Evangelos Kanoulas

Professor in AI at University of Amsterdam & Co-founder at LYDS.AI, ex-Google

Amsterdam, North Holland, Netherlands

About

I am a professor of Artificial Intelligence at the University of Amsterdam, where my research focuses on Information Retrieval, Language Technology, and Evaluation. I work on developing AI systems that retrieve, reason, interact, and generate in more autonomous and reliable ways, and I lead research on robustness, multimodal information access, and evaluation science. My contributions span conversational and agentic information access, adversarial robustness for retrieval models, speech- and vision-based retrieval, and new approaches to evaluating both retrieval and generative systems. I also co-lead several international benchmarking efforts, including TREC and CLEF, and collaborate regularly with industry on applied AI problems. Beyond academia, I am involved in several entrepreneurial initiatives. Through mnShot Labs I work with organizations on applied AI projects that require deep technical expertise. I co-founded Calli Labs, a joint venture focused on AI-driven tools for video content analysis and creation. Previously I co-founded Ellogon.AI a start up with a focus on improving cancer patient treatment. These activities reflect my broader interest in connecting research with real-world applications across domains such as media, diagnostics, and public-sector innovation.

Experience

  • Chief AI Officer at Calli Labs
    May 2025 - Present · 1 yr 2 mos

  • University of Amsterdam (11 yrs 7 mos)
    • Professor
      Apr 2022 - Present · 4 yrs 3 mos

      Head of the IRLab (https://irlab.science.uva.nl/)

    • Associate Professor
      Jan 2019 - Mar 2022 · 3 yrs 3 mos

      Head of the HuMIL group (http://ilps.science.uva.nl/human-machine-intelligence-lab/) Member of the ILPS group (http://ilps.science.uva.nl/) Lecturer for the UvA MSc in Artificial Intelligence (http://bit.ly/1M93LL6)

    • Assistant Professor (Tenured)
      Jun 2017 - Dec 2018 · 1 yr 7 mos

      Member of the ILPS group (http://ilps.science.uva.nl/) Coordinator of the UvA MSc in Data Science (http://bit.ly/1SAiN1x) Lecturer for the UvA MSc in Artificial Intelligence (http://bit.ly/1M93LL6

  • Co-Founder and COO at Ellogon AI B.V.
    May 2019 - May 2025 · 6 yrs 1 mo

  • Professor at University of Amsterdam Business School
    Dec 2017 - Mar 2022 · 4 yrs 4 mos

  • Visiting Professor at Università degli Studi di Padova
    Oct 2017 - Nov 2017 · 2 mos