# Thanh Tran

> Thanh Tran is Co-CEO of A5 Labs, a Foster City-based AI company building game integrity infrastructure for competitive online gaming. With a PhD in Computer Science from Karlsruhe Institute of Technology and a background scaling Upwork's data science team through its IPO, he now leads a 180-person team applying deep reinforcement learning, blockchain reputation systems, and real-time behavioral analytics to eliminate bots, collusion, and cheating from online poker and beyond.

- **Role:** Co-Chief Executive Officer at A5 Labs
- **Organizations:** A5 Labs, Upwork, Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, SearchWebDB
- **Nationality:** American
- **Education:** PhD in Computer Science, Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT), Germany, Master of Science in Computer Science - Business Informatics, Otto-von-Guericke University Magdeburg, Germany, Master of Commerce in Entrepreneurship and Finance, Macquarie University, Australia
- **Known for:** PhD in Computer Science from Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, Founded SearchWebDB, recognized in the 2008 Billion Triple Challenge for semantic search over billions of RDF triples, Scaled Upwork's data science and ML team from 5 to 50+ members through IPO ($6.5B+ valuation, 2019)

## Career timeline

- **2008** — Founded SearchWebDB, the first semantic search solution for natural language queries over billions of records, recognized in the 2008 Billion Triple Challenge
- **~2010s** — Led a worldwide AI research group as Professor at Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, Germany
- **2019-06** — Joined Upwork as VP of Engineering, Head of Data Science & Infrastructure and Search Engineering; scaled data/ML team from 5 to 50+ members
- **2019-10** — Began advising A5 Labs as Advisor to the CEO while still at Upwork; played role in Upwork's IPO reaching $6.5B+ valuation
- **2021-01** — Left Upwork and transitioned to full-time Co-CEO role at A5 Labs
- **2024-07** — A5 Labs featured in PokerNews for exclusive partnership with WPT Global to ensure game integrity in online poker
- **2025-04** — Featured in Joey Ingram's podcast 'The War on AI Bots: Exclusive Interview with Poker's Elite Bot Hunters'

## Achievements

- PhD in Computer Science from Karlsruhe Institute of Technology
- Founded SearchWebDB, recognized in the 2008 Billion Triple Challenge for semantic search over billions of RDF triples
- Scaled Upwork's data science and ML team from 5 to 50+ members through IPO ($6.5B+ valuation, 2019)
- Led AI research group at Karlsruhe Institute of Technology as professor
- Co-founded and leads A5 Labs, growing it to 180 employees and ~$41M annual revenue
- Developed AceGuardian AI technology achieving 99%+ game integrity issue detection proactively
- Secured exclusive partnership with WPT Global for online poker integrity
- Built real-time behavioral analytics platform for detecting GTO deviations, collusion, and bot activity

## Latest updates

- **2025-04** — Featured in Joey Ingram's podcast discussing AI bot detection and online poker security with A5 Labs
- **2024-07** — A5 Labs' partnership with WPT Global highlighted in PokerNews, with A5 Labs providing AceGuardian AI for game integrity

## Links

- Website: https://a5labs.co
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/drthanhtran/

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Profile page: https://yespress.io/thanh-tran
Published by YesPress — https://yespress.io
Last updated: 2026-05-15