The New Rules for Scaling AI: What Yum Brands Learned

Picking a use case, proving value, and expanding has been the standard starting point for enterprise AI. For organizations early in their AI journey, that advice still holds. But for large enterprises that are past the pilot stage and trying to scale across business units, geographies, and brands, it isn't enough.At NVIDIA GTC, Cameron Davies, Chief Data Officer of Yum Brands, shared how his team is thinking about AI differently — and why they had to. With 63,000 restaurant locations, 100 million daily transactions, and 1,500 franchisees across 155 countries, Yum operates at a scale where a single bad AI decision can fail loudly, repeatedly, and fast.In this episode, Maribel breaks down Davies' framework and what it means for how enterprise leaders should be thinking about AI in 2026 and beyond.---**What you'll learn**- Why the use case as a unit of AI planning has a structural limitation at enterprise scale- What "scalable AI skills" means and why it's different from building agents for specific use cases- Why governance has to come before deployment, not after — and what happens when it doesn't- How measurement functions as operational discipline, not just a reporting obligation- What Yum's AI flywheel looks like and why it only works if measurement is continuous- What this framework means for organizations that aren't Yum-sizedAbout Cameron DaviesCameron Davies is the Chief Data Officer at Yum Brands, the parent company of KFC, Taco Bell, Pizza Hut, and The Habit Burger Grill. He leads the company's corporate data and analytics strategy and oversees the development and adoption of advanced data capabilities. He previously spent seven years as SVP at NBCUniversal and over 18 years at The Walt Disney Company, where he led the Corporate Center of Excellence for AI and machine learning.---**Resources and references mentioned**-NVIDIA GTC session: "Scaling AI Agents Globally Across Brands, Use Cases, and Restaurants" (S81755) — Cameron Davies, Yum Brands- Responsible AI Institute — chaired by Manoj Saxena- Trustwise — AI trust startup founded by Manoj Saxena- Byte — Yum Brands' proprietary e-commerce, point-of-sale, and menu platform- Lopez Research blog: The Rules for Scaling AI Have Changed. Yum Brands Proved It. — [LINK]---📢 STAY CONNECTEDSubscribe to the AI with Maribel Lopez audio podcast: https://www.buzzsprout.com/1947446Subscribe to my LinkedIn newsletter — AI Decoded with Maribel Lopez: https://www.linkedin.com/newsletters/ai-decoded-with-maribel-lopez-7312533413582827520/Lopez Research blog: https://www.lopezresearch.com/research/Follow me on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/maribellopez/Follow me on X: https://x.com/MaribelLopez--- STAY CONNECTEDSubscribe to the AI with Maribel Lopez audio podcast: https://www.buzzsprout.com/1947446Subscribe to my LinkedIn newsletter — AI Decoded with Maribel Lopez: https://www.linkedin.com/newsletters/ai-decoded-with-maribel-lopez-7312533413582827520/Lopez Research blog: https://www.lopezresearch.com/research/Follow me on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/maribellopez/Follow me on X: https://x.com/MaribelLopez