About Teresa Escrig
My Story
Creating a More Human Future with AI.
Intelligence, Decision-Making, and What Happens Under Pressure
For more than three decades, I have worked at the frontier of artificial intelligence—as a researcher, entrepreneur, professor, inventor, and advisor.
Across robotics, symbolic AI, startups, and global enterprises, I kept encountering the same question:
Why do intelligent systems fail when the stakes are highest?
Today, that question sits at the center of my work.
As AI becomes woven into how we think, decide, lead, and create, the challenge is no longer simply building more capable systems. It is preserving human clarity, judgment, and responsibility while those capabilities grow.
My work explores what happens when intelligence—human and artificial—meets uncertainty, pressure, and consequence.
From Robotics to Human Reasoning
My journey began in Valencia, Spain, where I joined one of the country’s first computer science programs and later became a university professor and AI researcher.
I earned a PhD in Artificial Intelligence studying symbolic AI, robotics, and qualitative reasoning—developing systems capable of representing and reasoning about the world in ways humans could understand.
That work led to more than 130 scientific publications, multiple patents, research awards, and leadership roles across academia, startups, and global enterprises.
Long before explainable AI became a popular topic, I was already exploring a question that continues to shape my work today:
How can intelligent systems make decisions that humans can understand, trust, and improve?
Expanding the Definition of Intelligence
At twenty-five, I had a spontaneous out-of-body experience that fundamentally changed how I understood consciousness, perception, and reality.
What began as a personal event became a lifelong inquiry into meditation, awareness, and the deeper dimensions of human experience.
Rather than pulling me away from science, it expanded my view of it.
I came to see that intelligence is not only computational. It is also perceptual, relational, and shaped by how we interpret reality.
This perspective continues to influence my work today and informs a question that has become increasingly important in the age of AI:
What happens when technology begins to amplify not only our capabilities, but also the way we perceive, interpret, and decide?
Building AI Across Startups and Global Enterprises
Over the years, I have built AI from multiple vantage points: researcher, entrepreneur, executive, advisor, and educator.
I founded AI startups, secured public innovation funding, led multidisciplinary teams, and helped organizations translate emerging research into practical systems.
At Microsoft and Accenture, I worked on initiatives ranging from autonomous vehicles and machine teaching to responsible AI, transparency, validation, and governance.
These experiences taught me that technical capability alone is never enough.
The real challenge is creating systems that remain trustworthy when decisions must be made under uncertainty, complexity, and pressure.
My Journey
Where Science Meets Consciousness
For more than three decades, I have explored intelligence from multiple perspectives: as a researcher, entrepreneur, executive advisor, educator, and student of human development.
My work began with a fascination for how intelligent systems reason and make decisions. Over time, that inquiry expanded beyond machines to include the human beings who design, deploy, and depend on them.
Today, my work brings those worlds together—helping leaders navigate the opportunities and risks of AI while strengthening the quality of human judgment that remains at the center of every important decision.
Entrepreneurship
Beyond research and corporate leadership, I have spent much of my career building.
From AI startups and innovation programs to funded research initiatives, entrepreneurship taught me how to transform ideas into systems that create value in the real world.
The experience of building companies, securing funding, leading teams, and navigating uncertainty continues to shape how I approach technology, leadership, and decision-making today.
Highlights:
Cognitive Robots (2007)
Founded to develop advanced cognitive architectures, integrating symbolic reasoning with real-time sensorimotor control. We built systems enabling robots to understand their environment, anticipate outcomes, and adapt behavior, laying early foundations for neuro-symbolic AI, explainable robotics, and ethical AI design.
Impact: Early demonstration that intelligent systems require transparent reasoning, not just automated behavior—a principle that continues to guide my work today.
Patent: Systems and methods for establishing an environmental representation (US20110082668A1).
Qualitative Artificial Intelligence (QAI) (2015)
Established to apply qualitative reasoning to real-world AI challenges. One breakthrough project involved DNA sequencing, where traditional machine learning approaches failed. By modeling signals symbolically, we achieved high accuracy, restored confidence in the results, and helped secure the client's next funding round.
Impact: Demonstrated that transparent AI can outperform black-box approaches in high-stakes environments.
Patent (Awarded): System and method for use of qualitative modeling for signal analysis (US10338197B2).
SOVEREIGNTY INSTITUTE (2025)
Founded to help leaders and organizations navigate a new challenge created by AI: how to gain the benefits of intelligent systems without weakening human judgment. Through executive education, consulting, and the AI 202 program, the Institute develops the capacities required for responsible decision-making in an AI-augmented world.
Impact: Early cohorts demonstrated measurable improvements in perception, decision stability, identity alignment, and action quality, with average gains exceeding 40%. The work is now expanding into leadership development, enterprise AI adoption, and high-consequence decision environments.
See It in Action
Notable Recognitions
Over three decades, my work has been recognized across research, innovation, entrepreneurship, and international AI leadership. These milestones reflect a career dedicated to advancing both the science and practical application of intelligent systems.
TEDxTacoma Speaker
“Is There a Service Robot in Your Future?”
Featured Judge
MIT Arab Startup Competition
Invited Speaker
NATO International Conference on Cyber Conflict
Principal Investigator in 9 R&D projects with public funds
13+ M euros raised
Member of Multiple AI Scientific Committees
Member
Startup Weekend in Seattle
Seattle
Awards
What Fuels Me Now
Today, I work at the convergence of AI, human judgment, and decision-making.
I’ve pioneered research in qualitative reasoning and neuro-symbolic AI that’s still shaping how we think about transparency, ethics, and autonomy in modern systems.
I partner with companies, leaders, and conscious creators to implement AI that’s not just intelligent but meaningful. Through consulting, I help organizations design future-ready products, frameworks, and strategies that reflect innovation and integrity.
As AI becomes integrated into how we think, learn, lead, and create, I believe the most important question is no longer what AI can do, but what it is doing to us. My work focuses on helping people preserve clarity, responsibility, and sound judgment while benefiting from the extraordinary capabilities these systems provide.
As a speaker, I bring these ideas to global stages, sharing stories, frameworks, and tools that connect technology with purpose.
I lead with one core truth:
The future is being written by what we choose to value now.
Patent Highlights
My work has resulted in multiple patents spanning robotics, autonomous vehicles, machine learning validation, and explainable AI.
These innovations emerged from a common goal: making intelligent systems more transparent, trustworthy, and useful in real-world environments.
They represent the practical side of a question that has guided my career:
How do we build systems people can understand, trust, and improve?
My Vision for the Future
The future is not determined by technology alone. It is shaped by the decisions people make about how technology is used.
As AI becomes embedded in organizations, education, government, and everyday life, the question is no longer whether these systems will influence us.
The question is whether they will strengthen or weaken our ability to think clearly, act responsibly, and lead wisely.
My vision is a future where AI amplifies human capability without diminishing human judgment.
A future where:
- Technology expands our capacity to create and solve meaningful problems
- Human wisdom develops alongside machine intelligence
- Innovation serves long-term human flourishing rather than short-term efficiency
The choices we make today will determine which future emerges.
My Lens
Scientist. Entrepreneur. Student of Consciousness.
My perspective has been shaped by building AI systems, founding companies, conducting scientific research, and exploring the deeper dimensions of human awareness.
This combination allows me to see challenges that are often invisible when technology and human development are treated as separate domains.
My lens helps me:
- Reveal the forces shaping judgment and decision-making
- Connect technical strategy with human consequences
- Help leaders navigate uncertainty without losing clarity
I believe the most important questions raised by AI are ultimately human questions.
The Values Behind My Work
- CONSCIOUS GROWTH Scale human potential along with technological progress. True progress occurs when we evolve both our tools and ourselves.
- CREATIVE EMPOWERMENT AI should spark possibilities, not replace it. I believe everyone has the power to create meaningful impact by using AI as a tool for self-discovery.
- INNER AND OUTER ALIGNMENT The future we build reflects the consciousness we bring. I believe real change starts from within, and amazing things can happen when we align mind, heart, and action.
- RESPONSIBILITY STARTS WITH US The future of AI belongs not only to those who build it, but the intentions behind how we use it.
- CONNECTION True intelligence is relational. I believe in honoring the link between humans and technology, mind and spirit, individual and society – to build systems that serve us all.
There is significantly more stability under pressure.
I’m less reactive, less likely to escalate unnecessarily, and more able to pause instead of responding immediately. I can now see where effort or conflict stops producing results — and step back. That wasn’t visible before.
AI has become my business advisor and thinking partner.
Many blind spots are now uncovered through my work with AI. The program helped me become more intentional about how I relate to these systems while maintaining independent judgment.
Working with Teresa is a breeze.
She is proactive and thorough and enthusiastic. The work we are doing is tricky in its abstraction. Both of us need to travel into the weeds then pull ourselves up to the greater purpose. She does that easily. She is also very well connected in her space of responsible AI.
Teresa has an immense depth of knowledge in the field of Al
and its applications both in the field of Responsible Al and outside of it. Most importantly, Teresa has the rare ability to explain and communicate complicated technical terms in the most simplified and understandable manner. I have had the pleasure to closely collaborate with Teresa and I can personally attest to the fact that Teresa is inspiring, emanates expertise and gains respect seamlessly, which is a great quality for a Leader.
It is a pleasure to be able to work with you, Teresa
because of your depth and range of experience and knowledge. I always enjoy our interactions and learn something from you.
It has been a real pleasure working with you
You are visionary and quickly drove impactful initiatives around accelerators, big customer planning, and cross-team synergies. You excel at influencing without authority, onboarding others to your ideas, and securing resources to make them happen. Your ability to connect the dots from ideation to execution and present comprehensive designs seamlessly has been inspiring and a valuable learning experience.
We’ve been working with Teresa in the scope of MLOps Solution Accelerator,
Where she leads the Responsible AI (RAI) workstream. She brings deep knowledge, transparency, and passion, with a clear vision for embedding RAI into the end-to-end data science process, similar to how security is integrated by default. Teresa’s efforts in developing RAI components and evangelizing them internally are crucial for moving sensitive use cases from PoC to MVP and for helping business owners trust and engage in AI systems.
