In pole position in your field: our colleague Skip

Skip van der Meer (28) started working as a data & IT consultant at Yellowtail Conclusion immediately after his studies. When GenAI was still a gimmick, he was already experimenting with its applications. At the breakthrough, he was therefore at the starting blocks. Skip: ‘Yellowtail Conclusion realised that they had to get on the GenAI train. From my background and interest, I was keen to take the initiative there. That led to setting up the Artificial Intelligence Excellence Centre (AIXC), which is responsible for everything around AI. Yellowtail Conclusion gave me the confidence to set up the AIXC. And not only that. They put people with skills I don't have very close to me. They did a super job.’  

‘As a kid I wanted to be Willie Carrot, but being an inventor is not a job you can apply for. Yet subconsciously, it was exactly what I wanted to do. To innovate, to do new things. The fact that I can now be the Willie Root of my field is really cool. I am lucky that what I was enthusiastic about in my studies became booming at the right time. The technology was so new that everyone started from scratch. Then when you start running really fast and doing a lot, you always know more than others. I feel like a kid in a sweet shop.’

How do you stay ahead in a rapidly changing field? Skip: ‘A lot of reading, a lot of webinars and, above all, a lot of experimenting. The theoretical basis from my studies is my head start. Now it's mainly about keeping up. I follow all the big companies I find interesting, attend training courses and have a weekly literature block. Yellowtail Conclusion has created all the conditions to be able to do this. Especially Daniël Veenhoven, who has listened to me a lot. He made sure the right people were given time to join. I am enormously grateful to him for that. On my own, I could never have done this.’ 

The AIXC team has to keep in mind the strict laws and regulations for financial institutions when developing solutions. Skip: ‘For everything we want to build, we have to use components that comply with strict regulations. This is sometimes unfortunate, because it frames you. But there are always ways to do it. If the out-of-the-box solution is not compliant, then we have to build it ourselves to meet regulations.’ The next big thing? ‘AGI. That's going to open doors for whole new applications,’ Skip concludes.