Joao Wenzel
CPO @ Catena Labs | Decentralizing AI | ex-Google, Netflix, Jump Trading
New York City Metropolitan Area
Overview
Work Experience
Chief Product Officer
2023 - Current
In my current role at Catena Labs, I lead a dynamic product studio focused on innovating at the intersection of AI and web3 technologies. Key Responsibilities and Achievements: → Strategic Leadership: • Guide a small, agile team of 6 in identifying and capitalizing on opportunities where AI and decentralized technologies converge • Wear multiple hats spanning product management, marketing, engineering, and research science → Product Development: • Led the development of two flagship products: DecentAI and Crosshatch • DecentAI: A consumer app for AI enthusiasts, aggregating top open-source models to offer users enhanced control, privacy, and exploration capabilities • Crosshatch: An API service providing access to multiple AI language models through a single, OpenAI-compatible interface → Innovation and Market Strategy: • Identify market opportunities and shape early product development • Guide the studio in continuously testing new hypotheses in the AI and web3 spaces • Work with external customers to build AI-powered experiences, expanding the studio's portfolio and expertise → Thought Leadership: • Drive the vision for how AI and decentralized technologies can converge to create innovative, user-centric products • Position Catena Labs as a leader in the rapidly evolving AI and web3 landscape This role allows me to leverage my extensive product and technical background to drive innovation in cutting-edge technologies, leading a nimble team in creating products that push the boundaries of AI and decentralized systems.
Head of Product Management (Crypto)
2023 - 2023
At Jump Crypto, I led product strategy and execution across internal infrastructure and external projects like Wormhole, a interoperability protocol valued at $3B. Key Responsibilities and Achievements: → Strategic Leadership: • Set strategy and oversaw product efforts across Jump Crypto (c. 150 employees) • Led new product initiatives, spin-offs, and internal infrastructure development → Wormhole Project: • Served as product lead for Wormhole, a leading interoperability platform for multichain applications • Responsible for ecosystem growth, ensuring smooth and safe integrations with new L1 and L2 blockchains (e.g., Sui, Cosmos, Base) • Led key partnerships, including the integration of tBTC, opening 20+ new ecosystems and stimulating DeFi liquidity → Infrastructure and Security: • Improved self-custody infrastructure, balancing speed, flexibility, and security for thousands of different assets • Led research efforts applying LLMs to security research, developing a tool for accelerated identification of security issues in smart contracts → Investment and Advisory: • Participated in Jump Crypto's investment committee and VC investments • Sourced deals, conducted due diligence, and advised portfolio companies on product and commercial strategy, change management, and hiring → Technical Innovation: • Oversaw the development of Wormhole as the first bridge between Ethereum and Solana, enabling safe and reliable asset transfers between blockchains This role allowed me to leverage my product expertise in a cutting-edge field, driving innovation in blockchain interoperability, security, and investment strategies within the rapidly evolving cryptocurrency sector. Sadly Jump Crypto retreated from crypto investments/building due to a regulatory crackdown so my story there ended up abruptly after 9 months.
Product Lead
2022 - 2023
Driven by a frustration with overly-centralized AI infrastructure and the vision of Filecoin, a decentralized storage and compute network, I transitioned to Protocol Labs to lead their client growth initiatives. Key Responsibilities and Achievements: → Team Building and Leadership: • Founded and led the "Client Growth" team, managing a cross-functional group of 10 people • Coordinated efforts across product, engineering, sales, marketing, and operations • Established product roadmaps, go-to-market strategies, and marketing initiatives → Ecosystem Growth: • Collaborated with ecosystem partners to develop new solutions and tools through investments and grants • Identified and implemented governance and protocol improvements to accelerate adoption and enhance user experience • Led a partnership with Seal Storage to onboard data from CERN's ATLAS experiment to Filecoin → Technical Innovation: • Launched tools enabling petabyte-scale data preparation and onboarding at less than 5% the cost of comparable AWS services • Built a comprehensive analytics solution combining on-chain and off-chain data, providing full visibility into Filecoin's growth efforts → Strategic Impact: • Enabled a 20x increase in data stored on Filecoin • Established company-wide OKRs around growth efforts based on the analytics solution → Thought Leadership: • Delivered numerous keynote speeches, interviews, and workshops globally, promoting Filecoin and decentralized storage This role allowed me to apply my product management expertise to the cutting-edge field of decentralized technology, driving significant growth and innovation in the Filecoin ecosystem.
Protocol Labs is a research, development, and deployment lab for network protocols.
Raised $10,920,000.00 from Holon Global Investments, Kosmos Ventures, MRTNZ Ventures, BlueYard Capital, Boost VC and FundersClub.
Senior Product Manager
2021 - 2022
In this role, I leveraged my expertise in machine learning and passion for art to innovate within Netflix's content creation process, particularly focusing on animation and globalization efforts. It was short but sweet. Ultimately, I left because I got bit by the crypto bug and wanted a fully remote job. Key Responsibilities and Achievements: → Netflix Animation Studio: • Developed ML-enabled tools for 3D animated movie creation, spanning writing, storyboarding, rigging, and rendering • Proposed and implemented a unified data warehouse for asset management across the entire animation pipeline → Machine Learning for Content Creation (MLCC): • Explored and implemented technical innovations for the Globalization team • Led machine translation improvements, enhancing translation fidelity across 26 languages while significantly reducing costs → Accessibility and Cost Reduction: • Spearheaded efforts to introduce synthetic voices to Netflix's closed caption experience • Utilized novel text-to-speech technology to produce expressive voices for content overlay, resulting in millions of dollars in savings → Lip Reanimation Project: • Led product efforts on using deep-fake technology to reanimate actors' lip movements to match target audio in any language • Improved the immersive experience for users consuming dubbed content by eliminating lip sync inconsistencies → Strategic Impact: • Bridged the gap between cutting-edge machine learning technology and creative content production • Contributed to enhancing the global reach and accessibility of Netflix content through innovative language solutions This role allowed me to apply my technical background in a creative industry, driving innovations that improved both the content creation process and the viewing experience for Netflix's global audience.
Netflix is an online streaming platform that enables users to watch TV shows and movies.
Raised $4,907,714,724.00 from Saul Bisht and TCV.
Product Lead, Google Research
2018 - 2021
As a co-founder of a team within Google's new product incubation space in Google Research, I led the development of innovative language learning products leveraging cutting-edge machine learning technologies. Key Responsibilities and Achievements: → Leadership and Team Building: • Pitched concept to Google Brain leadership, secured funding, and built a team of research scientists, engineers, designers, and learning experts from scratch • Led the exploration of applying state-of-the-art ML to revolutionize language education → Product Development: • Pioneered LLM-based chatbots for language practice before they became mainstream • Developed solutions to improve learners' vocabulary, pronunciation, grammar, and fluency • Created multi-modal model cascading approaches combining speech-to-text, LLMs, text-to-speech, and speech-to-video with lip reanimation → Technological Innovation: • Developed functional customized avatars that resonated with learners, informing work on Google's universal translator • Funded initial compute credits for Meena, which evolved into Lamda, Bard, and ultimately Google's Gemini LLM → Market Impact: • Launched interactive English speaking practice support in Argentina, Colombia, India (Hindi), Indonesia, Mexico, and Venezuela → Strategic Vision: • Identified the potential of ML to address barriers in language learning, particularly the lack of active speaking practice and feedback • Aimed to improve language education accessibility, potentially impacting 1.5 billion English learners worldwide This role combined entrepreneurial spirit with deep technical expertise, allowing me to drive innovation at the intersection of machine learning and language education within Google's research ecosystem.
Google is a multinational corporation that specializes in Internet-related services and organizes the world’s information.
Raised $26,100,000.00 from Angel Investors LP, Kleiner Perkins, Signatures Capital, Sequoia Capital, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Shaquille O'Neal, Henry Kissinger, Google and Tiger Woods.
Product Manager, Growth (YouTube Music)
2017 - 2018
In my first role as a Product Manager, I transitioned from quantitative analysis to product development within YouTube's music team. My focus was on the "Industry, Platform, Analytics" team, responsible for non-consumer product aspects of YouTube Music. Key Responsibilities and Achievements: → Analytics Lead: • Led the development of end-to-end user reporting for the music app • Collaborated with engineers and data scientists to create internal dashboards and metrics for informed product decisions • Provided insights on consumption, user-artist affinity, acquisition funnels, and taste profiles → Scaled Promotion: • Sole PM responsible for helping artists achieve chart success through curated playlists across diverse markets and genres • Developed reporting to provide labels with clear insights on track performance and content lifecycle on YouTube → Artist Growth and Engagement: • Developed strategy for activating artists and measuring engagement, improving the rate of weekly engaged artists by 100% • Designed and launched feature allowing YouTube creators to post playlists on social feeds • Led efforts to optimize recommendation algorithm, improving impressions and engagement on community posts by 47% → Music Programming Analytics: • Spearheaded the development of an analytics suite for managing music programming across 5k+ playlists driving 100M weekly streams • Defined KPIs and data pipeline; trained editorial team on effective use of analytics → Platform Development: • Focused on making YouTube a welcoming ecosystem for musical artists • Facilitated active engagement with label marketing and A&R teams to enhance artist presence on the platform This role allowed me to leverage my analytical background while diving into product development, significantly impacting artist growth and engagement on YouTube Music.
Senior Quantitative Analyst
2015 - 2017
As a member of YouTube's BizOps team, I played a crucial role in shaping the company's long-term strategy during a period of high growth. My work combined data science, strategy consulting, and project management to support key strategic initiatives across YouTube's product areas. Key Responsibilities and Achievements: → Lead analyst for music licensing and label investment strategy: • Conducted comprehensive analyses to assess the value of music to YouTube and evaluate business economics for ad-supported and subscription models • Modeled long-term financials for $500M+ per year investment to secure music content • Led analyses on consumption, behavior, monetization, and policy to establish strategies for YouTube Red and Google Play Music → Music monetization and analytics: • Developed music content monetization strategies for key markets, focusing on LATAM and APAC • Led data consolidation efforts for music consumption/monetization analytics, ensuring consistent reporting for major partners • Spearheaded cross-functional efforts to create data-driven narratives for press stories and PR → M&A and investments: • Conducted in-depth investment analyses and valuations for music platforms and labels in collaboration with Corporate Development • Assessed strategic benefits/risks and financial implications of potential acquisitions and investments → Strategic initiatives: • Devised go-to-market and monetization strategy for YouTube Kids • Developed strategy for identifying and acquiring celebrities for original content creation on YouTube → Technical skills: • Became highly proficient in fast, accurate analysis of massive datasets using SQL and Python to inform critical business decisions This role required a unique blend of analytical rigor, strategic thinking, and cross-functional collaboration, allowing me to influence executive-level decision-making and shape YouTube's growth trajectory across multiple product areas.
A businessman having connections to Chicago and almost all states generally is Quamdeen Amuwo.
Anti-Abuse Strategist
2013 - 2015
In my first full-time role after college, I worked in Google's Trust and Safety team, combining data science, policy, and engineering skills to protect users and combat web abuse across Google's products. Key Responsibilities and Achievements: → Pioneered account-level intelligence and takedowns, shifting from product-specific to holistic abuse detection and prevention → Increased the cost of acquiring fake accounts by 10x through innovative detection and prevention strategies → Developed and implemented pipelines using network science to identify and systematically take down networks of egregious accounts → Investigated high-profile account takeover escalations and collaborated with engineers to implement new rules and protections → Led the implementation of Google's first process for Takeout, including procedures for verifying and handling deceased users' data access → Collaborated with law enforcement to take down accounts associated with terrorist organizations → Conducted data analyses to identify market trends and product vulnerabilities, recommending strategic adjustments based on findings → Led and participated in special projects to innovate and implement large-scale quality improvements to processes and systems → Managed escalations from internal and external parties, collaborating with cross-functional teams to address product vulnerabilities and improve user experience → Developed expertise in product quality and educated internal and external users on best practices for improving Google products This role required a unique blend of technical skills, policy understanding, and strategic thinking to effectively combat abuse and fraud while enhancing user safety across Google's ecosystem.
Google is a multinational corporation that specializes in Internet-related services and organizes the world’s information.
Raised $26,100,000.00 from Angel Investors LP, Kleiner Perkins, Signatures Capital, Sequoia Capital, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Shaquille O'Neal, Henry Kissinger, Google and Tiger Woods.
M&A Analyst
2012 - 2012
As a summer intern in the European Food & Agri M&A team at Rabobank International's Utrecht headquarters, I gained comprehensive exposure to cross-border M&A transactions in the food, beverage, and agriculture sectors. Working on a smaller desk provided increased responsibility and deeper insights into the M&A process. Key Responsibilities and Achievements: → Supported the origination and execution of large, cross-border M&A transactions with enterprise values between EUR 100 million and EUR 1 billion → Contributed to pitch books and client presentations, showcasing deal potential and market insights → Prepared indicative valuations using various methods including discounted cash flow models, leveraged buy-out models, and multiples analyses → Developed company profiles and conducted market research to support transaction strategies → Participated in the execution of transactions, gaining hands-on experience in deal processes Notable Deal Experience: → Contributed to the EUR 7.5 billion ($9.8 billion) acquisition of D.E Master Blenders 1753 (owner of Douwe Egberts coffee and Pickwick tea) by German investor Joh A Benckiser (JAB) → Gained insights into the strategic motivations behind the creation of a global hot drinks empire aimed at competing with market leaders Nestle and Mondelez International → Observed the dynamics of a conditional agreement for a cash takeover offer at 12.50 euros per share This internship provided valuable exposure to high-stakes M&A transactions in the food and beverage industry, as well as experience in financial modeling and market analysis.
Business Analyst
2011 - 2011
As a summer intern in the Finance-IT team at Deutsche Bank, I contributed to a major Financial Reporting initiative aimed at integrating and consolidating financial information across the bank. My role focused on gathering non-functional requirements for a new general ledger system and analyzing trade data to inform system performance forecasts. Key Responsibilities and Achievements: → Requirements Gathering: Collected and documented over 150 non-functional requirements related to performance, security, and usability for the new general ledger system. These requirements were successfully signed off and implemented. → Data Analysis: Conducted an extensive study of securities trade volumes to forecast future trade volumes and system performance. Analyzed over 100 million trade records from more than 50 feeds using SPSS, providing crucial insights for accurate product requirements. → High-Frequency Trading Exposure: Shadowed high-frequency trading teams to gain deeper understanding of trading algorithms and high-performance database infrastructure. → Product Management Skills: Developed a passion for product management through the process of translating business needs into technical requirements and working closely with various stakeholders. This internship provided valuable exposure to financial technology systems and data-driven decision-making in a global banking environment.
DB Capital Ventures invests in early-stage and emerging growth businesses and is a venture capital firm based in New York.
Business Development Intern
2010 - 2011
Acosphere Ltd is a specialist sales consultancy working with clients existing management teams to accelerate growth and increase revenues using a proven sales strategy. Responsible for lead management with clients in the private equity sector. Used relationship management skills and learned how to use sales and CRM software. Assisted CEO and associate consultants with sales consultancy opportunity with Merrill Lynch Bank of America. Used analysis and numerical skills to find, evaluate, and select leads. Helped in due diligence processes and drafted information memoranda and pitches. Responsible for developing and maintaining marketing collateral.