BOSTON--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Zapata Computing, Inc. (“Zapata AI” or the “Company”), the Industrial Generative AI company, today announced that Jon Zorio has joined the organization as Chief Revenue Officer. Jon’s track record and successful leadership in scaling global analytics and solutions companies will help Zapata AI accelerate revenue growth while continuing to evolve its enterprise sales and partner relationships to meet the surging market demand for Industrial Generative AI.
Zorio brings over two decades of go-to-market leadership experience forged across a range of technology and analytics companies. He has built and scaled category-defining startups to successful exits, led global GTM teams at AI-enabled organizations like Neustar and IBM, and held a range of senior leadership roles for both public and privately-held companies going through investment transactions and public offerings.
“We’re excited to have Jon join our company at this critical juncture in our journey to becoming a public company in Q1 2024,” said Christopher Savoie, Zapata AI CEO and co-founder. “He will lead our efforts in delivering significant revenue growth next year and beyond. Additionally, Jon will broaden our customer and partner pipeline to help us scale in a dynamic, rapidly evolving, and increasingly competitive market.”
Zorio’s priority focus is to drive enterprise customer and partner acquisition and expansion for the company’s Industrial Generative AI offerings: Prose for enhancing Large Language Models (LLMs) and Sense for enhancing computational analytics at scale. These offerings are targeted towards enterprises in industries such as Financial Services, Manufacturing, Logistics/3PL, Biotech/Pharma, Automotive, and Energy. For example, Zapata AI has applied its generative AI expertise to help enterprises such as Andretti Autosport, working with Zapata AI on predictive modeling and optimization challenges to improve their race strategy, and BMW (in collaboration with MIT) optimizing labor scheduling and staffing across its production plants.
Zapata’s Prose and Sense solutions address common challenges that enterprises face when solving industrial-scale problems with computational solutions. These challenges include bringing together data stores across the enterprise, unpredictable or incomplete data, model accuracy and specificity, mission-critical decisioning and responsiveness, interoperability across heterogeneous public/private cloud and on-prem environments, spiraling costs for large solution footprints, constrained compute resources, and security and governance concerns.
Zorio will join the company reporting to CEO and co-founder Savoie. “Industrial Generative AI has enormous transformative potential and represents a sea change in how large enterprises will function. The generative AI space is evolving with unprecedented speed, with significant advances occurring almost weekly. My experience building and scaling global go-to-market organizations to deliver business value through advanced analytics solutions, while accelerating enterprise sales and partner acquisition fits perfectly with Zapata's needs at this stage of the company's evolution,” said Zorio. “Christopher has built an incredible team of world class thought leaders and practitioners in the generative AI space, and I’m energized to get to work scaling the company alongside my new colleagues.”
About Zapata AI
Zapata AI is the Industrial Generative AI company, revolutionizing how enterprises solve their hardest problems with its powerful suite of Generative AI software. By combining numerical and text-based solutions, Zapata AI empowers enterprises to leverage large language models and numerical generative models better, faster, and more efficiently—delivering solutions to drive growth, savings and unprecedented insight. With proprietary science and engineering techniques and the Orquestra® platform, Zapata AI is accelerating Generative AI’s impact in Industry. The Company was founded in 2017 and is headquartered in Boston, Massachusetts. On September 6, 2023, Zapata AI entered into a definitive business combination agreement with Andretti Acquisition Corp. (NYSE: WNNR), the consummation of which, subject to customary closing conditions, will result in Zapata AI becoming a publicly listed company on the New York Stock Exchange. To learn more, visit: https://www.zapata.ai
Forward-Looking Statements
Certain statements made herein are not historical facts but are forward-looking statements for purposes of the safe harbor provisions under The Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Forward-looking statements generally are accompanied by words such as “believe,” “may,” “will,” “estimate,” “continue,” “anticipate,” “intend,” “expect,” “should,” “would,” “plan,” “predict,” “potential,” “seem,” “seek,” “future,” “outlook,” and similar expressions that predict or indicate future events or trends or that are not statements of historical matters. These forward-looking statements include, but are not limited to, statements regarding future events, the transaction, the estimated or anticipated future results and benefits of the combined company following the transaction, including the likelihood and ability of the parties to successfully consummate the transaction, future opportunities for the combined company, and other statements that are not historical facts. These statements are based on the current expectations of Andretti Acquisition Corp.’s and Zapata AI’s management and are not predictions of actual performance. These forward-looking statements are provided for illustrative purposes only and are not intended to serve as, and must not be relied on, by any investor as a guarantee, an assurance, a prediction, or a definitive statement of fact or probability. Actual events and circumstances are difficult or impossible to predict and will differ from assumptions. Many actual events and circumstances are beyond the control of Andretti Acquisition Corp. and Zapata AI. These statements are subject to a number of risks and uncertainties regarding Zapata AI’s businesses and the transaction, and actual results may differ materially. These risks and uncertainties include, but are not limited to, ability to meet the closing conditions to the transaction, including approval by stockholders of Andretti Acquisition Corp. on the expected terms and schedule and the risk that regulatory approvals required for the transaction are not obtained or are obtained subject to conditions that are not anticipated; delay in closing the transaction or failure to close the transaction within the period permitted under its governing documents; failure to realize the benefits expected from the proposed transaction; a decline in the price of Andretti Acquisition Corp’s securities following the transaction if it fails to meet the expectations of investors or securities analysts; the amount of redemption requests made by Andretti Acquisition Corp.’s public stockholders; the ability of Andretti Acquisition Corp. or the combined company to issue equity or equity-linked securities in connection with the transaction or in the future; the effects of pending and future legislation; risks related to disruption of management time from ongoing business operations due to the proposed transaction; business disruption following the transaction; risks related to Andretti Acquisition Corp.’s and Zapata AI’s indebtedness; other consequences associated with mergers, acquisitions, and divestitures and legislative and regulatory actions and reforms; Zapata’s ability to maintain its current rate of growth; maintenance and renewal of customer contracts and subscriptions; competition in Zapata AI’s industries; Zapata AI’s ability to raise additional capital; the successful integration of potential targets, products, or technologies; Zapata AI’s ability to improve its operational, financial, and management controls; Zapata AI’s failure to maintain and enhance awareness of its brand; increased costs associated with being a public company; cybersecurity incidents; ability to prevent fraudulent activities by Zapata AI’s customers, employees, or other third parties; potential interruptions or delays in third-party services; protection of proprietary rights; intellectual property infringement, data protection, and other losses; compliance with federal, state, and local laws as well as statutory and regulatory requirements; risks of implementing controls and procedures required for public companies following the transaction; and the ability of Zapata AI’s or the combined company to issue equity or equity-linked securities with the proposed business combination or in the future; and those factors discussed in Andretti Acquisition Corp.’s Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2022, under Risk Factors in Part I, Item 1A and other documents of Andretti Acquisition Corp. filed, or to be filed, with the SEC.
If any of these risks materialize or if assumptions prove incorrect, actual results could differ materially from the results implied by these forward-looking statements. There may be additional risks that Andretti Acquisition Corp. or Zapata AI presently do not know or that Andretti Acquisition Corp. or Zapata currently believe are immaterial that could also cause actual results to differ from those contained in the forward-looking statements. In addition, forward-looking statements provide Andretti Acquisition Corp.’s or Zapata AI’s expectations, plans, or forecasts of future events and views as of the date of this communication. Andretti Acquisition Corp. or Zapata AI anticipate that subsequent events and developments will cause their assessments to change. However, while Andretti Acquisition Corp. or Zapata AI may elect to update these forward-looking statements at some point in the future, Andretti Acquisition Corp. or Zapata AI specifically disclaim any obligation to do so. These forward-looking statements should not be relied upon as representing Andretti Acquisition Corp.’s or Zapata AI’s assessments as of any date subsequent to the date of this communication. Accordingly, undue reliance should not be placed upon the forward-looking statements.
