#1 Kickoff

Icebreaker Games & AI Trivia –

The AI Biz Club hosted its first-ever virtual meeting, introduced by Secretary Dhwani Singh. She welcomed attendees with energy and walked them through the agenda, ensuring everyone felt comfortable and included. The session opened with light-hearted icebreaker questions, helping new and returning students connect informally. Dhwani set the tone by emphasizing the club’s goal of making AI learning engaging and collaborative. She also conducted a few icebreaker games.

Club Vision & Mission – Prof. Ashim Bose

Vision
Prof. Ashim Bose shared that the AI in Business Club was founded to give UTD students a safe, collaborative space to explore and apply AI strategically and ethically. He emphasized that this is not just another AI club — it's one focused on both the business impact of AI and the business of AI itself. The vision is to empower students to critically engage with AI technologies, understand their implications, and build solutions that create real-world value.

Mission
He outlined the club’s mission as fourfold: to educate students on AI advancements through workshops, lectures, and hands-on projects; to connect them with industry experts, alumni, and researchers to bridge the academic-practice gap; to innovate by fostering interdisciplinary collaboration across fields like marketing, finance, HR, operations, and strategy; and to promote responsible AI by encouraging dialogue around ethics, fairness, and social impact.

His message was clear: "We're building a community where curiosity meets business insight — and where integrity drives innovation."

Fall 2025 Grad Class - BUAN/MIS 6399.501: AI in Business
Wed 7:00 to 9:45 PM

Prof. Ashim Bose gave a quick overview into the upcoming Fall 2025 semester. He emphasized the introduction of formalized capstone projects this semester, building on last year’s student-led project success. Unlike before, this new structure involves sponsored projects from real companies across industries like healthcare, commercial real estate, supply chain, and financial services. These organizations will provide problem statements, domain insights, and possibly real data, giving students the opportunity to work on practical, AI-focused challenges—such as building or enhancing AI agents. He encouraged students to actively participate and reach out with any questions.

Journey from Storytelling to AI - President Ashwin Thomas

Ashwin Thomas, President of the AI Biz Club at UTD, shared his inspiring journey from filmmaking and storytelling to design, marketing, and ultimately product management and AI. Initially drawn to creative communication, his curiosity led him to explore the business side of digital content, earning an MBA and gaining industry experience in Dubai.

The turning point came when tools like Midjourney and ChatGPT opened his eyes to AI’s transformative potential, sparking a desire to understand the technology beyond just using it. Despite having no coding background, Ashwin built his first AI prototype in Professor Bose’s "AI in Business" class, gaining hands-on experience and confidence. Realizing the value of this journey, he co-founded the AI Biz Club to provide others with the same learning, community, and growth opportunities that shaped his path.

Meet the Core Team
The leadership team introduced themselves, highlighting their roles and passion for building an inclusive AI community

Each officer took a moment to introduce themselves and explain their roles:
· Ashwin Thomas (President) shared his creative journey from filmmaking to AI product work.
· Rushil Srivastava (VP), an AI engineer at Avenue, brings deep LLM experience.
· Dhwani Singh (Secretary) focuses on event logistics and member engagement.
· Tejas Deshkulkarni & Abhinav Nallamalli(Events Officers) manage event planning and execution.
· Priyanka Bhatla (Outreach Officer) leads social media and is a current analytics intern.
· Ramya Javvadi & Venkat Turlapati(Technology Officers) handle Gen AI workflows, tools, and engineering.
· Vaishnavi Iyer& Drushti Shetty(Industry Liaisons) bridge academic and industry collaboration.
· Keertana Sreeramareddy (Recruitment Officer) manages new member onboarding and officer hiring.

Their combined skills reflect the club’s cross-functional and collaborative culture.

More about the club, communication channels and upcoming events - President Ashwin Thomas

Ashwin continued by delivering a passionate and inspiring overview of the club’s vision, rooted in the diverse journeys of its members and a shared enthusiasm for AI. He emphasized how the convergence of different backgrounds into a single stream—AI—has united the club’s community and outlined the club’s three core pillars:

Building Foundation: Building foundational knowledge in AI through topics like generative models and AI agents.

Practical Experience: Gaining real-world, hands-on experience via hackathons and project-based collaborations with external partners

Industry Connections: Connecting with industry through expert panels and networking events.

Project Spotlight: Cursor - Technology Officer Venkat Turlapati

Technology Officer Venkat gave a live demo of Cursor, an AI-enhanced IDE built on top of VS Code. The highlight was a weather app built from scratch in under 8 minutes using Flutter and AI-generated code. He also showcased his personal project SSP (Self-Supervised Browsing) — an automation tool that uses Gemini 2.5 Flash API to book hotels and shop online securely and cheaply. Unlike expensive tools ($300/month), this solution costs under $1 for 200 requests, with added layers of security via local wallets and API key vaults.

The Winners of the quiz were announced at the end

 Upcoming Events: Cometville and Beyond

The club will participate in Cometville on August 27th, UTD’s largest student organization fair, where new members can meet the team and join. The September event details will be announced soon, with future events planned as in-person gatherings to enrich the club community.