Clodéric Mars

AI Product Engineer & Tech Leader, turning research prototypes into enterprise products since 2006

Montréal, QC

Canada

Creative, enthusiastic and thoughtful software engineer & tech leader!

Since 2006, I'm building AIs with one overarching goal: fostering collaboration between Humans and AIs.

To bridge the gap between research and productization, I've developed a wide range of skills: AI and ML algorithms, applied data science, distributed cloud architecture, API design, product & tech roadmap management, workshop facilitation, customer & partners relationships.

Over the years my role has evolved from individual contributor, to team leader, to managing several teams internally and in coordination with external stakeholders. As CTO of craft ai and VP Engineering of AI Redefined, I recruited and led teams of 15+ AI researchers, software engineers and data scientists in challenging deep tech startup environments.

I have experience working in multi-cultural and international environments with full proficiency in both French, my native language, and English.

Experience

since 2021/02 - Montréal, Canada

VP of Engineering - AI Redefined

  • Coordination of product & technological strategy, research and external collaboration efforts in line with corporate strategy and business development.
  • Recruiting and leading the research & engineering team from 5 to 16 engineers & researchers.
  • Key contribution to product and sales strategy, as well as operations: defining offers, managing the product roadmap, participating in business development, setuping technological & research partnerships.
  • Hands-on research and development of Cogment a multi-agent, human-in-the-loop reinforcement learning orchestration platform and several projects implementing it: Python, Go, Javascript, Kubernetes, Reinforcement Learning, Machine Learning, Data Science.
  • Coordination and contributions on multiple collaborations including with Thales, CAE, NAV CANADA, University of Alberta, MILA and IRT SystemX.
from 2020/05 to 2021/01 - Paris, France

Freelance AI engineer

from 2020/08 to 2021/01

AI Product Engineer - AI Redefined

Contribution & coordination of the open source release of Cogment v1.

from 2020/05 to 2020/06

Volunteering Data Scientist - APHP

Data extraction and preparation for epidemiological studies of the first COVID-19 patients in Paris hospitals: Python, PostgreSQL, Apache Spark, data science.

from 2015/03 to 2020/04 - Paris, France

Co-founder & CTO - craft ai

  • Development of the company from 7 to 20+ employees, participation in fundraising for a total of ~9M€, deployment of ~10 AI projects within large companies including EDF, Total and Dassault Aviation.
  • Leading product development, R&D and Customer Success teams.
  • Hands-on development of an explainable AI SaaS specialized in time series: Rust, Javascript, Python, Kafka, Redis, Kubernetes, Docker, machine learning, data science.
from 2012/01 to 2015/02 - Paris, France

Lead Software Engineer & Product Manager - MASA Group

  • Leading a product development team (~5 software engineers) based in Paris and Munich.
  • Managing an AI product, a middleware enabling non-specialists to create and control AIs for simulations and video games: Technical pre-sales, participation to business development, speaker at several international conferences (e.g. GDC), coordination with the research team.
  • Development of the behavior tree and spatial reasoning engine: C++, Computational Geometry, Game AI, Unity, Ogre3d, VBS2/3.
from 2010/01 to 2011/12 - Rennes, France

R&D Software Engineer - Golaem

from 2010/01 to 2011/12 - Rennes, France

R&D Software Engineer - INRIA

  • Development of a 3d simulation engine and industrialization of a navigation engine for virtual crowds: C++, Qt, Ogre3d, Computational Geometry, Game AI.
from 2006/07 to 2009/02 - Rennes, France

Software Engineer - Teamlog (acquired by Open)

from 2006/02 to 2006/09 - Rennes, France

AI Research Intern - INRIA

Member of the Bunraku project-team, advised by Fabrice Lamarche. Environment representation formalism for crowd simulation using semantic & topologic abstraction of navigation graphs.

Education

from 2001/09 to 2006/06 - Rennes, France

MEng (Diplôme d'ingénieur) in Computer Science - INSA de Rennes

2 years of general scientific and engineering courses followed by 3 years of computer science specialization.

from 2005/09 to 2006/06 - Rennes, France

MSc in Artificial Intelligence - Université de Rennes 1

Academia-oriented 1 year curriculum with a focus on Artificial Intelligence, including machine learning and symbolic reasoning, in collaboration with INRIA.

MOOCS

Peer-reviewed publications

Full list on Google Scholar

Talks