Obama appoints DJ Patil as first US chief data scientist

The White House has named DJ Patil its first ever Chief Data Scientist and Deputy Chief Technology Officer for Data Policy. “Patil joins the White House following an incredible career as a data scientist — a term he helped coin — in the public and private sectors, and in academia,” The White House said in a statement. The Indian-origin executive has worked with several Silicon Valley biggies, including LinkedIn, Greylock Partners, Skype, PayPal, eBay; and most recently Patil served as VP-product at RelateIQ, which was acquired by Salesforce. [caption id=“attachment_2108471” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  DJ Patil[/caption] As Chief Data Scientist, Patil will help shape policies and practices to help the US remain a leader in technology and innovation, foster partnerships to help responsibly maximize the nation’s return on its investment in data, and help to recruit and retain the best minds in data science, the statement said. He will also work on the Administration’s Precision Medicine Initiative, which focuses on utilizing advances in data and health care to provide clinicians with new tools, knowledge, and therapies to select which treatments will work best for which patients, while protecting patient privacy, the statement said. As part of the CTO team, Patil will work closely with colleagues across government, including the Chief Information Officer and U.S. Digital Service. His work will also include data science leadership on the Administration’s momentum on open data and data science. Patil will work in the Office of Science and Technology Policy, reporting to US Chief Technology Officer Megan Smith. “President Obama has prioritized bringing top technical talent like DJ into the federal government to harness the power of technology and innovation to help government better serve the American people,” Megan Smith added. Prior to his work in the private sector, he also worked at the Department of Defense, where he directed new efforts to bridge computational and social sciences in fields like social network analysis to help anticipate emerging threats to the United States. Patil holds a bachelor’s degree in mathematics from the University of California, San Diego, and a PhD in applied mathematics from the University of Maryland College Park.

His father Suhas Patil was born in Jamshedpur and completed his bachelor’s degree in engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Kharagpur. He completed his Masters’ degree in electrical engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where he also pursued his PhD degree, and later had a five-year stint (1970-1975) as assistant professor. He started Patil Systems in 1981. In 1984, he co-founded Cirrus Logic, a fabless semiconductor company.