# Enrique (Rick) Sanchez, Jr. — complete site content > Single-document export of https://ricksanchez.org. Updated 2026-08-30. Contact: rick@sanchize.com · (877) AI-CAIO-1 ============================================================================== # Home — Enrique (Rick) Sanchez, Jr. > Overview of the practice: AI governance counsel, IP and technology strategy, and fractional Chief AI Officer engagements. Source: https://ricksanchez.org/ · Updated: 2026-08-30 · Contact: rick@sanchize.com · (877) AI-CAIO-1 --- ## Govern AI With Clarity. Protect Innovation With Confidence. I help organizations align AI governance, IP strategy, data risk, and business execution — so innovation can scale responsibly. #### Legal Judgment Grounded in law. Focused on defensible outcomes. #### Practical Execution From framework to controls your teams actually run. #### Board-Ready Communication Complex material taught plainly to any audience. #### Technical Fluency Deep understanding of AI, data, and the systems beneath. #### Mission Discipline Judgment built where the stakes were already real. ### Three Ways I Help Organizations Move Responsibly and Faster. #### AI Governance Counsel Design governance that scales with technology and regulation. - Policy design & governance charters - Vendor & third-party review - Risk frameworks & assessments - Governance controls & training #### IP & Technology Strategy Protect, position, and commercialize innovation with clarity. - Patent strategy & portfolio development - Licensing & revenue strategy - Commercialization planning - AI & data contract strategy #### Fractional CAIO Executive partnership for responsible, value-driven adoption. - Executive briefings & workshops - Roadmap alignment - Responsible adoption & guardrails - Cross-functional leadership ### A Practical Framework for Governing Innovation. #### Assess Understand your goals, risks, and current-state capabilities. #### Prioritize Focus on high-impact, high-risk areas that move the needle. #### Implement Design policies, controls, and workflows that work in practice. #### Monitor Measure outcomes, adapt, and evolve with confidence. ### Clarity Today. Confidence Tomorrow. #### Translate Complexity I turn legal, technical, and regulatory complexity into clear next steps. #### Prioritize Avoidable Risk Proactive governance lowers exposure and builds trust. #### Accelerate Responsible Adoption Practical frameworks help teams move faster with fewer surprises. #### Align Legal, Technical, and Business Teams Unified strategy. Stronger execution. Better outcomes. ### One Advisor. Multiple Disciplines. I bring together engineering rigor, military leadership, legal expertise, teaching experience, and executive advisory to help organizations govern innovation with judgment and integrity. Electrical engineering background with a focus on systems, signal processing, and technology. I engage technical stakeholders in the technical weeds to understand how your systems actually work. U.S. Navy Reserve cryptologic officer, leading teams and mission-critical operations. I establish clear processes and roles to accomplish your mission. Patent attorney advising innovators, founders, and global enterprises. I turn what the law requires into language your teams can follow and your counsel can defend. Adjunct professor teaching intellectual property, AI governance, and innovation law. I teach your board and your builders the same material, each in the vocabulary they already use. Executive advisor and fractional CAIO helping organizations navigate AI with confidence. I sit in the executive seat with you and own the decision, not just the recommendation. ### Publications & Speaking #### Selected Publications - What Responsible AI Governance Looks Like in Practice - Vendor Risk in the Age of AI Tools - From Policy to Execution: Building an AI Governance Program #### Speaking - AI Governance for Boards and Leadership Teams - Practical IP Strategy for AI-Enabled Businesses - Legal, Technical, and Operational Alignment in AI Adoption ### What I'm Talking About Right Now. ### Where your data lives in AI: the prompt boundary. ### Vendor risk is the AI risk most programs miss. ### Policy is not a program. ### Start Now — Protect Your Customers and Your Organization. You do not need a finished program to begin. Governance can start with what you already have today — policies, contracts, and workflows. Let's build a plan that reduces risk, protects the people who trust you with their data, and accelerates responsible innovation. ============================================================================== # International IP Practice — Enrique (Rick) Sanchez, Jr. > Patent, trademark, and copyright prosecution, litigation, licensing, and post-grant proceedings — including multinational enforcement. Source: https://ricksanchez.org/ip-practice.html · Updated: 2026-08-30 · Contact: rick@sanchize.com · (877) AI-CAIO-1 --- ## International IP Practice. I am a registered patent attorney with a degree in electrical engineering and a background in cryptology. I prosecute, litigate, and license patents, trademarks, and copyrights — and because I can read the technology myself, the strategy starts with what the invention actually does. #### Prosecution Preparing and prosecuting patent, trademark, and copyright applications — and building the portfolio they belong to, here and abroad. #### Litigation Patent and trademark litigation in federal court for plaintiffs and defendants, including coordinated actions across several countries at once. #### Licensing Licenses, acquisitions, and joint development — the agreements that turn a portfolio into revenue rather than a filing cabinet. **Prosecution** #### Applications Drafted by Someone Who Can Read the Schematic. I prepare and prosecute patent applications across cryptocurrency and blockchain, semiconductors, augmented and virtual reality, VTOL, aircraft and rotorcraft, control systems, and machine learning. I prosecute trademark applications before the USPTO, file copyright registrations, and respond to refusals from the Copyright Office. I also counsel clients on international portfolios — what to file, where, and when it stops being worth it. - Patent preparation and prosecution before the USPTO - Trademark applications, office actions, and maintenance - Copyright registration and response to refusals - Freedom-to-operate opinions, patentability and knock-out searches - International portfolio strategy and foreign associate coordination - Invention harvesting and disclosure programs for engineering teams **Litigation** #### Both Sides of the Caption, in Several Countries at Once. I represent plaintiffs and defendants in patent and trademark litigation in federal court. In-house, I managed concurrent international litigation in Germany, China, France, Italy, and Spain — reviewing every filing for substance and strategic coherence across jurisdictions, and attending the oral hearings in each. That work produced multiple German injunctions, a nullity hearing in which all claims were upheld, simultaneous saisie-contrefaçon proceedings in France, and defeated negative declaratory judgment actions in Italy. - Patent and trademark litigation, plaintiff and defendant side - Multinational enforcement and coordinated cross-border strategy - Claim construction, infringement contentions, and invalidity analysis - Reverse engineering coordination and technical expert management - Post-grant proceedings before the PTAB — IPR, reexamination, appeal - TTAB appeals, cancellations, and oppositions **Licensing** #### The Agreement Is Where the Value Is Realized. I draft and negotiate patent and trademark license agreements, acquisition agreements, joint development agreements, master services agreements, non-disclosure and common-interest agreements. For clients in the entertainment industry I handle copyright assignments and licenses. Earlier in my career I ran licensing campaigns end to end — identifying licensees, structuring deals, and coordinating with litigation and prosecution counsel through each stage. - Patent, trademark, and copyright license agreements - Patent purchase, settlement, and acquisition agreements - Joint development, MSA, NDA, and common-interest agreements - Licensing campaign strategy and counterparty diligence - Portfolio diligence across hundreds of international assets - AI and data contract terms — training rights, outputs, and indemnity > “A patent is a technical document that has to survive a legal fight. I have spent my career on both halves of that sentence.” **Admissions** **Professional Service** **Recognition** ### Start Now — Protect Your Customers and Your Organization. You do not need a finished program to begin. Governance can start with what you already have today — policies, contracts, and workflows. Let's build a plan that reduces risk, protects the people who trust you with their data, and accelerates responsible innovation. ============================================================================== # AI Practice — Enrique (Rick) Sanchez, Jr. > AI governance programs, risk and compliance, contracts and vendors, data and model governance, incident readiness, and the six-layer framework. Source: https://ricksanchez.org/ai-practice.html · Updated: 2026-08-30 · Contact: rick@sanchize.com · (877) AI-CAIO-1 --- ## AI Practice. I help organizations build and use AI responsibly — governance frameworks, risk and compliance, contracts, data, and incident readiness — designed so engineers can implement them, executives can defend them, and a regulator can audit them. ### What I Deliver. #### AI Governance Governance frameworks, policies, and operating models that scale with innovation instead of stalling it. #### Risk & Compliance Identify, assess, and mitigate legal, regulatory, security, and ethical risk across the AI lifecycle. #### Contracts & Vendors Draft and negotiate AI, data, and technology contracts that allocate risk and protect value. #### Data Governance Data governance programs that protect privacy, ensure quality, and unlock the value of what you already hold. #### Model Governance Controls for model selection, testing, monitoring, and continuous improvement — with evidence at every step. #### Incident & Response Prepare for and respond to AI incidents with clear playbooks and regulatory alignment. ### How I Help Organizations. - Risk-aware innovation. Enable AI initiatives with guardrails, not roadblocks. - Executive alignment. Translate AI risk into business and board-level language. - End-to-end coverage. From strategy and policy to operations and response. - Regulatory readiness. Align with emerging laws and standards across the globe. - Practical outcomes. Frameworks, playbooks, and training your teams will actually use. - AI governance program design and implementation - Policy and procedure development - AI due diligence and readiness assessments - Vendor and model risk management - AI incident response and investigations - Training for leaders, legal, and technical teams ### My Framework: Six Layers of AI Governance. Integrated. Practical. Defensible. #### Strategy Align AI with business strategy, risk appetite, and value creation. #### Governance Establish roles, policies, committees, and decision rights. #### Legal & Regulatory Ensure compliance with laws, contracts, and emerging regulations. #### Information Governance Manage the data lifecycle — privacy, quality, retention, and access. #### AI Security Secure the systems, data, models, and integrations behind every deployment. #### Operations Monitor performance, manage risk, and continuously improve. This model is built on leading frameworks — including ISO/IEC 42001, the NIST AI RMF, and ISO/IEC 23894 — and tailored to your organization's industry, risk profile, and goals. ### Who I Work With. I partner with leaders building or using AI in complex, regulated, or high-stakes environments. ### Why Work With Me. - Lawyer + engineer + operator. I understand both the technology and the law, and I have shipped systems under both. - Board and executive trusted advisor. I speak to risk, value, and strategy in the room where it is decided. - AI governance leadership. Member, State Bar of Texas Emerging Technology Committee. - Author, speaker, educator. I teach, publish, and translate complexity for the people who have to act on it. - Hands-on experience. I build practical solutions that work in the real world, not reference architectures. > “His combination of governance depth, technical fluency, and mission-critical systems experience is exactly what this moment in healthcare demands.” ### Frameworks I Use. I align programs to globally recognized standards and best practices. ### Start Now — Protect Your Customers and Your Organization. You do not need a finished program to begin. Governance can start with what you already have today — policies, contracts, and workflows. Let's build a plan that reduces risk, protects the people who trust you with their data, and accelerates responsible innovation. ============================================================================== # CAIO & Advisory — Enrique (Rick) Sanchez, Jr. > Fractional and interim Chief AI Officer engagements and board advisory; current CAIO seats at XelaOS and Immersive Solutions Group. Source: https://ricksanchez.org/caio-advisory.html · Updated: 2026-08-30 · Contact: rick@sanchize.com · (877) AI-CAIO-1 --- ## CAIO & Advisory. Some organizations need counsel. Others need someone to own the AI function outright — set the strategy, carry it to the board, and stand behind the decisions. I hold that seat today at XelaOS and at Immersive Solutions Group, and I take it for other organizations on a fractional and interim basis. #### Fractional CAIO Ongoing executive ownership of the AI function at a fraction of a full-time seat — strategy, oversight, and the board relationship. #### Interim CAIO Full ownership through a defined period: a launch, a regulatory deadline, a transaction, or the search for a permanent hire. #### Board Advisory Briefings, risk appetite work, and the oversight structure a board needs to govern AI without becoming its engineers. **What The Seat Covers** #### Owning the Decision, Not Just the Recommendation. An advisor writes a memo. An officer signs. In a CAIO engagement I set the AI strategy against a stated risk appetite, decide what gets built and what gets bought, own model oversight and the traceability of outputs, stand up the internal governance function, and answer for all of it in front of the board. - AI strategy and risk appetite, set with and carried to the board - Model oversight, evaluation, and traceability by design - Build-versus-buy decisions and deployment sequencing - Standing up the internal governance team and its operating cadence - Vendor and partner decisions across the model supply chain - Executive briefings, workshops, and cross-functional leadership > “Rick brings an exceptional combination of AI governance, intellectual property, legal strategy, military leadership, and enterprise advisory experience — and a commitment to responsible AI.” ### In Practice. **Chief AI Officer** #### XelaOS. XelaOS is the AI integration layer for healthcare — an EMR-agnostic system that structures data across records, documents, and workflows for clinics, hospitals, home health, hospice, skilled nursing, surgical, and clinical research environments. As its first Chief AI Officer I own model oversight, the governance frameworks, and the compliance backbone as clinical deployments expand. The core technology pulls structured clinical data out of unstructured, contradictory sources — a domain where a confident wrong answer is both a patient-safety problem and an audit-defensibility problem. Every generated artifact stays traceable to its source, so clinical, quality, and revenue teams can stand behind what the system produces. **Chief AI & Strategy Officer** #### Immersive Solutions Group. Immersive is a global intelligence company building technology designed to raise human intelligence and deliver it in new ways. As Chief AI & Strategy Officer I help guide the company's AI strategy, governance framework, responsible deployment practices, strategic partnerships, and innovation roadmap as its technology portfolio expands. Here the two halves of the title are the point: strategy decides what gets built and which partnerships accelerate it, while governance decides what ships and on what evidence. Holding both means the roadmap and the guardrails are drawn by the same hand rather than negotiated after the fact. ### Start Now — Protect Your Customers and Your Organization. You do not need a finished program to begin. Governance can start with what you already have today — policies, contracts, and workflows. Let's build a plan that reduces risk, protects the people who trust you with their data, and accelerates responsible innovation. ============================================================================== # Teaching — Enrique (Rick) Sanchez, Jr. > Adjunct Professor of Law at Texas A&M teaching AI Governance & Policy; CLE and executive teaching; casebook in development. Source: https://ricksanchez.org/teaching.html · Updated: 2026-08-30 · Contact: rick@sanchize.com · (877) AI-CAIO-1 --- ## Teaching. I teach because it forces precision. A board, a bench, and a room of law students will each accept a different explanation of the same system — and being able to give all three is most of what my clients are actually paying for. **Law School** #### AI Governance & Policy — Texas A&M University School of Law. I teach the course as an Adjunct Professor of Law beginning Fall 2026. It takes students from the international frameworks down to the documents an organization actually adopts: the ISO/IEC 42001 management system, the NIST AI Risk Management Framework, the EU AI Act and TRAIGA, and the liability questions that follow when a model is wrong. Students leave able to read a governance program and say what is missing. **Continuing Legal Education** #### Teaching Lawyers to Work With the Technology, Not Around It. - AI Governance and Policy — Texas Bar CLE, Law in the Age of AI (2026) - Inteligencia Artificial Aplicada al Derecho — Bexar County Courthouse Cross-Border Exchange (2025) - Inteligencia Artificial en la Práctica de Patentes — Supreme Court of the State of Jalisco, Mexico (2024) - Global Trends in Enforcement — UT 24th Annual Advanced Patent Law Institute (2019) **In Development** #### AI Governance: Law, Liability, and Regulation. A casebook in progress for law school and executive programs, built around the same premise as the course — that the frameworks only matter once they become procedures somebody runs. Also forthcoming: a co-authored chapter in Relaciones Jurídicas Contemporáneas en el Contexto Internacional (CUTonalá 2026). **Available Formats** #### What I Am Asked to Teach. #### For Boards Ninety minutes on what the board is actually accountable for, what to ask management, and what evidence to expect. #### For Legal Teams A working session on AI in practice — governance obligations, privilege, contracts, and the technology underneath. #### For Builders What the regulation requires of the system, in the vocabulary of the people who have to implement it. ### Start Now — Protect Your Customers and Your Organization. You do not need a finished program to begin. Governance can start with what you already have today — policies, contracts, and workflows. Let's build a plan that reduces risk, protects the people who trust you with their data, and accelerates responsible innovation. ============================================================================== # Speaking — Enrique (Rick) Sanchez, Jr. > Keynotes, panels, and CLE on AI governance, IP strategy, and legal-technical alignment, in English and Spanish. Source: https://ricksanchez.org/speaking.html · Updated: 2026-08-30 · Contact: rick@sanchize.com · (877) AI-CAIO-1 --- ## Speaking. I speak to boards, bar associations, courts, and technical audiences — in English and in Spanish. The talks below are the ones I am asked for most often, and each can be scaled from a keynote to a working session. #### Governing The AI You Already Deployed For boards and executive teams: what is running today, who owns it, and what oversight actually looks like. #### Practical IP Strategy For AI-Enabled Businesses Protecting and monetizing innovation when the invention includes a model, the data, and the outputs. #### Legal, Technical, And Operational Alignment Why AI programs stall in the handoffs, and how to build alignment that survives contact with production. **Recent & Upcoming** #### Where I Have Been on the Program. **Booking** #### What I Need to Know. Audience, room size, and how much of the session is mine. I will tailor the material to the industry and, where it helps, to the specific systems in the room — a talk about governance is more useful when it names the tools people are actually using. Sessions are available in English or Spanish. ### Start Now — Protect Your Customers and Your Organization. You do not need a finished program to begin. Governance can start with what you already have today — policies, contracts, and workflows. Let's build a plan that reduces risk, protects the people who trust you with their data, and accelerates responsible innovation. ============================================================================== # Publications — Enrique (Rick) Sanchez, Jr. > Chapters, articles, and papers on intellectual property, enforcement, and AI governance, 2011 to present. Source: https://ricksanchez.org/publications.html · Updated: 2026-08-30 · Contact: rick@sanchize.com · (877) AI-CAIO-1 --- ## Publications. Chapters, articles, and papers on intellectual property, enforcement, and the governance of artificial intelligence — written across fifteen years of practice, in two languages. **Forthcoming** #### In Progress. - 2026 Contemporary Legal Relationships within the International Context (co-author), in Relaciones Jurídicas Contemporáneas en el Contexto Internacional (CUTonalá 2026). - 2026 AI Governance and Policy , Texas Bar CLE, Law in the Age of AI. - In Progress AI Governance: Law, Liability, and Regulation — a casebook for law school and executive programs. Six-layer treatment of governance, liability, and regulation, built around the Black Lion Integrated AI Framework™. **Articles & Chapters** #### Published Work. - 2012 Patents and the Internet (co-author), in Intellectual Property Law in Cyberspace (2d ed. 2012 Supp.), BNA Books. - 2012 Pleading and Proving Willfulness Under the America Invents Act , 23 ABA Intell. Prop. Litig. 3 (Spring 2012). **Presentations & Papers** #### Delivered. - 2025 Inteligencia Artificial Aplicada al Derecho , Bexar County Courthouse Cross-Border Exchange. - 2024 Inteligencia Artificial en la Práctica de Patentes , Supreme Court of the State of Jalisco, Mexico. - 2020 IP Protection for the Agricultural Industry , Ag Law in the Field Podcast, Episode 76. - 2019 Global Trends in Enforcement , UT 24th Annual Advanced Patent Law Institute. - 2019 Protecting Creativity and Innovation , Global Entrepreneurship Week. - 2011 Toast to the Constitution , Hon. Barbara M. G. Lynn American Inn of Court, Inaugural Meeting. **Series** #### Where Your Data Lives in AI. An ongoing series written for governance and legal audiences on what actually happens to enterprise data inside an AI system — the prompt boundary, vendor terms, retention, and the difference between a policy and an audit trail. ### Start Now — Protect Your Customers and Your Organization. You do not need a finished program to begin. Governance can start with what you already have today — policies, contracts, and workflows. Let's build a plan that reduces risk, protects the people who trust you with their data, and accelerates responsible innovation. ============================================================================== # Insight — Enrique (Rick) Sanchez, Jr. > SurvAIable, the Black Lion Integrated AI Framework and its crosswalk matrix, and current writing. Source: https://ricksanchez.org/insight.html · Updated: 2026-08-30 · Contact: rick@sanchize.com · (877) AI-CAIO-1 --- ## Insight. Two things I built, and what I am working through in public. The framework is the method; SurvAIable is how an engagement finds its starting point; the posts are the thinking before either one is finished. ### SurvAIable A secure, AI-driven survey and analytics platform that gathers structured, role-based input from across an organization and turns it into a clear, defensible picture of how AI is actually being used — formally and informally — where it creates exposure, and where it could create value. Simple for the people answering. Strategic for the people reading. A governance policy written from assumptions governs an organization that does not exist. This is how I find out what actually exists. - AI usage trends by role and function - Perceived benefits and risks of AI tools - Organizational readiness for adoption - Priority areas for investment or controls #### Policy Grounded in Reality Responses reveal which AI tools are in use, sanctioned or not. That becomes a tailored AI governance policy and acceptable use policy built on real behavior rather than assumptions — addressing risk, compliance, and security while fitting how the organization actually operates. #### Opportunity, Not Only Risk The same instrument captures friction, inefficiency, and unmet need — surfacing high-impact automation candidates, the places employees are already experimenting, and the processes best suited for AI augmentation. #### Confidential by Design Participants enter through a shared credential, so no response is personally identifiable and everything is analyzed in aggregate. Results reach authorized administrators only. Candor is a design requirement, not a hope. ### The Black Lion Integrated AI Framework™ I do not sell policies. I sell an operating model. Six layers, built so each one produces the evidence the layer above it needs — board strategy at the top, the control an engineer runs on a Tuesday at the bottom. One obligation, traced across every framework that governs it, ending in the policy your organization actually adopts. This is what turns overlapping standards into a single defensible system. ### What I'm Talking About Right Now. ### Where your data lives in AI: the prompt boundary. ### Vendor risk is the AI risk most programs miss. ### Policy is not a program. ### Start Now — Protect Your Customers and Your Organization. You do not need a finished program to begin. Governance can start with what you already have today — policies, contracts, and workflows. Let's build a plan that reduces risk, protects the people who trust you with their data, and accelerates responsible innovation. ============================================================================== # About — Enrique (Rick) Sanchez, Jr. > Full biography and timeline résumé: engineer, cryptologic officer, patent attorney, professor, and Chief AI Officer. Source: https://ricksanchez.org/about.html · Updated: 2026-08-30 · Contact: rick@sanchize.com · (877) AI-CAIO-1 --- ## About. Five careers, one problem. I did not arrive at AI governance from a single direction — engineering, cryptology, patent practice, the classroom, and an executive seat each taught me a language the others do not speak. Standing in the space between them is the work. #### A Translator Between the Lab and the Boardroom. Most AI programs stall in the same place: engineers who cannot read the regulation, lawyers who cannot read the architecture, and executives who need one answer they can sign. I spent a decade prosecuting and litigating patents in the technologies underneath today's AI systems — signal processing, semiconductors, cryptography — before governance was a job title. Most lawyers stop at the legal requirement. Most consultants stop at the ISO clause. The work I do continues into the governance process, the technical rationale, the policy language, the evidence an auditor will expect, and how the board should oversee all of it. ### The Long Version. **2026 – Present** #### Chief AI Officer First CAIO at the AI integration layer for healthcare. Owns model oversight, governance frameworks, and the compliance backbone as clinical deployments expand. **2026 – Present** #### Chief AI & Strategy Officer Guides AI strategy, the governance framework, responsible deployment practices, strategic partnerships, and the innovation roadmap at a global intelligence company building technology to raise human intelligence. **2026 – Present** #### Adjunct Professor of Law Teaching AI Governance & Policy beginning Fall 2026. **2022 – Present** #### Equity Member Head of the firm’s Intellectual Property Section. Practice spans AI governance, prosecution, litigation, licensing, and post-grant proceedings across AI, blockchain, semiconductors, VR and AR, VTOL, and finance. **2019 – 2022** #### Member **2016 – 2019** #### Associate **2015 – 2016** #### EVP of Licensing & IP Counsel Managed multinational litigation across the U.S., Germany, France, Italy, Spain, and China — multiple German injunctions, all claims upheld in a German nullity hearing, simultaneous saisie-contrefaçon in France, and defeated Italian declaratory actions. **2014 – 2015** #### SVP of Licensing Licensing campaigns across a broad range of portfolios — licensee identification, deal structure, and negotiation. **2013 – 2014** #### Director Patent monetization strategy, license negotiation, and portfolio diligence alongside inventors, experts, and counsel. **2012 – 2013** #### Associate Patent litigation across semiconductors, power electronics, mobile devices, telecommunications, CAD software, medical devices, and streaming. Part of the trial team that secured a multi-million-dollar award in power electronics. **2009 – 2012** #### Law Clerk **2008 – 2009** #### Director of Intellectual Property Managed patent, trademark, and copyright portfolios and worked with technical staff to develop future IP assets. **2006 – 2008** #### Technical Consultant **2006** #### Senior Systems Engineer **2004 – 2005** #### DSP & Communications Engineer Custom signal processing and digital communications systems, image processing, and FPGA-based designs. **2003 – 2004** #### Signal Processing Engineer **Service** **2004 – 2008** #### Cryptologic Officer (1645) Technical expertise and training on signal processing and space-related topics for Space and Naval Warfare Systems Command and Naval Security Group Reserve. Honorably discharged. **2003 – 2004** #### Cryptologic Technician Technical **Education** **2026** #### Post Graduate Program in AI & Machine Learning Artificial intelligence and machine learning for business applications — models, deployment, and the decisions leaders have to make about both. **2026** #### Chief AI Officer Program (pilot cohort) Accepted to the inaugural cohort, beginning June 2026. **2026** #### Professional Certificate (in progress) Twelve-month Digital Transformation in the AI Age program — Applied Agentic AI for Organizational Transformation, Applied Generative AI, Innovative Leadership, Leadership for the AI Age, and Cultural Awareness for Global Business. **2012** #### Juris Doctor National Order of Barristers. **2004** #### B.S., Electrical Engineering; Minor, Mathematics Klipsch Electrical and Computer Engineering Scholarship. University Senator, College of Engineering Representative. **Admissions** **Certifications & Programs** **Honors** **Associations** **Community** ### Start Now — Protect Your Customers and Your Organization. You do not need a finished program to begin. Governance can start with what you already have today — policies, contracts, and workflows. Let's build a plan that reduces risk, protects the people who trust you with their data, and accelerates responsible innovation. ============================================================================== # FAQ — Enrique (Rick) Sanchez, Jr. > Direct answers on AI governance, ISO/IEC 42001, TRAIGA and the EU AI Act, fractional CAIO engagements, and AI-assisted invention. Source: https://ricksanchez.org/faq.html · Updated: 2026-08-30 · Contact: rick@sanchize.com · (877) AI-CAIO-1 --- ## Questions I Am Asked Most. Short, direct answers to the questions that come up in first conversations — about governance programs, the standards and statutes behind them, and how the work is structured. Nothing here is legal advice or creates an attorney–client relationship. #### What does an AI governance engagement actually produce? A management system, not a binder. Typically: an AI policy and acceptable use policy grounded in what your organization is actually running, a governance charter with named decision rights, a model registry, vendor intake and diligence criteria, human-oversight procedures, an incident response playbook, and the audit evidence each of those generates. The test I hold the work to is whether an engineer can implement it, an executive can defend it, and a regulator can trace it. #### Do I need ISO/IEC 42001 certification? Usually not on day one. ISO/IEC 42001 is a management-system standard, and its value is the operating discipline it imposes — certification is a separate decision driven by customer or procurement pressure. Most organizations get more out of building to the standard, mapping it against the NIST AI Risk Management Framework and the regulations that already bind them, and certifying later if a counterparty requires it. #### What is TRAIGA and does it apply to my organization? The Texas Responsible Artificial Intelligence Governance Act imposes obligations on organizations that develop or deploy AI systems touching Texans, with disclosure, documentation, and prohibited-use provisions. Whether it reaches you depends on your role in the chain — developer, deployer, or distributor — the sector you operate in, and the data involved. It rarely arrives alone: the same deployment often implicates the EU AI Act, state privacy statutes, FTC enforcement posture, and HIPAA at once, which is why I map obligations against each other rather than one at a time. #### How is the EU AI Act different from the NIST AI Risk Management Framework? The EU AI Act is binding law with risk classifications and penalties. The NIST AI RMF is a voluntary framework describing how to govern, map, measure, and manage AI risk. They are complementary: the framework gives you the practice, the Act tells you what is mandatory and by when. A well-built program uses the framework to produce the evidence the Act will ask for. #### What is a fractional Chief AI Officer, and when does it make sense? A fractional CAIO owns the AI function — strategy, risk appetite, model oversight, build-versus-buy, the board relationship — at a fraction of a full-time seat. It fits organizations that have AI in production, or about to be, but not enough scale to justify a full-time executive. An interim CAIO is the same ownership through a defined period: a launch, a regulatory deadline, a transaction, or the search for a permanent hire. #### Who owns the output of a generative AI system? Ownership splits into three questions that are often conflated: rights in the training data, rights in the model, and rights in the output. In the United States, copyright requires human authorship, so purely machine-generated output generally is not protectable, while human-directed and human-edited work may be. Contract terms with your model provider frequently control more of the practical answer than copyright does, which is why I read those terms before advising on the IP position. #### Can an AI system be named as an inventor on a patent? No. Under current U.S. law an inventor must be a natural person, and the Federal Circuit has confirmed it. That does not mean AI-assisted inventions are unpatentable — it means inventorship analysis has to identify the human contributions to conception, and your disclosure practice has to capture them contemporaneously. Getting that record right at the time of invention is far cheaper than reconstructing it during litigation. #### What is shadow AI and why does it matter? Shadow AI is the AI already in use inside an organization that no one registered, approved, or classified data for. It matters because governance written from assumptions governs an organization that does not exist. Surfacing it is what SurvAIable does: anonymous, role-based intake that produces a defensible picture of actual usage before anyone writes a policy. #### Do you take patent prosecution and litigation work, or only AI governance? Both, and they are increasingly the same file. I am a registered patent attorney and prosecute, litigate, and license patents, trademarks, and copyrights across cryptocurrency and blockchain, semiconductors, AR and VR, VTOL and rotorcraft, control systems, and machine learning — including multinational enforcement and PTAB and TTAB proceedings. #### How do engagements usually start? With an honest inventory. Most begin with a readiness assessment of the AI already deployed — what it is, who owns it, what data it touches, and what obligations attach — followed by a sequenced plan that fixes the highest-exposure gaps first. You do not need a finished program to begin. ### Start Now — Protect Your Customers and Your Organization. You do not need a finished program to begin. Governance can start with what you already have today — policies, contracts, and workflows. Let's build a plan that reduces risk, protects the people who trust you with their data, and accelerates responsible innovation.