DisrupTV Episode 439

Vinton G. Cerf is vice president and Chief Internet Evangelist for Google. He contributes to global policy development and continued spread of the Internet. Widely known as one of the "Fathers of the Internet," Cerf is the co-designer of the TCP/IP protocols and the architecture of the Internet. He has served in executive positions at MCI, the Corporation for National Research Initiatives and the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency and on the faculty of Stanford University.

Vint Cerf served as chairman of the board of the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) from 2000-2007 and has been a Visiting Scientist at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory since 1998. Cerf served as founding president of the Internet Society (ISOC) from 1992-1995. Cerf is a Foreign Member of the British Royal Society and Swedish Academy of Engineering, and Fellow of IEEE, ACM, and American Association for the Advancement of Science, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the International Engineering Consortium, the Computer History Museum, the British Computer Society, the Worshipful Company of Information Technologists, the Worshipful Company of Stationers and a member of the National Academy of Engineering. He currently serves as Past President of the Association for Computing Machinery, chairman of the American Registry for Internet Numbers (ARIN) and completed a term as Chairman of the Visiting Committee on Advanced Technology for the US National Institute of Standards and Technology. President Obama appointed him to the National Science Board in 2012.

Cerf is a recipient of numerous awards and commendations in connection with his work on the Internet, including the US Presidential Medal of Freedom, US National Medal of Technology, the Queen Elizabeth Prize for Engineering, the Prince of Asturias Award, the Tunisian National Medal of Science, the Japan Prize, the Charles Stark Draper award, the ACM Turing Award, Officer of the Legion d’Honneur and 29 honorary degrees. In December 1994, People magazine identified Cerf as one of that year's "25 Most Intriguing People."

His personal interests include fine wine, gourmet cooking and science fiction. Cerf and his wife, Sigrid, were married in 1966 and have two sons, David and Bennett.

Dr. David A. Bray is a Distinguished Fellow and Chair of the Accelerator with the Alfred Lee Loomis Innovation Council at the non-partisan Henry L. Stimson Center. He is also a non-resident Distinguished Fellow with the Business Executives for National Security, and a CEO and transformation leader for different “under the radar” tech and data ventures seeking to get started in novel situations. He is Principal at LeadDoAdapt Ventures and has served in a variety of leadership roles in turbulent environments, including bioterrorism preparedness and response from 2000-2005. Dr. Bray previously was the Executive Director for a bipartisan National Commission on R&D, provided non-partisan leadership as a federal agency Senior Executive, worked with the U.S. Navy and Marines on improving organizational adaptability, and aided U.S. Special Operation Command’s J5 Directorate on the challenges of countering disinformation online. He has received both the Joint Civilian Service Commendation Award and the National Intelligence Exceptional Achievement Medal. David accepted a leadership role in December 2019 to direct the successful bipartisan Commission on the Geopolitical Impacts of New Technologies and Data that included Senator Mark Warner, Senator Rob Portman, Rep. Suzan DelBene, and Rep. Michael McCaul. From 2017 to the start of 2020, David also served as Executive Director for the People-Centered Internet coalition Chaired by Internet co-originator Vint Cerf and was named a Senior Fellow with the Institute for Human-Machine Cognition starting in 2018. Business Insider named him one of the top “24 Americans Who Are Changing the World” under 40 and he was named a Young Global Leader by the World Economic Forum. For twelve different startups, he has served as President, CEO, Chief Strategy Officer, and Strategic Advisor roles.

David’s passions include complicated, near-impossible missions involving humans and technology in challenging circumstances. Through the efforts of a team of “positive change agents”, he led the transformation of the Federal Communication Commission’s legacy IT with more than 207 different systems to award-winning tech. This included rolling out new cloud-based IT that achieved results in 1/2 the time at 1/6 the cost. He was the recipient of the Armed Forces Communications and Electronic Association’s Outstanding Achievement Award for Civilian Government. He also received the global CIO 100 Award twice, which usually is awarded to private sector Fortune 500 companies, both in 2015 and 2017, for his transformational leadership in change-adverse settings. From 2017-2021, he both worked with multiple services associated with the U.S. Department of Defense on improving organizational adaptability and countering disinformation online – including personally surviving a disinformation attack that occurred in 2018. In 2019, he was invited to give the AI World Society Distinguished Lecture to the United Nations on UN Charter Day. In 2025, he was invited to be an expert witness before a public Congressional hearing on AI, specifically to provide both verbal and written testimony as well as answers to questions from members of the U.S. Congress to help inform AI policies.

As Principal at LeadDoAdapt Ventures, Dr. Bray’s passions include providing Board-level and CEO-level leadership to different “under the radar” tech and data ventures seeking to get started in novel situations to include activities that shape the Future of Data, Bio, and Space. He provides strategic direction, advice, and leadership to organizations confronting turbulent environments on multiple topics ranging from quantum computing to commercial space endeavors; synthetic biology to data cooperatives paired with AI. He accepted a role of Co-Chair for 2016-2017 with an IEEE Committee focused on Artificial Intelligence, automated systems, and innovative policies globally and has been serving as a Visiting Executive In-Residence at Harvard University since 2015 and as a Faculty Member giving talks on Impact and Disruption at Singularity University since 2017. In 2021 and 2022, he was named a Distinguished Fellow with the Atlantic Council. In 2023, he was named a distinguished Academy Fellow with the National Academy of Public Administration focused on the role of transformative technologies, like AI, on public service. In 2022, the Business Executives for National Security welcomed him as a Distinguished Fellow focused on the intersection of transformative technologies, global collaborations, and over-the-horizon challenges for the future ahead. David has been an invited keynote speaker to CEOs, world leaders, and crowds of more than 3,000 participants at events in India, Vietnam, Australia, Taiwan, Dubai, South Africa, Brazil, Colombia, Mexico, Canada, Belgium, Sweden, Singapore, Saudi Arabia, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom.

Cheryl Einhorn helps organisations transform ambiguity into advantage. An award-winning investigative journalist turned decision-science entrepreneur, she founded Decisive and created the AREA Method—an evidence-based framework that controls for cognitive bias, clarifies incentives, and drives confident choices. Cheryl honed the system during two decades breaking stories for The New York Times, Foreign Policy, Barron’s and Harvard Business Review, where rigorous fact-finding was mission-critical.

Today the AREA Method powers high-stakes deliberations across sectors: Goldman Sachs merchant bankers use it to assess capital commitments; U.S. State Department counter-terrorism teams employ it to build trust between rival factions; Columbia Business School students deploy it to evaluate investments. Wherever complexity and consequence intersect, Cheryl equips leaders with a repeatable, scalable process for sound judgment.

She is the author of four influential books on decision-making. Problem Solved (2017) tackles personal and professional choices; Investing in Financial Research (2018) applies the system to markets; Problem Solver (2023) introduces Problem-Solver Profiles; and a forthcoming volume on the human edge in AI-enhanced decisions will publish in late 2025.

A long-time educator, Cheryl teaches decision-making at Columbia University and Cornell Tech, leads global workshops, and delivers a widely viewed TED Talk. On stage she helps audiences diagnose their decision style, stress-test assumptions, and embed a culture of thoughtful inquiry—leaving teams ready to solve their toughest problems with clarity and conviction.