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Ian Ayres    

Lawyer, Economist, Yale Law Professor, Author of "Super Crunchers"

Ian Ayres is a lawyer and economist, currently serving as the William K. Townsend Professor at Yale Law School, the Anne Urowsky Professorial Fellow in Law, and a Professor at Yale's School of Management.

He contributes as a columnist for Forbes magazine and writes for the New York Times Freakonomics blog. His commentary has been featured on public radio’s “Marketplace.” Notably, Ayres's research has gained attention on television programs such as "Primetime Live," "The Oprah Winfrey Show," and "Good Morning America," and in well-known publications like Time and Vogue magazines.

Ayres’s publication record includes 11 books, such as the New York Times bestseller "Super Crunchers" and his recent work, "Carrots and Sticks: Unlock the Power of Incentives to Get Things Done." His collaborative work in 2010 with Barry Nalebuff, "Lifecycle Investing," adds to his extensive portfolio. Additionally, he co-founded stickK.com, a website dedicated to helping individuals achieve their personal goals. His contributions to legal scholarship were recognized when he was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2006. That same year, his collaboration with Greg Klass, "Insincere Promises: The Law of Misrepresented Intent," received the Scribes book award for outstanding legal scholarship. Ayres has been acknowledged as one of the most prolific and most-cited law professors of his generation. From 2002 to 2009, he also served as the editor of the Journal of Law, Economics and Organization. His other notable works include "Straightforward," co-authored with Jennifer Gerarda Brown; "Optional Law"; "Why Not?" with Barry Nalebuff; "Voting with Dollars," co-authored with Bruce Ackerman; and "Pervasive Prejudice?" among others.

Speech Topics


Carrots & Sticks: Unlock the Power of Incentives to Get Things Done

Lifecycle Investing: Advantages of Time Diversification

Personal & Institutional Risk Management & Investment Strategies

Why Not? How to Use Everyday Ingenuity to Solve Problems Big & Small

Super Crunchers: Predictive Analytics & Data-Driven Decision Making

Gone are the days of solely relying on intuition or yesterday's data to make decisions. A new breed of decision makers is increasingly calling the shots and delivering amazingly accurate results by harnessing collective intelligence. Who are they? Super Crunchers.

Those who want to be competitive need to understand how Super Crunchers are increasingly determining - or at least predicting - consumer and business choices. Ayres describes this revolutionary trend in this keynote, based on his best-selling book, Super Crunchers: Why Thinking-by-Numbers Is the New Way to Be Smart. He explains how, by analyzing millions of bytes of information, companies can gain greater insights into human behavior and the ability to predict the future with staggeringly accurate results. Ayres helps audiences understand how they can succeed in a data-based world by providing a better understanding of how to analyze massive amounts of data at lightning speeds and impact decisions in real time.

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