Dean Pettit brings an MIT PhD, a research background in language and cognition, and more than a decade of applied NLP and AI experience to his role as Founder & CEO of Zeus AI. He helps organizations identify where AI can create meaningful value and build the systems that make it possible.
Before founding Zeus, Dean developed natural language processing and machine learning solutions at First Databank, including prescription interpretation, drug-to-concept mapping, and medication image recognition. He has worked extensively with transformer and embedding models since 2018, including custom training and fine-tuning. Earlier, he spent fifteen years teaching linguistic theory, semantics, and logic at UNC Chapel Hill. His research on language, understanding, and human judgment has appeared in Mind, Mind & Language, and an Oxford University Press volume.
At Zeus, Dean combines that technical depth with close attention to how people and businesses actually work. His approach connects AI models with the knowledge, tools, evaluation, and human oversight each task requires. Whether helping a team take its first practical step or diagnosing a complex AI workflow, he focuses on making systems more useful, reliable, and accountable to business results.
