Data & AI Executive · São Paulo, Brazil

Data & AI
Executive
Leader

Driving data strategy at Latin America's largest bank. PhD in Machine Learning from the University of São Paulo, with a decade of leadership across top-tier financial institutions.

10+
Years in Finance
PhD
Machine Learning
160+
Citations
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Felipe Duarte, Data & AI Executive no Itaú Unibanco e PhD em Machine Learning pela USP
About

Where Technology Meets
Business Strategy

I'm Felipe Duarte, a Data & AI Executive at Itaú Unibanco — the largest financial institution in Latin America. I lead the data strategy across Cards, Current Accounts, and Payment Methods for the entire Retail Banking division.

My career uniquely bridges deep technical expertise and executive leadership. With a PhD in Machine Learning from the University of São Paulo and hands-on experience across Data Engineering, Data Science, ML Engineering, Analytics Engineering, and Data Governance, I bring a rare combination of scientific rigor and business acumen.

Over the past decade, I've built and led data organizations at Brazil's most prestigious banks — Itaú Unibanco, Santander, and BTG Pactual — transforming how these institutions leverage data and AI to create competitive advantage.

Strategic Vision

Defining and executing enterprise-wide data strategies for billion-dollar business units

Technical Depth

PhD-level expertise in ML, with published research in time series analysis and data visualization

Team Leadership

Proven track record of building and scaling high-performing data & AI teams across organizations

Domain Mastery

Deep financial services expertise across cards, payments, and retail banking

Experience

A Track Record of Impact

Progressive leadership across Latin America's top financial institutions

Itaú Unibanco

Largest Bank in LatAm

Superintendent of Data & AI — Retail Banking, Cards, Current Accounts & Payments

Jun 2024 — Present

Leading data strategy for the entire Retail Banking division. Responsible for Data Engineering, Data Science, ML Engineering, Analytics Engineering, Data Governance, and Quality across Cards, Current Accounts, and Payment Methods.

Superintendent of Data & AI — Cards, Current Accounts & Payments

Jan 2023 — Jun 2024

Expanded scope to include Current Accounts and Payment Methods, overseeing all data disciplines and cross-functional initiatives.

Superintendent of Data & AI — Cards

Dec 2021 — Jan 2023

Established the data & AI function for the Cards business unit, building the team and defining the technology strategy from the ground up.

Santander Brasil

Global Banking Group

Superintendent / Head of Data Science

May 2019 — Aug 2021

Promoted from Manager to Superintendent in 2 years. Built and led the Data Science function, driving model development and advanced analytics across the organization.

BTG Pactual

Largest Investment Bank in LatAm

Data Science Specialist

Mar 2019 — May 2019

Applied advanced data science techniques at Latin America's leading investment bank.

Itaú Unibanco

First Tenure

Data Science Coordinator — Computer Vision & Image Processing

Jul 2016 — Mar 2019

Progressed from Data Scientist II to Coordinator, leading the Computer Vision & Image Processing team. Built ML models that directly impacted business operations.

Academia

Professor

Professor of Machine Learning & Big Data

2015 — 2018

Taught Machine Learning, Big Data, and Computer Science at FIA (Fundação Instituto de Administração) and FATECE, bridging industry practice with academic theory.

Education

Academic Foundation

Three degrees from Brazil's #1 ranked university

Doctorate

PhD in Machine Learning

University of São Paulo (USP)
2015 — 2020

Time Series Decomposition Preserving Deterministic Influences

FAPESP Fellowship · Advisor: Prof. Rodrigo F. de Mello

Master's Degree

Data Visualization

University of São Paulo (USP)
2012 — 2014

Exploring Web Data on Mobile Devices: an Information Visualization Approach

FAPESP Fellowship · Advisor: Prof. Fernando V. Paulovich

Bachelor's Degree

Computer Science

University of São Paulo (USP)
2008 — 2012

CNPq Fellowship

Research

Published Work

Peer-reviewed contributions to Machine Learning and Data Visualization

Decomposing Time Series into Deterministic and Stochastic Influences: A Survey

Digital Signal Processing, Vol. 95, 2019

Survey Paper

Time Series Decomposition Using Spring System Applied on Phase Spaces

BRACIS — Brazilian Conference on Intelligent Systems, 2018

Time Series Analysis

Nmap: A Novel Neighborhood Preservation Space-filling Algorithm

IEEE Transactions on Visualization and Computer Graphics, Vol. 20, No. 12, 2014

IEEE TVCG

LoCH: A Neighborhood-based Multidimensional Projection Technique for High-dimensional Sparse Spaces

Neurocomputing, Vol. 150, pp. 546–556, 2014

Dimensionality Reduction

Multidimensional Surrogate Stability to Detect Data Stream Concept Drift

Peer-reviewed Publication

Concept Drift Detection
Expertise

Core Competencies

A unique blend of technical depth and executive capability

Leadership & Strategy

Data Strategy Team Building Organizational Design Stakeholder Management P&L Ownership Cross-functional Leadership Executive Communication

Data & AI Disciplines

Machine Learning Data Science Data Engineering ML Engineering Analytics Engineering Data Governance Computer Vision Data Visualization

Domain & Languages

Financial Services Cards & Payments Retail Banking Risk Analytics Portuguese (Native) English (Fluent) Spanish (Basic)
Contact

Let's Connect

Open to conversations about executive Data & AI leadership roles, advisory opportunities, and strategic partnerships.