JPMorgan Names New AI Leaders After Heitsenrether Exit

JPMorgan Chase is reshuffling its artificial-intelligence leadership after Teresa Heitsenrether, the bank's AI chief for four decades, announced her retirement this month. The move goes beyond a single succession. The firm is restructuring its firm-wide chief data and analytics office, or CDAO, to shift focus from AI infrastructure to revenue-generating business initiatives.

"With the foundations now in place, and AI delivery shifting more to business and functions, we believe that aligning CDAO with Global Technology will best position us to continue our momentum to deliver for our clients and colleagues," the bank said in an internal memo seen by Business Insider.

Gerard Francis, who was chief product officer of data and AI, is also leaving. In February, the head of AI research, Manuela Veloso, departed after eight years. The departures come as JPMorgan spends nearly $20 billion a year on technology and has more than 1,000 active AI use cases, CEO Jamie Dimon said on a recent earnings call. The bank can even track individual engineers' token usage, Business Insider previously reported.

Here are the executives now directing the AI strategy and rollout.

Lori Beer remains the global chief information officer, sitting atop the bank's technology leadership. She oversees the tech budget and roughly 65,000 technologists. Beer joined JPMorgan in 2014 and is a member of the operating committee.

Scot Baldry, formerly chief technology officer, is taking on the additional role of chief data and analytics officer after Heitsenrether's retirement. In that capacity, he will helm the overall AI program and strategy. Baldry, who joined JPMorgan in 2022 after stints at Goldman Sachs, Credit Suisse, and T. Rowe Price, reports to Beer. His expanded team will "focus on AI & data strategy and governance, commercialization and value delivery, and external engagement with policymakers, regulators and the broader ecosystem," according to the memo.

Manoj Sindhwani, already the chief information officer for AI/ML and data platforms, is now also responsible for the data and AI product team. He oversees the employees who design and build firmwide data platforms and execute the broad strategy. Sindhwani joined JPMorgan in 2024 after nearly a decade at Amazon, and reports to Beer.

William Patrick Opet oversees information security, technology controls, and risk management – increasingly pressing issues as AI adoption accelerates. His role includes ensuring AI systems are secure and that the firm is protected against cyber threats, including those enabled by AI. Opet joined JPMorgan in 2014 after working at Lockheed Martin and has been in his current role since 2021. He reports to Beer.

Mark Birkhead, the firmwide chief data officer, is responsible for making JPMorgan's more than one exabyte of data – one billion gigabytes – AI-ready for both large language models and generative AI. Birkhead, who joined in 2020 and now reports to Baldry, said in a recent LinkedIn post that "data strategy is the competitive differentiator in banking."

Arvind Joshi manages the nearly $20 billion annual technology budget, including AI investments. He has commented on the challenge of managing rising AI token costs. Joshi has been at JPMorgan for more than two decades and reports to Beer.

Sumitra Ganesh took over as head of AI research in February, the latest role in her decade-long tenure at the bank. She succeeded Veloso, who started the research team in 2018. As of April, JPMorgan had the largest AI research team among the 50 banks tracked by intelligence platform Evident AI. Ganesh's research has focused on multi-agent systems in finance, according to her LinkedIn profile.

The leadership reset aligns CDAO with the broader technology group, a structural change that the memo said would help the bank "continue our momentum to deliver for our clients and colleagues."

JPMorgan shares rose 0.95% to $353.21 on the day. The stock carries an Alpha Score of 65 out of 100 from AlphaScala, a moderate rating that suggests the market sees balanced risk and reward. JPM stock page