How can you apply AI and data science to inform business decision-making? With Jean-Baptiste Bouzige, Ekimetrics

Data Malarkey - the podcast about using data smarter

In this episode of the Data Malarkey podcast, data storyteller Sam Knowles is joined by Jean-Baptiste Bouzige, the CEO of Ekimetrics. The company describes itself as “a pioneering leader in data science and AI-powered solutions for sustainable business performance”. Jean-Baptiste is one of the founders of Ekimetrics, a business he launched in 2006 after starting his career at the ad agency DDB. At DDB he was in charge of developing analytics and modeling methodologies.

Jean-Baptiste is passionate about finding innovative ways to deliver simple insights from complex methods for better decision-making, and Ekimetrics is increasingly focused on helping businesses become sustainable for the long term. He teaches “Data for Marketing” at the HEC business school in Paris on the Executive MBA program. Jean-Baptiste is a graduate of both the École Polytechnique and the École des Mines de Paris, where he specialised in applied mathematics and micro-economics.

Our conversation was recorded remotely, via the medium of Riverside.fm, on 11 April 2023.

Thanks to Joe Hickey for production support.

Podcast artwork by Shatter Media.

Voice over by Samantha Boffin.

Although he spends much of his time managing and building the 400-strong Ekimetrics team of data scientists and engineers, Jean-Baptiste takes most pleasure from writing. His writing focuses on the impact of the data-driven models his team builds to help the company’s clients enhance their business decision-making. “Smarter use of data all starts with well-informed, key business questions,” he tells me.

Jean-Baptiste believes that the most important encounter data scientists and engineers can have with the data sets they’re working with is the very first exploration of raw, unfiltered information. This initial encounter sets the tone for how the data will be used and enables everyone in a business to start speaking the same language. For Jean-Baptiste, the failure to find a common lexicon across different functions is one of the main reasons why data doesn’t solve the problems it can.

Ekimetrics brings together algorithms and data, technology and core business functions with the single-minded goal of securing competitive advantage. The company aims to deliver transformational impact and invests its time here rather than in piecemeal, micro-optimisations. This is particularly important for legacy businesses which are forced to evolve because of societal change, consumer pressure, and legislation; businesses including automotive and consumer goods. Hence Ekimetrics’ current and future focus on sustainability.

The rapid evolution of powerful AI engines which are widely-available at no or low cost – engines such as ChatGPT – excites Jean-Baptiste, provided they’re used at the right time and in the right way. He agrees with Bill Gates that AI is the most important innovation in business in the past 35 years.

We end our conversation talking about Jean-Baptiste’s 2022 interview with his hero, the Princeton psychologist Daniel Kahneman (link below). He was so impressed with Kahneman’s thoughtful, considered response to his questions, as if considering them for the first time.

EXTERNAL LINKS

Ekimetrics website – https://ekimetrics.com

Jean-Baptiste’s LinkedIn profile – https://www.linkedin.com/in/jean-baptiste-bouzige-6aaa242/

Jean-Baptiste interviewing Daniel Kahneman – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TMLujEsoxoM

To find out what kind of data storyteller you are, complete our data storytelling scorecard at https://data-storytelling.scoreapp.com. It takes just two minutes, and we’ll send you your own personalised scorecard which tells you what kind of data storyteller you are.