How AI-Native Teams Use AI

Hosted by Aki Wijesundara, PhD and Manu Jayawardana

Thu, Aug 20, 2026

9:00 PM UTC (45 minutes)

Virtual (Zoom)

Free to join

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AI Engineering Bootcamp and Certificate: Build and Ship Production AI Agents
Dr. Aki Wijesundara and Manu Jayawardana
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What you'll learn

How the world's leading AI teams actually work

Reverse engineer the workflows, tools, and operating principles behind OpenAI, Anthropic, Cursor, and Perplexity.

Where AI-native companies apply AI across the business

See how the best teams use AI across engineering, product, research, and decision-making to build and innovate faster.

How to apply these principles in your own role

Leave with practical strategies for adopting AI-native ways of working and unlocking your team's full potential.

Why this topic matters

AI-native companies move faster than everyone else, and it's not just the AI they use - it's how they work. Understanding these operating principles is becoming a core professional advantage for engineers, product managers, founders, consultants, and business leaders alike. This lesson gives you the playbook behind that speed, so you can apply it in your own team starting Monday.

You'll learn from

Aki Wijesundara, PhD

AI Advisor | Educator | Google AI Accelerator Alum

Aki Wijesundara is an AI leader with a PhD in Machine Learning and extensive experience mentoring startups at Google’s AI Accelerator. With a career spanning both research and applied AI, Aki has taught 5,000+ students worldwide how to design and deploy production-ready AI systems.

He has worked across cutting-edge areas of applied AI, from LangChain and RAG pipelines to observability and large-scale deployment. As a researcher and educator, Aki bridges the gap between theory and practice, making complex systems approachable and actionable for engineers, founders, and product leaders.

Aki is also a frequent speaker and advisor to organizations adopting AI, helping them transition from experimentation to production at scale.

Manu Jayawardana

AI Founder | CEO at TAI Labs | Co-Founder of Snapdrum

Manu Jayawardana is a serial entrepreneur with multiple AI startup successes.

He is also the Co-Founder of Snapdrum, an AI consultancy helping companies integrate and automate their businesses using AI. Through Snapdrum, Manu has worked with top startups and enterprises across the U.S., Europe, and Asia, advising on automation, product development, and AI strategy.

Currently, Manu is the Co-Founder & CEO of Krybe, an AI voice agent startup in London transforming how businesses automate customer interactions. His experience spans fundraising, scaling products, and leading teams to deliver production-grade AI solutions adopted globally.

Previous Students from

OpenAI
Boston Consulting Group (BCG)
NVIDIA
Google
Meta
See all products from TAI Labs

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