Mike de Vere

Chief Executive Officer

As Chief Executive Officer, Mike de Vere sets the strategic vision and leads the company’s mission to harness artificial intelligence to modernize lending and strengthen the financial system. Under his leadership, Zest AI is expanding access to affordable credit and helping more people achieve long-term financial prosperity.

With more than 30 years of experience, Mike has built his career around giving consumers a stronger voice in how businesses and governments serve them. He has held leadership roles at organizations including Nielsen, The Harris Poll, and J.D. Power, where he specialized in turning data into insights that drive growth and improve organizational performance.

Mike earned his MBA from the University of Southern California and a B.S. in Business Administration from California State University, Northridge. He lives in Southern California with his wife, children, and their family pets.

Sean Kamkur

Chief Technology Officer

As the Chief Technology Officer, Sean Kamkar oversees Zest AI’s engineering and data science teams. His teams focus on building robust systems, innovative AI applications, and scalable, transparent models that drive performance, fairness, and automation in credit underwriting. Under Sean’s leadership, Zest AI enables financial institutions to deploy cutting-edge AI/ML solutions that are both powerful and compliant, while ensuring ease of implementation.

Sean holds a Ph.D. from Stanford University in Aeronautics and Astronautics Engineering and conducted post-graduate work at the NASA Ames Research Center. Before joining Zest AI, Sean led large-scale projects, including managing a team of over 200 engineers to improve the safety of aging U.S. natural gas pipelines.

Sean and his family reside in Burbank, California, where he attempts to play outdoor tennis year-round, with varying degrees of success.

Sean McCarron

Product Marketer for Underwriting & Fraud Detection at Zest AI

A sociologist turned marketer, Sean has spent the past 15 years helping companies understand emerging technologies—and the ways they shape organizations and the communities they serve. At Zest AI, he leads product marketing for credit underwriting and fraud detection.

Jasmine Chen

Product Marketer for LuLu

Jasmine has a track record of helping companies launch, position, and grow products that solve real problems for real people. She leads GTM for LuLu, Zest’s lending intelligence platform, at a time when smarter lending decisions have never mattered more.