicians to install and repair wireline connections of its B2C customers. A wide range of technologies supports these services (e.g., FTTH, pair-bonding), and the complexity of jobs varies greatly. Also, the technicians dispatched to these jobs fall on a broad spectrum of experience, certifications, and specialization.

This project was a collaboration between Bell, IVADO Labs, Exfo (Bell supplier of network sensors), and VuPoint Systems (Bell supplier for satellite field services). The main goal was to create a proof of concept (PoC) to optimize the field install and repair experience by using AI models to assign technicians to the tasks that suit them most.

PROPOSED SOLUTION:
We built an AI model based on 3TB of data from 5 million interventions—from over the last three years with 100+ variables from the field, network, and customer operations sources. We would then cluster tasks with similar characteristics, predict technician efficiency at completing these tasks, and derive insights to optimize Bell systems for technicians tasks assignment.

Handover Aware Interference Management in LTE Small Cell Networks

https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/6576398

Managed and integrated a collaborative project for 4G-LTE advanced resource management techniques.

We proposed an enhanced inter-cell interference coordination (ICIC) mechanism based on the multi-armed bandit (MAB) approach that aims at maximizing the throughputs of the attached users and also their handover (HO) performances evaluated through 3GPP mobility robustness optimization (MRO) indicators.

To this end, the MAB procedure explicitly considers the HO performances to configure the optimal spectrum split. The simulation results highlight the benefits of the proposed solution: higher throughputs and reduced HO failures. This is particularly the case concerning high and medium-speed users for which HO performances are more sensitive to interference.

Categorical Variable Selection in Risk Modeling for KYC Activities

http://crm.umontreal.ca/probindustrielsEn2021/index.php/societe-generale-eng/

Led the research and planning activities for a project with AI students and a banking client.

In financial institutions, categorical features appear quite often in credit datasets and in compliance models, for example, features related to clients’ risk profiles.

Traditional feature selection methods (e.g., statistical significance, recursive feature elimination, LASSO) do not work well with categorical features since these methods would retain certain levels and remove other levels of the same feature. The Group Lasso approach has shown to be more stable in terms of variable selection but displays shortcomings in terms of predictability. Instead, for a given feature, would it be more appropriate to devise a method that aggregates neighboring levels in bins in order to get a feature representation space that would better scale with the output?

Because of the numerous ways to represent categorical variables and to select which variables are of the importance we ask what are the most appropriate methods for improving categorical feature selection.

White Paper for a Blockchain-based Education App

https://pocket.asu.edu

Designed and wrote a white paper for a blockchain-enabled initiative.

I composed a white paper for an ongoing blockchain-enabled initiative called Pocket, which is a digital wallet and portfolio that captures and stores the holistic evidence of learning—what students create in any format—and gives them the autonomy to securely share it with employers and further education.

FinOps Strategy for Multinational Data Company

I designed the FinOps strategy with a multi-cloud environment and several years roadmap.

I designed the cloud evolution, change management, and financial modeling workstreams. I also developed a multi-cloud environment and several years' roadmap based on a company-wide analysis of existing practices and gaps.

AI Product Management for VC-backed Manufacturing Firm

Designed an AI-enabled product strategy for advanced manufacturing operations in North America.

I developed the following during the entirety of the project:

• Strategic and technical roadmap for AI-enabled use cases
• Company-wide data governance foundations to catalog and govern all relevant data systems and sources
• An AI architecture based on specific use cases to continue evolving the cloud infrastructure
2017 - 2018

Master of Business Administration (MBA) in Business Administration and Innovation

HEC Montreal - Montreal, Canada

2011 - 2012

Master of Science Degree in Mobile Communications (Telecommunications and Wireless)

Telecom ParisTech | Institut Eurecom - Sophia Antipolis, France

2006 - 2010

Engineer's Degree in Computer Science and Telecommunications

Universidad Politecnica de Madrid - Madrid, Spain

DECEMBER 2023 - PRESENT

Copilot for M365 Achiever Badge - Fundamental

Microsoft

AUGUST 2023 - PRESENT

AWS Partner: Generative AI Essentials (Business)

AWS

JULY 2023 - PRESENT

GCP - Cloud Digital Leader

Google

AUGUST 2021 - PRESENT

Essentials for Istio

Solo.io

AUGUST 2021 - PRESENT

Introduction to GitOps (LFS169)

The Linux Foundation

JULY 2021 - PRESENT

FinOps Certified Practitioner

FinOps Foundation

JULY 2021 - PRESENT

Product Analytics Certificate (PAC)™

Product School

JULY 2021 - PRESENT

[SC-900] Microsoft Security, Compliance, and Identity Fundamentals

Microsoft

JUNE 2021 - PRESENT

Gremlin Certified Chaos Engineering Practitioner

Gremlin

JUNE 2021 - PRESENT

Product-Led Certificate®

Product-Led Institute

JUNE 2021 - PRESENT

[MB-901] Microsoft Dynamics 365 Fundamentals

Microsoft

MAY 2021 - PRESENT

[MS-900] Microsoft 365 Fundamentals

Microsoft

SEPTEMBER 2020 - PRESENT

Data Science for Business Leaders Nanodegree

Udacity

SEPTEMBER 2020 - PRESENT

[PL-900] Microsoft Power Platform Fundamentals

Microsoft

AUGUST 2020 - PRESENT

[DP-900] Azure Data Fundamentals

Microsoft

AUGUST 2020 - PRESENT

[AI-900] Azure AI Fundamentals

Microsoft

JULY 2020 - PRESENT

Introduction to Data Studio

Google

JUNE 2020 - PRESENT

Introduction to Delta Lake

Databricks

JUNE 2020 - PRESENT

Certified Product Manager

The Association of International Product Marketing and Management (AIPMM)

MAY 2020 - PRESENT

AI for Business Leaders

Udacity

MAY 2020 - PRESENT

AWS Business Professional

Amazon Web Services

MAY 2020 - PRESENT

[AZ-900] Azure Cloud Fundamentals

Microsoft

MAY 2020 - PRESENT

UX Designer

Udacity

APRIL 2020 - PRESENT

Enterprise Design Thinking — Team Essentials for AI

IBM

FEBRUARY 2020 - PRESENT

AI Product Manager

Udacity

OCTOBER 2019 - PRESENT

Situational Leadership SLII®

The Ken Blanchard Companies

AUGUST 2019 - AUGUST 2021

Certified Scrum Product Owner

Scrum Alliance

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