The State of Artificial Intelligence in Boston

Sometimes it's just a matter of recognizing an opportunity, as well as having the right combination of technical expertise and a willingness to learn. That's the situation Rob May found himself in when he sold his data recovery startup Backupify to Datto in 2014. May said he started to look AI, among other emerging technologies, when he realized he didn't want to stay at Datto for much longer. May began reading research papers on machine learning. At the same time, he recognized the rise of work collaboration platforms like Slack and HipChat, which weren't just providing better ways for workers to communicate but also creating giant repositories of data.