In just one year, the Pittsburgh-based AI Strike Team has become a force — elevating Pittsburgh on the global stage through its AI Horizons Summit, spurring the city into contention for Waymo’s next wave of rollouts, and accelerating the secure infrastructre local startups need to work with the U.S. Army’s nearby AI Integration Center.
Now it’s scaling up.
The AI Strike Team has launched “Strike Team 2.0” — a statewide expansion with a reconstituted board of business and industrial heavyweights and a new organizational home at Team Pennsylvania beginning January 2026.
Why now: The AI race has entered a critical phase where states looking to compete must define their standing in the new AI Economy. Pennsylvania has been among the fastest and most aggressive to lock in momentum. Strike Team 2.0 is built to sustain that pace.
“We cannot afford incremental thinking — we must act boldly,” said the Strike Team’s CEO Joanna Doven.
A Year of Compounding Momentum
The AI Strike Team’s statewide expansion caps a year of milestones in Pennsylvania:
January: The AI Strike Team formally launched on the heels of its first AI Horizons Summit.
July: U.S. Senator Dave McCormick’s Energy Innovation Summit brought the President, five Cabinet officials, and 60+ CEOs and investors to Pittsburgh to unveil $92 billion in AI investment – an event described by stakeholders as a seminal, historic day.
September: The Strike Team’s second AI Horizons Summit convened AI and energy leaders with keynotes from Governor Josh Shapiro and Senator McCormick (and was where Standard & Works officially launched).
Last Week: Waymo announced plans to test and deploy in Pittsburgh, returning to the city where its foundational technology originated at Carnegie Mellon. The Strike Team was pivotal to securing this outcome.
“Having autonomous taxis in your city is a signal that you’re sitting at the future and that you’re a city of modern technology,” Doven told Standard & Works.
The New Structure
Strike Team 2.0 introduces a board stacked with Pennsylvania-based global leaders – CEOs and executives whose companies are deeply ingrained in AI, energy, robotics, finance, and workforce systems:
Sunil Wadhwani — Global AI investor; Managing Partner, SWAT Capital
Shiv Rao — CEO, Abridge (valued at $5.3B)
Toby Rice — President & CEO, EQT
Joe Mastrangelo — CEO, Eos Energy Enterprises
Mike Keslar — President, BNY Pennsylvania
Michael Pohl — Google Pittsburgh Site Lead
Abby Smith — President & CEO, Team Pennsylvania; author of the Commonwealth’s 10-year Energy, Data Centers, and AI Roadmap
Martial Hebert — Dean, CMU School of Computer Science; Director, Robotics Institute
Rob Cherry — CEO, Partner4Work
Team Pennsylvania
A key name on the Strike Team’s board is Abby Smith, CEO of Team Pennsylvania, a private-public partnership with deep policy depth that anchors a statewide network of stakeholders.
Team Pennsylvania recently released a 10-year Energy, Data Centers, and AI Roadmap, which sets a coordinated decade-long path for how Pennsylvania can compete. The document builds on discussions held at the Energy Innovation Summit and AI Horizons Summit.
“Team Pennsylvania exists to help cross-sector leaders move faster on big, nonpartisan priorities for the Commonwealth, said Abby Smith, President and CEO of Team Pennsylvania.
“The AI Strike Team has built real momentum, and we’re proud to serve as their fiscal sponsor, providing the administrative backbone that gives them the capacity to expand their impact across Pennsylvania.”
Bottom Line
Across the country, the most aggressive states are building a new layer of economic development — sector-specific vehicles that unify traditional stakeholders.
They’re well-branded, fast-moving, and relationship-driven — purpose-built to change narratives and close deals faster than legacy structures allow.
If you want to see this playbook in action, look to Pennsylvania.
Go Deeper: Watch our Standard & Works Show episode “Inside Pittsburgh’s AI Strike Team,” recorded this fall with Joanna Doven at the AI Horizons Summit.
