VERSES Appoints Michael Blum as New Chair of The Board of Directors and Jay Samit into Executive Position

VERSES AI Inc.
VERSES AI Inc.

In This Article:

Jay Samit to Relinquish Board Duties to Lead Go to Market as Head of Global Partnerships

Michael Blum Appointed to Chairman Position

VANCOUVER, British Columbia, Sept. 10, 2024 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- VERSES AI Inc. (CBOE:VERS) (OTCQX:VRSSF) ("VERSES'' or the "Company”), a cognitive computing company specializing in next generation intelligent systems, announces that Jay Samit is relinquishing his position as Chairman of the Board in order to take a position with the Company while concurrently appointing Michael Blum into the vacated Chairman position. Mr. Samit’s new role at VERSES will be Head of Global Partnerships, focusing on deploying Genius to systems integrators, channel partners, and business process outsource firms and strategic investors.

“With the strategic investment from G42, the IEEE working group approval of the Spatial Web standards, as well as the most recent research demonstrating technical scalability of the technology, VERSES is at an inflection point, and I feel that the timing is right for me, to have a more direct impact by leveraging the relationships that I’ve built over my career to help bring Genius to market,” said Jay Samit.

“We want to thank Jay for his service as Board Chairman, but we are even more delighted that he will head up and nurture our key global partnerships,” said Gabriel René, CEO of VERSES. “Jay’s experience as a pioneering top executive in Fortune 500 Companies and leading global consultancies, like Deloitte, combined with his extensive international contacts, will be an invaluable asset as we roll out Genius commercially.”

“At the same time, I want to welcome Michael to the Board and look forward to working with him at this exciting phase of VERSES development,” continued Mr. René.

Michael Blum is a co-founder and president of Hedgeye Risk Management, a premier independent investment research house whose customer base advises more than $10 trillion in assets and spans close to 100 countries. In 2014 Blum co-founded Firefly Space Systems which designed and developed space launch vehicles for small payloads working with, among others, NASA, DARPA, and Boeing. Previously, Blum was co-founder and chief operating officer of hedge fund, Falconhenge Partners LLC. Before his tenure on Wall Street, Blum spent seven years in Silicon Valley including at Paypal developing business and product strategy. Mr. Blum received his Bachelor of Arts in Economics and International Studies (honors) from Yale University.

“I am delighted to be joining the VERSES Board,” said Chairman Michael Blum. “VERSES nature based approach to software is, I believe, paradigm shifting. It is going to change the economics of computing to allow for a whole new category of previously unattainable products and applications creating a safer, smarter world.”