Thank you,
Heena Purohit
We built this to say thank you. Everything on it is public and cited, and none of it came from anywhere you did not put it yourself.
Her work is finding and supporting the data and AI startups Microsoft wants to see succeed, and she writes publicly for that audience.
Heena Purohit is Director of AI Startups at Microsoft for Startups, a title Microsoft carries on her byline on its own publication. She publishes guidance for founders on the enterprise trends to prepare for, and on the AI themes running across both startups and enterprise.
Before Microsoft she was Head of Product at IBM's corporate venture studio, where she led IBM Watson's first generation of large language models and AI products. She counts more than fifteen years building and scaling AI technologies. In 2019 she founded AI for Her, which began with ten members and grew past ten thousand within months, and which she expanded in 2024 toward making AI literacy accessible to everyone.
Speaking at the AI Summit at Stanford.
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The record
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Serves as Director of AI Startups at Microsoft for Startups, bylined on Microsoft's own blog
MicrosoftFounded AI for Her in 2019, growing from 10 members to over 10,000 within months
AI for HerPreviously Head of Product at IBM's corporate venture studio, leading IBM Watson's first generation of large language models
AI for Her
@heena-purohit
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Where this came from
- Role and session read from the event programme, captured 31 July 2026, via AI Summit at Stanford
- Exact title, stated by her employer, via Microsoft
- AI for Her founding and growth, and her IBM background, via AI for Her