Climate & Sustainability Lead at the AI research lab Google DeepMind, Sims Witherspoon is focused on finding ways for artificial intelligence to help us tackle climate change. She is a techno-optimist, but not a techno-solutionist — someone who expects technology to solve all our problems for us — and strongly advocates that tech is only one tool among many that we need to deploy.
Sims spent the last decade building technologies for social good and was a founding member of Google’s Crisis Response team, which develops and activates products like SOS Alerts that deliver timely, relevant information to people during natural and human-made crises.
She is also the co-founder of the Centre for AI & Climate, an international organisation connecting technology, policy and business to accelerate the world’s transition to net zero.