
The Tech Leaders Podcast
#135: Thales' Chief AI Officer Ajay Chakravarthy, AI on the Battlefield: Where Should We Draw the Line?
Join us this week on the Tech Leaders Podcast, where Gareth talks to Ajay Chakravarthy, Chief AI Officer at Thales. Ajay shares practical insights on leadership, deploying AI in constrained environments, human oversight, measuring returns, and preparing workers for change. What happens when AI decisions have real-world consequences? From AI-enabled drones in Ukraine to the future of autonomous military systems, Ajay explores AI in high-stakes environments. Drawing on his work across defence, policing and government, he discusses frugal AI, AI-supported decision-making, and why transparency, ethics and human oversight are essential when the stakes are high. Timestamps: AI use cases in defence and government (12:30) Why the UK has fewer globally recognized AI frontier-model companies (16: 03) Frugal AI systems (18:34) The future of AI (21:05) AI in the defence sector (23:20) AI autonomy and agentic systems (27:15) AlphaFold and biology (35:00) Battlefield Technology & AI in warfare (37:40) How Thales uses AI (44:40) What worries & excites Ajay most? (53:20) https://www.bedigitaluk.com/

