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AI is only as strong as the data beneath it. Yet most enterprises still rely on fragmented tools and reactive processes that undermine trust. The result: innovation that looks impressive in demos but collapses under real-world pressure. In this keynote, Salma Bakouk, CEO of Sifflet, argues that metadata, not models, is the true foundation for the AI era. By building a metadata control plane enriched with agentic observability, enterprises can move from reactive patchwork to proactive intelligence. In this keynote, she offers a provocative vision of where the market is heading, what traditional approaches are getting wrong, and why the winners of the AI economy will be those who treat trust not as insurance, but as infrastructure.

Salma Bakouk (CEO of Sifflet) and I discuss the evolving data and AI landscape, the rise of data observability in the age of AI, balancing personal and professional life as a founder, and much more.

Summary The problems that are easiest to fix are the ones that you prevent from happening in the first place. Sifflet is a platform that brings your entire data stack into focus to improve the reliability of your data assets and empower collaboration across your teams. In this episode CEO and founder Salma Bakouk shares her views on the causes and impacts of "data entropy" and how you can tame it before it leads to failures.

Announcements

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Interview

Introduction How did you get involved in the area of data management? Can you describe what Sifflet is and the st