The Principal
Ariffin Yahaya, Ph.D.
Former Chief Architect at Yahoo & Senior Distinguished Architect at Autodesk. Ph.D. in Computer Science & Economics. 30+ technical due diligences. $2B+ in deal value evaluated.
Ariffin Yahaya has spent 20+ years at the intersection of technology and investment. As Chief Architect at Yahoo, he served as the technical gatekeeper for 30+ acquisitions totaling $2B+ in deal value, creating early-stage evaluation frameworks that prevented $50M+ in write-downs.
His systems have served 100M+ daily users and supported $3B+ in revenue. At Autodesk, he led cloud transformation strategy for a $3B product portfolio. At Amobee, he unified 7 acquisitions into an integrated platform while eliminating $10M/year in vendor costs.
Ariffin holds a Ph.D. from UC Irvine with a dissertation combining Computer Science and Economics — research on market-based resource management that shaped his approach to technology as an economic asset, not just an engineering artifact.
He currently serves as Chair of the Innovation & Technology Committee for Etiqa Insurance ($15B+ AUM) and has presented technology strategy to the board of PNB, Malaysia's largest sovereign wealth fund ($70B+).
By the Numbers
Education
Ph.D., Computer Science with Economics
UC Irvine
M.Sc., Computer Science
UC Irvine
B.Sc., Computer Science
Cal State Northridge
Board & Advisory
Chair, Innovation & Technology Committee
Etiqa Insurance ($15B+ AUM)
Former Board Member
OneMarket
Advisor
PNB/MIDF — $70B+ sovereign wealth fund
Why "The Economics of Technology"
Most technology advisors are engineers who learned some business. Ariffin's doctoral research combined Computer Science with Economic Theory — studying how to allocate resources efficiently in distributed systems using market mechanisms.
That foundation shapes everything we do: technology decisions are investment decisions, architecture is capital allocation, and technical debt is financial debt that compounds.
We don't just evaluate if technology works. We evaluate if it creates value.