The holidays came early for five BlackRock employees, who joined an elite circle of some of the firm’s most accomplished technologists on Tuesday.
They became members of BlackRock’s Tech Fellows program, a group of 24 senior technologists playing a crucial role in the $13.5 trillion firm’s vision and operations.
This year’s members underwent a rigorous application process — from being nominated to completing written evaluations and interviews — before being voted into the program by current fellows, Nish Ajitsaria, BlackRock’s co-head of Aladdin product engineering and executive sponsor of AI, and the co-executive sponsor of the program, said.
“We think about the combination of technical expertise, domain expertise, commercial mindset, but really lifting the platform, the culture, the experience across the firm,” said Ajitsaria, who has been involved with Tech Fellows since it launched in 2020. Many of this year’s fellows are credited with mentoring other technologists, according to an internal announcement shared with Business Insider.
Technologists are gaining more and more influence on Wall Street as firms race to adopt AI. BlackRock has long positioned itself as equal parts financial technology company and asset manager. Aladdin — the firm’s sprawling risk and portfolio management platform — underpins its client relationships, and tech-related revenue is among its fastest-growing businesses. BlackRock’s technology services and subscription revenue jumped 28% year-on-year over the last quarter, fueled by Aladdin and the integration of newly acquired Preqin’s private-markets data business, the firm reported in its latest earnings.
Four of this year’s fellows work in Aladdin, though Ajitsaria said that the group has always represented a wide swath of the firm’s businesses.
“We are also really deliberate about leveraging and applying our tech fellows to the firm’s most critical technology initiatives,” Ajitsaria said. As of 2023, one in every third BlackRock employee was a software engineer or technologist, according to a document about the firm.
Fellows meet internally at least once a month and are expected to foster the firm’s engineering culture both internally and externally — they might, for example, contribute to BlackRock’s engineering blog or attend conferences, Ajitsaria said.
BlackRock has set high targets for the year 2030, when it aims to reach $35 billion in annual revenue and fundraising $400 billion in private markets. As Ajitsaria said, “the 2030 vision of BlackRock is very much underpinned by technology.”
These five new fellows have just become a more integral part of that vision.
David Woodhead
BlackRock
As the head of Aladdin Studio Engineering for Aladdin Data, David Woodhead has spearheaded the effort to “open Aladdin,” giving stakeholders access to the platform’s data and analytics models, among other tools. He’s recognized for “championing modern data platforms, cloud-native technologies, and open-source adoption,” according to the internal announcement. Woodhead has helped craft the very architecture of Aladdin.
Beyond his role at Aladdin Studio, Woodhead also oversees services that give Aladdin and its clients reference, market, and other third-party data. He joined BlackRock in 2006 and is based in Virginia, serving as a managing director.
Kirsty Craig
BlackRock
Kirsty Craig has been at BlackRock for 15 years and now serves as the head of research, data, and AI strategy for portfolio management tech. She’s shaped how the firm uses AI and data science in investment research. While Craig is this year’s only fellow who doesn’t work within the Aladdin program, she has forged collaboration between the investment and technology teams.
Craig has worked in offices in Edinburgh, San Francisco, and now Philadelphia, and is currently a managing director.
Infant Vasanth
BlackRock
New York-based director Infant Vasanth is known for his work pushing BlackRock’s internal research and automation platform forward. He joined the firm in 2011 and is now a senior director of engineering, running the team behind an analytics and automation platform.
Vasanth, an advocate for open-source, often speaks at tech conferences and is the brain behind multiple patent filings. He also leads a team focused on Aladdin Studio’s AI abilities.
“Drawing on deep expertise in neural networks and pattern-recognition algorithms, he applies research rigor to building enterprise-scale AI systems,” the announcement said.
Michael Duncan
BlackRock
Michael Duncan, a director and engineering lead on Aladdin’s Trading Engineering team, is the architect behind a collection of tools dubbed BlackRock’s Xceler Ecosystem, which is now integral across Aladdin and has helped raise engineering standards. His team is in charge of “delivering multi-asset trading solutions and technology across global markets,” and Duncan has improved its abilities.
Beyond that, Duncan is the global engineering lead for part of Aladdin and leads a client support and performance engineering program.
Duncan joined BlackRock in 2020 and is based in Chicago.
Charlie Johnston
New York-based Charlie Johnston joined BlackRock as a summer intern in 2013 and has worked his way up to being a director. A software engineer, he has improved the quality of the asset management giant’s code and development processes.
“Charlie’s technical contributions and collaborative approach have strengthened the engineering community across Aladdin,” the internal announcement reads.
