Nicholas Schmidt is the Chief Technology and Innovation Officer of the disparate impact mitigation and proxy detection software company SolasAI.SolasAI uses cutting-edge AI and deep industry expertise to illuminate and reduce causes of disparate impact, disparate treatment, and other forms of bias in algorithmic models.  But it does this while preserving the model’s predictive value, which means that our clients can achieve their business goals while also encouraging equitable outcomes that benefit everyone.Nick has led SolasAI to create a groundbreaking product that allows you to review, analyze, and make decisions related to disparity reduction in an efficient and transparent way. All the while, it protects against problems such as fair lending risk, and it accelerates your modelers’ ability to innovate.Nicholas Schmidt is still a partner at BLDS, LLC, and heads the Artificial Intelligence Practice. In these roles, Nick specializes in the application of statistics and economics to questions of law, regulatory compliance, and best practices in model governance.As head of the A.I. practice, Nick develops and assists in the deployment of methods that allow his clients to make their A.I. models fairer and more inclusive. In this work, he has created A.I.-based techniques that enable clients to minimize disparate impact in credit, insurance, and marketing models. He has additionally helped his clients understand and implement methods that open “black-box” A.I. models, enabling a clearer understanding A.I.’s decision-making process. His clients use this work to inform their customers on potential denials of credit (“adverse action notices”). These methods are used in a number of the top-10 U.S. retail banks and FinTechs. In his litigation practice, Nick testifies and consults on matters relating to employment discrimination litigation, wage and hour law, and other matters requiring the utilization of statistics to address questions of liability or damages.Nick holds an MBA in economics and econometrics from the University of Chicago Booth School of Business.