Scale AI names Francis deSouza as new CEO

Scale AI names Francis deSouza as new CEO

Thu, July 30, 2026 at 8:49 PM GMT+3 2 min read

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Scale AI announced Thursday that its board of directors has appointed Francis deSouza as chief executive officer, effective Aug. 10, 2026. At Google Cloud, deSouza held the roles of chief operating officer and president of security products before taking on the CEO position at Scale.

Before joining Google Cloud, deSouza served as president and CEO of Illumina, a publicly traded genomics company, where the company's revenue grew to more than $4.5 billion and its operations expanded across more than 150 countries, Scale said. His earlier career included a stint as president of products and services at Symantec, and he founded two startups that Microsoft and Symantec each went on to acquire. He holds bachelor's and master's degrees in electrical engineering and computer science from MIT.

deSouza replaces Jason Droege, who has led Scale as interim CEO since June 2025. Droege will work with deSouza over the coming months to assist with the transition, the company said.

"Scale sits at a rare intersection of frontier model development and real-world deployment, and the opportunity for continued growth and success is enormous," deSouza said in a statement. "My focus will be getting Scale's solutions into more businesses and governments, delivering the best data for AI labs, and showing our value through provable outcomes."

Scale AI founder Alexandr Wang, who now serves as chairman of the board, said in a statement that deSouza "has led and scaled complex, technical businesses, and understands what it takes to serve both enterprises and governments at the highest level of trust and reliability."

The appointment comes as Scale said it has added enterprise customers including BP and Mayo Clinic and expanded work with U.S. and international governments.

Scale AI, which built its business providing data labeling and evaluation services that underpin AI model development, also operates an applications business that builds AI software for companies and governments. According to The Next Web, that applications arm is expected to surpass its data division in revenue within a year and a half.

Speaking to The Next Web, deSouza said companies "understand the value and the potential of AI, but they want help realising that potential," and described that gap as "a very, very big need."