From Bay Street lawyer to Bold Future Award Winner, Arteria AI founder and CEO Shelby Austin has come a long way since her stomping grounds at a Toronto law firm.
Today, she has successfully created a leading technology company that is helping global financial institutions around the world.
In September, French champagne company Veuve Clicquot held its 2023 Bold Woman Awards to highlight and embolden successful female leaders.
Among the recipients was Austin who was given the Bold Future Award for her innovative contributions to the business world. Specifically, in regards to her latest venture Arteria AI, a tech company that has garnered international recognition as one of the only two financial service companies globally named to CB Insights’ 100 Most Promising AI companies for 2023.
In an interview with Now Toronto, the CEO explained how she got to her position and what inspired her to start the tech business.
“About 15 years ago I was a partner in a law firm and I looked around and saw so much documentation in binders, in papers hanging around, that I was inspired to start my first company in the documentation space,” she said.
“If that doesn’t make me the most boring person ever,” she joked, while adding, “15 years later, I then started a second company in the space because it is so captivating…From a technical perspective, it’s so rich of a problem space and then from a functional perspective, it’s so interesting to understand how the large scale enterprise really approaches these sorts of problems and all the various details of the processes.”
So, what exactly does her company do? Austin says it works with financial institutions to assist them with unstructured data challenges.
“What that means is like anything found within a document across the entire bank, those are the sorts of challenges that we’ve worked on, in order to make sure that not only can we help people be more efficient in those processes, but also that we can access all of the treasure troves of data that’s found in these processes as well,” she clarified.
She emphasizes that what sets Arteria AI apart from its competitors is that it is catered to targeting one area or one problem.
“We are the banking guys. So, we’re not trying to be all things to all people, we’re just trying to be all things to one very targeted segment. And I should include financial institutions writ large, and insurance companies with that, but we’re really specialized. We’re vertical SaaS (Software as a service), meaning that we’re not trying to conquer the world today, just trying to conquer a segment. And so, we have a much deeper understanding of our clients’ problems and we’ve built our tech stack very specifically to answer those problems,” she explained.
Much like every up and coming new business, building it comes with its own set of obstacles and triumphs. For Austin, the obstacles were finding the right people to hire, ensuring the product works, ensuring customers understand their vision and finally, delivering value and quality product to them.
On the other hand, the triumphs were securing a major client for the first time, being happy with a feature, and the first time promoting an employee. She defines this as her favourite phase of growth. Since her company is still in its beginning stages, it is able to make an impact on its employees.
Thanks to her team, one of the many enlightening lessons Austin has learned is to not handle everything herself.
“…As a CEO, make sure that you have a really great support network, and both professionally and personally, to ensure that everything is going. Always remember that you are only as good as your culture and so really ensure that you’re providing the right environment for people to work in. And that if you give your best to them, they will give their best to you and that goes for customers as well,” she said.
There are very few female founders and CEOs in the world, so for Austin, stressing the importance of women in the tech space is a mentality she highly vocalizes. The wise words of advice she has for women in STEM who aspire to be like her is to just go for it, to not be afraid of failure and get involved as soon as possible.
“I think we just need to really welcome people into the field because it’s so important that we have diverse thinking around the table. In addition, it probably goes without saying that I love working with women, bringing them into STEM and opening up those doors because I think it’s actually so important. And I think we bring really valuable points of view to the table. And so I would say, it’s something we need to continue to focus on for many, many, many, many years,” she shared.
Receiving the Bold Future Award was momentous for Austin especially because when working in tech, she says people can’t necessarily see or touch what she’s doing, and in turn, people can’t fully grasp or understand the concept of her work. Thus, this award is a visual acknowledgement of her hard work, dedication and flourishing career.
“It was really, really special for me because I was overwhelmed by how excited my friends and family were that I did that and so, I suppose to me…I think that these words are a reflection of accomplishment. I don’t think they’re accomplishments in and of themselves because I think you win them after you’ve done the stuff that makes you deserve them. And so, I guess it’s a recognition in a really public way,” she said.
In terms of what’s next for the established entrepreneur, Austin says she and her team will continue growing Arteria AI, take it to new heights and further establish its mission of building an iconic Canadian company that will make a difference in people’s lives.
