Payal Heggade — Director of Engineering
My career began in hands-on engineering, where my focus was building reliable, scalable systems. Over time, my perspective evolved from solving technical challenges to shaping how intelligent systems influence enterprise strategy. Today, I serve as the Director of the AI Division at Aziro Technologies, leading the vision, execution, and governance of AI initiatives across the organization. At Aziro Technologies, I oversee enterprise AI programs spanning machine learning, advanced analytics, and Generative AI adoption. My role extends beyond model development — I am responsible for defining AI strategy, aligning investments with business priorities, and ensuring scalable, production-grade deployment across client ecosystems. Under my leadership, the AI division has: -Delivered 40+ production AI/ML deployments across forecasting, personalization, automation, and optimization -Improved operational efficiency for enterprise clients by 30–45% through intelligent workflow automation -Reduced model deployment cycles by ~40% through standardized MLOps frameworks -Established governance and risk management protocols for responsible AI adoption -Built and scaled a multidisciplinary AI team spanning data science, ML engineering, and platform architecture My evolution as a leader has been shaped by a shift from execution to orchestration — from writing models to building AI capability. I work closely with executive stakeholders to translate business objectives into AI roadmaps, define ROI metrics, and ensure long-term sustainability rather than short-term experimentation. I strongly believe AI leadership today requires three dimensions: technical depth, strategic clarity, and organizational alignment. My focus is building AI systems that are not only accurate, but scalable, governable, and commercially viable. Beyond work, traveling has given me global perspective on markets and cultures, cooking reinforces creativity and precision, and reading — particularly on leadership, behavioral economics, and emerging technologies — continues to shape how I approach innovation and decision-making. The future of AI belongs to organizations that treat it not as a feature, but as foundational infrastructure. At Aziro Technologies, my mission is to build that foundation — responsibly, strategically, and at scale.
Stackforce AI infers this person is a leader in AI strategy and enterprise transformation within the SaaS industry.
Location: Bengaluru, Karnataka, India
Experience: 13 yrs
Skills
- Ai Strategy
- Executive Leadership
- Digital Transformation
- Artificial Intelligence (ai)
- Data Strategies
- People Management
- Machine Learning
- Pandas (software)
- Python (programming Language)
Career Highlights
- Delivered 40+ production AI/ML deployments
- Improved operational efficiency by 30–45%
- Reduced model deployment cycles by ~40%
Work Experience
Aziro (formerly MSys Technologies)
Director-AI (1 yr 7 mos)
Associate Director-AI (2 yrs 2 mos)
Accenture
Senior Manager – AI & Advanced Analytics (2 yrs 9 mos)
Accenture in India
Manager of Artificial Intelligence (1 yr 10 mos)
Capgemini Engineering
Senior Software Engineer (1 yr 7 mos)
Software Engineer (3 yrs 1 mo)
Education
Master of Business Administration at Indian Institute of Management, Calcutta
Bachelor of Engineering at Manipal Institute of Technology
