Joanna Shields HIDDEN
Joanna Shields is passionate about creating responsible technology that benefits humanity, and has spent her professional life building companies, products and Platforms that have transformed markets and reshaped industries. As Chief Executive Officer, Joanna Shields leads BenevolentAI in its mission to scale the discovery of life-changing new medicines for patients.
Joanna has spent over three decades building and growing some of the world's best-known technology companies, most recently at Facebook, Aol and Google. As a tech industry veteran, Joanna has a deep understanding of the technological and commercial innovation needed to make a transformative impact on human health.
Since joining BenevolentAI as CEO in 2018, Joanna has accelerated BenevolentAI’s transformation from a startup to a clinical-stage AI-enabled drug discovery company. Under Joanna’s leadership, BenevolentAI has scaled and validated the Benevolent Platform™ (its AI-enabled drug discovery Platform), broadened the Company’s pipeline of Platform-generated disease programmes and developed lasting successful commercial collaborations with leading pharmaceutical companies. In April 2022, Joanna successfully transitioned BenevolentAI to a publicly traded company via a merger with Odyssey Acquisition.
Prior to joining BenevolentAI, Joanna served in the UK Government as Under Secretary of State and Minister for Internet Safety & Security, Digital Economy Adviser and Chair and CEO of TechCityUK. Joanna serves as the Co-Chair of the Global Partnership on Artificial Intelligence (GPAI), an OECD-endorsed multi-stakeholder initiative working on the trustworthy development and deployment of AI. She is the founder of the WeProtect Global Alliance, is a Life Peer of the House of Lords, a Commissioner on the Oxford Commission on AI & Good Governance (OxCAIGG), and a member of the Council on Foreign Relations.