Pawan Araballi

I%27m Director of Engineering at Stellarus, where I run AI application development — RAG systems, security architecture, and the build-vs-buy call on every AI initiative we take on. That%27s the core of what I%27d bring to a board: I can tell when an AI strategy is actually sound versus a vendor demo dressed up as one.

Before that, seven years at Rally Health and Optum, most recently as Senior Engineering Manager leading Conversational AI and Payments — so I%27ve built payment gateway systems directly, plus claims and provider data, seeing healthcare from both the payer side and the provider side. Earlier on, I worked on security and encryption at Ancestry, product at Apple, and data and network analysis at IBM. I also advise Nela, an AI real estate platform.

Best fit: fintech and payments companies, dev tools and AI infrastructure companies, and vertical SaaS outside healthcare. I skip healthcare and health tech boards on purpose, direct conflict with my day job.