V2 AI has appointed four senior executives to its leadership team as demand from enterprise customers has risen fivefold in recent months. The Asia-Pacific data and AI consultancy said the hires bring additional depth across consulting, AI strategy, engineering and data transformation at a time when large organisations are moving from AI experimentation to full-scale deployment.
Clare Cranston joins as General Manager Consulting, Millicent McCutcheon as Partner, Gulnnar Grover as Director, Data & AI, and Dwayne Helena as Director of AI Engineering. The firm, founded in 2023 with offices in Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane and Kuala Lumpur, was recently named an implementation partner in Anthropic's Claude Partner Network. It already works with AWS, Databricks, Google Cloud and OpenAI on enterprise AI projects.
Consulting lead
Cranston brings more than 20 years of experience leading consulting, customer success and delivery teams across Australia and Asia-Pacific. She previously held senior roles at Cognizant, including Head of Delivery & Strategy, and has worked at Contino, Logicalis, Optus and IBM. At V2 AI she will lead the consulting practice, focusing on delivery, the company's squad-based model, and pre-sales and customer engagement.
"Clients increasingly need partners who can move from AI strategy to enterprise-scale delivery, and I'm excited to help grow that capability at V2 AI," Cranston said.
Enterprise focus
McCutcheon spent more than six years at Amazon Web Services advising senior leaders at major Australian financial institutions and insurers on cloud and AI transformation. She will strengthen V2 AI's work with large regulated entities, where governance, risk and implementation remain central to AI adoption.
"V2 AI combines deep technical capability with practical execution, helping organisations adopt AI responsibly and at scale," she said.
Data and AI engineering depth
Grover, the new Director of Data & AI, has over a decade of experience spanning consulting, product and enterprise delivery. He will help clients establish the data, governance and delivery foundations required for broader AI adoption-a sign of how companies are shifting from isolated pilots to formal AI operating models.
"Successful AI starts with trusted data, strong governance and a relentless focus on business outcomes," Grover said.
Helena joins as Director of AI Engineering after 25 years in engineering transformation across banking and financial services. His appointment highlights the growing overlap between software engineering and AI deployment, particularly as industries modernise legacy systems while introducing new tools.
"I joined V2 AI because it sits at the intersection of two areas I'm most passionate about: engineering transformation and enterprise AI adoption," Helena said. "The future of software engineering will be AI-enabled, and enterprises need modern engineering practices to realise its full potential."
Craig Howe, V2 AI's Founder and CEO, linked the appointments to the company's next phase of growth. "As we enter our next phase of growth, we're investing in exceptional leaders who bring deep consulting, engineering, data, cloud and commercial expertise," he said. "Clare, Millicent, Gulnnar and Dwayne significantly strengthen our ability to help clients build AI capability that is secure, scalable and delivers measurable business value."
Why this matters for executives and strategy
V2 AI's hiring spree signals that enterprise AI work is maturing beyond proof-of-concept projects. As consultancies compete for a growing pool of corporate AI spending, leadership teams need to evaluate whether their external partners can connect strategy to secure, governed deployment-not just run a pilot. The appointments in engineering, data foundations and sector-specific consulting reflect exactly the mix of skills that companies will need to scale AI without creating new operational risks.
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