NZ UNESCO Commissioner | Founder, She Sharp | Chair, AI Forum NZ | Associate Professor, AUT | Fulbright Scholar | Finalist, New Zealander of the Year | IEEE Senior Member | Global Keynote Speaker
Masha McCauley is one of New Zealand's most decorated AI experts, and her career has been built around a consistent conviction: the benefits of artificial intelligence should reach everyone, not just those already in the room. An Associate Professor at AUT with over 80 published papers, she has earned recognition across research, policy, advocacy, and public life simultaneously, a combination that is genuinely rare.
She chairs the AI Forum NZ, represents New Zealand at UNESCO as its Communication and Information Commissioner, is a Fulbright Scholar, an IEEE Senior Member, and has been a finalist for New Zealander of the Year three times. She founded She Sharp to bring more women and girls into technology, understanding that the people shaping AI systems need to reflect the full range of people those systems will affect.
Both as a speaker for Disruptive Technologies and an advisor for the Master of Technological Futures at academyEX, she brings a perspective shaped by research, policy, and advocacy working in concert. When Masha talks about AI, the country listens because she has earned that standing.