Dr. Abhay Gupta
EO-AI Labs  /  Team  /  Lab Head

Dr. Abhay Gupta

Coordinator, EO-AI & Commercialisation · Head, EO-AI Labs
Adjunct Professor, Department of SPASE · Space Technology Accelerator (STAr), IIT Kanpur
Director, Efficient World · Vancouver, Canada
Economist · Engineer AI Architect EO / Geospatial AI DARPA Forecasting Winner Gates Foundation Awardee PhD UBC · B.Tech IITK

About

Dr. Abhay Gupta is an economist-engineer specialising in evidence-driven artificial intelligence systems — AI grounded in empirical evidence and physical reality, where inference chains are traceable, outputs are measurable, and decisions are auditable. At STAr IIT Kanpur, he leads the EO-AI Labs as Coordinator for EO-AI & Commercialisation, directing the translation of Earth Observation science and AI research into production-grade intelligence systems for government, industry, and humanitarian applications.

The defining thread across his 20+ year career is the emphasis on observed actions and measurable outputs rather than self-reported metrics, opinion-based scoring, or opaque models. This makes his systems particularly suited for government, mission-critical, and industrial deployments where accountability is non-negotiable. His work spans three continents, eight organisations, and 30+ countries — from building actuarial models for a $500B national pension system at the House of Commons, to OECD intangible asset standards now embedded in IFRS and GAAP, to founding AI companies processing 100M+ enterprise documents.

At STAr IITK, Dr. Gupta leads the EO-AI Labs programme: defining 60 applied research topics across India-specific and global EO-AI frontiers, architecting the foundation model + data schema + agentic framework infrastructure for now-casting and real-time decision support systems, and building the commercialisation pathway from research to fundable products. His research bridges satellite remote sensing, economic intelligence, and the governance systems that need to act on both.

Research Focus at EO-AI Labs

Foundation Models for EO
India-centric geospatial FM pretraining, cross-sensor domain adaptation (Cartosat, EOS, Sentinel), and agentic reasoning systems with physically grounded inference.
Economic Signals from EO
Alpha-generating signals for financial markets: crop yield ahead of FASAL, reservoir storage for hydropower, NTL-based industrial output, supply chain risk from SAR flood extents.
Now-Casting & Scenario Planning
Ensemble Kalman Filter data assimilation, NWP downscaling, probabilistic scenario platforms with CMIP6-downscaled emulators and counterfactual generators.
Research Commercialisation
IP strategy, tiered FM licensing, phased commercialisation roadmap from PoC to ARR, grant acquisition (DST, ISRO, ESA BIC, USAID DIV), and open-core release strategy.
Industrial & Policy AI
ESG evidence synthesis, BRSR/CSRD compliance monitoring, digital twin integration for infrastructure, and regulatory alert systems for NDMA, CPCB, and state DMAs.
Data Standards & Governance
STAC 1.1, GeoParquet, OGC API, CF Conventions, FAIR Data Principles; sovereign data compliance for MeitY-approved deployments; immutable audit trail design.

Career History

2024 – Present
Coordinator, EO-AI & Commercialisation · Head, EO-AI Labs
Space Technology Accelerator (STAr), IIT Kanpur
Leading the EO-AI Labs programme: 60-topic research agenda (India + Global), applied research roadmap (FM architecture, data schemas, agentic systems), now-casting engine, scenario planning platform, and real-time alert & decision support systems. Building the commercialisation pathway from academic research to IP-protected, fundable products.
EO-AIFoundation ModelsResearch CommercialisationIIT Kanpur
2021 – Present
Director
Efficient World · Vancouver, Canada
35+ analytical reports with transparent methodology for governments and industry. AI systems for ESG evidence synthesis at scale. Productivity and competitiveness strategies for public sector clients. AI systems combining EO, sensor, and engineering data for industrial optimisation.
ESG AnalyticsGovernment AdvisoryAI Research
2019 – 2025 · Acquired
Founder & Head of Product
Lunge AI · Vancouver (Acquired 2025)
Built AI-native enterprise platform operating on 100M+ documents. LLM-enabled pipelines parsing unstructured organisational artefacts via NLP/NER. AI for priority management, constrained trade-off analysis, and evidence-based performance measurement. Led architecture, applied ML, and enterprise deployment end-to-end from zero to acquisition.
LLM PipelinesNLP / NEREnterprise PlatformStartup Exit 2025
2022 – 2023
Director, Centre of Economic Data Analysis
Ashoka University · India
Led economic data analysis initiatives, building research capacity at the intersection of data science and applied economics for policy-relevant research.
Economic DataPolicy Research
2019 – 2020
VP, Data & AI
SkyHive Technologies · Vancouver
Built production ML pipelines using CVs and real-time job-posting data at scale. Developed large-scale skills ontologies and embedding-based representations for labour market intelligence.
Skills OntologiesEmbeddingsLabour Market AI
2017 – 2021
Lead Consultant
European Investment Bank · Luxembourg
Designed non-financial performance and impact evaluation frameworks for major development portfolios. Authored 12 published studies, methodology handbook, and M&E frameworks. Evaluated projects spanning infrastructure, climate, and innovation across 30+ countries.
Impact EvaluationM&E Frameworks30+ Countries
2016 – 2017
Policy Advisor
House of Commons of Canada · Ottawa
Built actuarial models for a $500B national pension system serving 30M+ Canadians. Technical briefs directly to Members of Parliament and Senators. Costed major national policy initiatives across fiscal, social, and economic domains.
$500B Pension ModelParliamentary AdvisoryActuarial Modelling
2011 – 2013
Senior Administrator
OECD · Paris, France
International STI indicators managing 500+ data series from 26 countries. Intangible asset valuation contributions embedded in IFRS and GAAP accounting standards. Micro-data initiatives and productivity measurement frameworks.
Intangible AssetsIFRS / GAAPInternational Statistics
Pre-2011
Earlier Career
Conference Board (NY) · Wipro Technologies · MindTree
Economist at Conference Board New York (economic outlooks, policy analysis). Engineering Manager at Wipro Technologies managing 200-person teams. Software Engineer at MindTree on enterprise platforms. Sessional Instructor, UBC (2008–09).
EconomicsEngineering ManagementSoftware Engineering

Education

PhD, Economics
University of British Columbia (UBC)
Vancouver, Canada · 2009
B.Tech, Chemical Engineering
IIT Kanpur
Premier Technical Institute · India · 1999
MA, Economics
Lakehead University
Ontario, Canada
Executive Education
Harvard Kennedy School & Columbia Business School
Leadership & Policy · Finance & Strategy · 2016

Awards & Recognition

🏆
DARPA Forecasting Competition Winner — Global events, prediction accuracy and confidence, 2013. International recognition for evidence-based prediction methodology.
🌍
Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation Challenge — Future of Foreign Aid, 2014. Global development impact award for innovative aid effectiveness frameworks.
📊
IFRS & GAAP Standards Contributions — OECD intangible asset valuation work embedded in global accounting standards, shaping how R&D and intellectual capital are measured worldwide.
🇪🇺
European Union Grant, EU KLEMS Project — 2009–2011. Pan-European productivity and growth accounting research initiative.
🎓
Canadian Academic Awards & Scholarships — Multiple awards through doctoral programme at UBC, 2003–2009.

Selected Publications

Estimating Direct Gains in Consumer Welfare in Telecommunications Sector. Journal of Consumer Policy, Vol. 36, p. 119–138, 2013.
Indian Manufacturing Productivity: What caused the growth stagnation before the 1990s? International Productivity Monitor, Fall 2010.
Recent Productivity Developments in the World Economy. International Productivity Monitor, Spring 2010 (with Bart van Ark et al.).
Comparing Bank Lending Channel. Finance India, Vol. 25, p. 785–815, 2011.
Doing It Wisely: Using Financial Instruments to Increase Foreign Aid Effectiveness. Global Development Network, Mar 2015.
The Mystery Behind India's Revised GDP Numbers In Two Charts. Seeking Alpha, Feb 2015.
Objective Driven Geo-Politics: Leveraging for India's Economic Gains. Diplomatist, Nov 2014.
India: Growth vs. Development Agenda. Business Today, April 2014.
R&D Capitalisation: Synthesis report about industry level implementation. OECD, July 2012.
Intangible Assets in OECD Countries: An Industry Perspective. OECD, November 2011.
Measuring the Contribution of ICT to Economic Growth. Chapter in The Linked World: How ICT is Transforming Societies, Cultures and Economies. Fundación Telefónica, 2011.
An Analysis of Economic Growth in India: What explains the economic growth surge? VDM Publisher, October 2010.
The 2010 Productivity Brief: Productivity, Employment, and Growth in the World's Economies. The Conference Board Report, 2010.

250+ total publications across reports, papers, and policy frameworks. Download full CV →

Standards, Advisory & Other Affiliations

ISO/TC 225 "Market, Opinion and Social Research" — International Organization for Standardization
ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 42 "Artificial Intelligence" — International Organization for Standardization
ISO/TC 347 "Data Driven Agrifood System" — International Organization for Standardization
IEC SEG16 "Standardization of Sustainability Technologies" — International Electrotechnical Commission
IEC/ISO JSyC BDC "Bio-Digital Convergence" — Joint Standardization Committee
Digital Governance Council — Technical Expert
National Data Spaces (Canada) — Scientific Expert, AI-Readiness & Data Governance
GLG / VisasQ — Advisory & Expert Network
Beedie Luminaries — Mentor, SFU Beedie School of Business
Airawat AI — Advisory, India's National AI Computing Infrastructure

Ventures

2019 – 2025 · Acquired
Lunge AI → Lunge Systems
AI-native enterprise platform processing 100M+ documents. LLM pipelines for organisational intelligence. Acquired 2025.
Active
Moonshot Zero
Industrial decarbonisation AI. Expanding to incorporate real-time sensor data and EO imagery for net-zero pathway identification.
Active
PPO-99 Capital
Investment and strategy vehicle focused on evidence-driven technology and analytics companies.
Upcoming
You 2.0 Books
Midlife reinvention book series. Volumes 4–8 in progress: AI Future-Proofing, Purpose & Legacy, Relationships & Impact.