NEW YORK – Trustpair, a leading vendor fraud prevention platform for global enterprises, has appointed co-founder Simon Elcham as its Chief AI Officer (CAIO) and formalized a companywide AI governance model. This strategic move aims to integrate artificial intelligence effectively across its operations, addressing the common challenge many enterprises face in scaling AI beyond pilot stages.
Most organizations struggle to implement AI broadly, often remaining in experimental phases without achieving companywide adoption, according to McKinsey’s 2025 State of AI report. For rapidly expanding companies, this can lead to increased risks, including data security vulnerabilities, compliance gaps, and organizational fragmentation. Trustpair’s approach seeks to mitigate these issues by unifying technical leadership and people transformation under a structured framework from the outset.
Simon Elcham, formerly the company’s Chief Technology Officer, will now lead a structured, cross-functional AI strategy. This strategy is built on Trustpair’s belief that technology alone is insufficient for successful AI adoption. He developed the “AI for teams” program alongside Cyrille de la Brunetière, Chief Operations Officer, and Céline Gallon, Chief People Officer.
Baptiste Collot, CEO and co-founder of Trustpair, stated, “AI was already appearing organically across teams, but without shared practices, we were only capturing a fraction of what was possible. Scaling AI isn’t about deploying more tools. It’s about aligning structure, security, and our people and culture around a common framework. Appointing Simon as Chief AI Officer is our commitment to making AI a permanent, companywide advantage, ensuring our teams are equipped, trained and engaged in this transformation.”
“Most companies treat AI as a software rollout,” said Simon Elcham. “But adoption stalls when it remains isolated within IT. AI impacts workflows, decision-making, compliance and culture, and it must be governed as an organizational discipline. Our model bridges technical leadership and people strategy from day one.”
The “AI for teams” program is structured around three core pillars:
Business outcomes first: Each AI initiative is grounded in a clearly defined business objective, with use cases selected based on measurable operational impact rather than trend adoption.
Security and compliance by design: All tools undergo vetting against internal security standards and data protection requirements prior to deployment. Governance is continually aligned with evolving regulatory expectations.
Organizational adoption and accountability: AI champions are embedded within each department to foster consistent practices and facilitate knowledge sharing.
Initial internal deployment results at Trustpair indicate measurable productivity gains. A post-launch survey revealed that employees reported a 40-50% reduction in research and information synthesis time, with half of all respondents noting significant efficiency improvements in their daily workflows. This also resulted in a shift from informal AI experimentation to standardized practice, which reduced risks associated with “shadow AI” and enhanced quality control and oversight.
Trustpair, founded in 2017, focuses on empowering large global companies to eliminate vendor payment fraud through its market-leading account validation platform. The company serves over 500 corporate and enterprise customers, assisting finance teams in protecting against fraud attacks. With offices in New York City, Paris, and London, Trustpair employs more than 100 professionals dedicated to payment security.
As AI-driven fraud threats become more complex, Trustpair views its internal AI governance as integral to its mission of securing enterprise financial ecosystems with rigor and transparency. The appointment of a dedicated Chief AI Officer is emerging as a crucial step for enterprises seeking to formalize executive ownership of AI governance and move beyond ad hoc adoption in highly regulated environments. As CAIO, Simon Elcham will be responsible for leading Trustpair’s AI risk management framework, scaling AI-enabled productivity across all business functions, and building the internal systems necessary to transform individual AI use into a shared organizational capability.
