Scale AI has appointed Francis deSouza as chief executive, tapping a veteran of Illumina and Google Cloud to lead the AI data infrastructure company through an expansion phase that has added BP, Mayo Clinic, and multiple government contracts to its customer roster.
deSouza, who takes the role August 10, was most recently chief operating officer and president of security products at Google Cloud. Prior to that he led Illumina as president and CEO, overseeing the genomic sequencing company’s growth to over $4.5 billion in annual revenue across 150 countries.
Scale founder and chairman Alexandr Wang said deSouza’s track record scaling complex technical businesses for both enterprise and government customers matched what Scale needs as more organizations depend on its AI platform.
Interim CEO Jason Droege has led Scale since June 2025 and will assist with the transition.