AI in the Built Environment—From Hype to Hard ROI

Description

AI is here and making an impact—do you understand it, and how will you leverage it safely?

Over breakfast, MBC hosts a candid fireside chat with industry leaders on what’s working now, how to prove hard ROI, and where the risk/reward curve is headed next. You’ll hear practical use cases from jobsite to portfolio, so you can move from hype to results this year.

Who should attend: owners, developers, GCs, specialty contractors, designers, FM leaders, and Contech decision-makers responsible for budget, schedule, safety, and asset performance.

Speakers:

Wan Li Zhu is a Co-Founder and Managing Partner of Suffolk Technologies, a built environment venture capital firm investing in and accelerating construction, real estate, and infrastructure innovations.  Affiliated with tech-forward construction leader Suffolk, Suffolk Technologies has backed over 50 ConTech, PropTech, and InfraTech startups across AI & automation, sustainability, supply chain, financial services, and smart building themes. Suffolk Technologies also runs the BOOST startup accelerator, providing hands-on company-building support, and access to industry-wide partnerships and piloting for early stage companies.

Wan Li is an experienced technology investor and was previously a Partner at Fairhaven Capital, a Boston-based VC firm that has invested over $430M in enterprise software and deep tech. Wan Li also founded MIT Alumni Angels, which has backed over 100 MIT-affiliated startups in technology and life sciences. Prior to venture capital, Wan Li held product and marketing leadership roles at Microsoft in Dynamics CRM. Wan Li holds an MBA from Harvard Business School and Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees from MIT in Computer Science.

Himanshu Joshi is an AI implementation and deployment specialist who helps enterprises turn responsible AI into measurable ROI. An alumnus of MIT Sloan's Executive Program in General Management and an MIT Sloan Affiliate Alumnus via the Advanced Certificate for Executives, currently pursuing an MS in AI and doctoral research in AI focused on collective intelligence of humans and AI systems, he blends rigorous management training with hands-on delivery of complex, tech-enabled transformations.

He contributes to MIT's AI Risk Repository, where his work centers on practical governance frameworks that let Fortune-500 organizations deploy generative and agentic AI safely at scale. As an AI Strategy Leader, Himanshu previously led cross-functional AI, operations and strategy programs across industries, applying data-driven methods to improve efficiency, reduce risk, and accelerate growth.

At MBC's fireside chat, he'll translate the hype into hard numbers—showing where AI is paying off now and how to adopt it safely."