TechTalk: AI 2.0: Startup Leads AI Revolution to Transform the World

Welcome to TechTalk, Dan. I'm thrilled to have you join me today.

Dan Sinawat:

Hi, Janina. Yes, same with me. It's an honor, especially to be here on the special month, right, where we celebrate Asian history, and myself being Thai American, but Chinese heritage, also spend a lot of time in Japan, I'm a mix of everything Asia, so happy to be here.

Janina Teoxon:

All right, let's jump right in. So in a few sentences then please explain AI CONNEX for our audience and the story behind starting this company.

Dan Sinawat:

AI CONNEX, what we aim to be is a global AI community where we actually help from underrepresented groups to learn more about AI because we believe that everybody have the same access now. Everybody have equal opportunity. So I think AI can help elevate every communities, every part of the world.

And alongside with that, we also try setting new trends around AI and responsibility of using AI, share the knowledge and then creating a community from in-person to online that we can all come together from business leaders to technology leaders to come and discuss about this exciting opportunity of AI and how it can be applied to their businesses. So that's kind of what we do. At the end, we are looking at ourself as being at the top of AI ecosystem where everyone will come to us for anything AI.

Janina Teoxon:

Nice. That's good. And congratulations on becoming a global AI community. And I like what you said that you are trying to teach AI, especially in the underrepresented communities, so that's truly admirable. So I'm sure our listeners, Dan, would like to hear what is the problem that AI CONNEX is aiming to solve?

Dan Sinawat:

I think we name ourself AI CONNEX, but at the end of the day, we are trying to solve things that AI cannot do, right? I have people, business leader, C-level of the company asking me, "Hey Dan, I know you're in technology. Do you think AI can help solve our problem? We are a big construction company, but we just lost $100 million because someone installed a pole in the wrong place where it shouldn't have been done," and stuff like that could have been prevented by AI technologies. And I said, "Yes."

We actually have an AI startup doing things specifically for construction in AI, and then I see the gap, like why do people come to me? And I have the same thing happening with the startup owners, founders coming to me, "Dan, how can we go to market? How can we talk to the customer? We don't know where to go."

So at the end, I have ... This big question mark came up just recently. I just started this in January 2024, but before that, I have been getting inquiry from all over the places. And I think you can already access all this AI information from internet. Why do people still come to me? And I realized there's a big trust issue with the technology. With everything being out there on the internet, they don't know who to go to, where to go to, and most importantly, who to trust. And that's what we represent. Trust is where AI cannot really represent as well as the human.

And then another thing is the human connection side of it. We promote and encourage the human connection, like the kids in underrepresented community. The leader of the Fiscal Inclusion Committee came up to me and said, "Dan, do you think you can teach underrepresented Hispanic kids about AI?" And I said, "Yes," and we have Spanish-speaking members that could reach out to them, could be teaching them about AI so that they can trust that this technology is not only for a different group, but it's available for everybody. And I think it's all come down to trust issue that what we are having today and that's what we are here to solve.

Janina Teoxon:

Yeah, that sounds amazing. So you are trying to find a specific solution, right, AI solution for these people that come to you and ask for suggestions and all that. So being an AI enthusiast and being the go-to person, right, for all things AI, tell us if there is a specific AI or a technology that your company is using to further its mission and vision.

Dan Sinawat:

I would say Gen AI is number one because that's where everybody can approach from Chat GPT to Microsoft Bing to everything, right? That's the first interface of AI where everybody have access to today. But the actual real AI work that can solve real problem is more on symbolic reasoning or we call it machine reasoning. That's a big difference. I would say Gen AI is more of a phase one of where AI is going. But the real problem solver that would solve a lot of humanity issues and business issue and all this is actually the [inaudible 00:06:05] reasoning, the machine reasoning, which is the phase two of the AI. And that's where we focus on a lot of, when we actually come down to the business discussion, how we solve our customer problem is actually using those machine reasoning to do more advanced AI solutions for the customer.

Janina Teoxon:

Right, so it's incredible what AI can do for us. If I could just share quickly, because I scheduled a call with my client the other day, so I invited the VP of finance and the CEO just to start and plan our upcoming audit engagement with them. So I sent the invitation, and then I joined my Teams call. And when I joined the call I saw an AI was there on the call, so I was kind of surprised. And the VP of finance explained to me that it was the CEO's note taker because the CEO couldn't make that call.

So it's just fascinating what AI can do for all of us. CEO just like yourself, they're all busy all the time, it can make these calls. They probably have a bunch of meetings. Now CEOs can do two things at the same time because they have a note taker/AI who can help them multitask. So it's really amazing and fascinating what AI can do for us.

Dan Sinawat:

Yeah. And I love your talk just now because that's exactly what we've been talking to. For example, some of the construction companies, they have a lot of great project managers, but one person cannot do everything. They cannot handle hundreds of projects, right? And that's exactly what AI is helping them. We are cloning the best project manager they could have, but making it available, any multiple of human can possibly create, right? So then they can handle thousands projects at the same time instead of 10, right? And that's the beauty of this artificial intelligence and all the new technology that's coming out.

Janina Teoxon:

Right. Amazing. Amazing. So I'm hearing a lot of great things about your company, AI CONNEX, and you being a go-to person, and we all know that every journey has pivotal moments. Dan, could you share a specific moment that had a profound impact on the direction of AI CONNEX?

Dan Sinawat:

Yes. Yes. I think when we first started, we are looking only few areas where we would focus and then for example, just doing networking event and B2B, go-to-market support for some of the AI solution companies and matching the corporates and the AI solution. But then later, we realized there's so much bigger problems that the world is facing, right? For example, and it became our grand vision and that's how we attract so many followers. We grew in two months. We have just finished the biggest event, AI event in the Dallas Fort Worth area where we have almost 200 people join and C-levels from Toyota, big AI solution company, CEO and founder. And it's just amazing how we could do that in a short time. But I think it all come down to this grand vision where I ask everybody, do you know what's coming in 2026 to America? Do you know, Janina?

Janina Teoxon:

No, I don't know. That's two years from now. No.

Dan Sinawat:

It is the biggest event in the world. And when I ask that question, 90% of the time people cannot answer what is coming, right? It's the World Cup 2026 and the US is a host country and most people cannot answer that, right? And I tell people that is the once in a lifetime opportunity for everybody. The whole world is coming here and do we want to show the world just soccer and let them go home, or do we want to show them something else?

And that's what we finally see, that there's bigger vision, bigger things that we have to do than just connecting business to business. We want to connect the world to communities that are here and benefiting and elevating every community. And I see that, for example, such a big event like World Cup. There's opportunity for any community to grow, right?

And I tell everybody, by 2026, we want to bring or we want to create the biggest AI conference in the world here in Texas. And then they will come not just once but twice, twice or maybe 10 more times. And you can think of the economic impact it would have in the communities, right? And I think a lot of people around here are only looking at things maybe a month or two ahead and only thing in their neighborhood, right, but that's I think our mission at AI CONNEX.

That's why we are becoming a global community where we want to bring more global initiatives, but using AI as the major trend setter to bring attention to it. But I tell people, I have people in ministry, we can do the same for the biggest ministry gathering on earth, 2026 because the whole world is coming here anyway, right? There's so many opportunities for everybody to grow and rejuvenate these communities in the US.

And four years from now we have Olympic 2028, right? Everybody thinks US right now, economy is going down, recession. I see opposite. I see this as our golden time. We have AI. We have World Cup. We have Olympics, right? And that's what our mission is, is to come and help people realize there's grander vision that we should be aiming for and leveraging that AI technology and AI discussion to bring that forward and help communities thrive. And that's exactly what we are trying to do. It's really more than just one thing. We try to do so many things and it's been kind of like a catalyst for the growth that we have seen.

Janina Teoxon:

Right, so you're planning big events in 2026 and 2028?

Dan Sinawat:

Yeah, yeah. But along the way, we're just trying to set a deadline. A lot of time, unless you have a deadline, you know what happens, right? People don't move.

Janina Teoxon:

Well, that's really great. You have great visions and plans for the AI community, right? That's really inspiring. It's really inspiring to know.

All right, so I'm down to my last question, Dan. So to wrap things up, I'm going to ask you a favorite question that I like to ask my guests during our initial conversation. So Dan, tell me one bragging point you're most proud of about your company.

Dan Sinawat:

Yeah. I would say that we are able to set ourselves as a leader in AI community so quick, so fast. And I think we have great vision and that's why people are following us. And it's not resonating just to myself, and we're not doing things just for business. We're doing things for purpose. And I think that's what we are always proud of. I have more and more people joining us, volunteering to be on the board just because we want to do the same thing. We want to elevate every community through AI education, through exposure to AI technologies, and that's what we are proud of.

Janina Teoxon:

Yeah, it's truly a remarkable achievement. It's a testament to your hard work and your team's dedication.

That's a wrap, Dan. Thank you for taking time to have a conversation with me today. And thanks to our listeners for tuning into TechTalk, the entrepreneurs and innovators who turn to EisnerAmper for audit, tax, advisory and outsourcing solutions to help propel their business forward.

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