Stanford Data Science

What Stanford Data Science does

Stanford Data Science (SDS) is a university-wide academic research institute within Stanford University, founded in 2018 and formally launched with its inaugural campus-wide conference on April 5, 2022. SDS operates as a horizontal institute that enables data-driven discovery across all Stanford schools (Humanities & Sciences, Engineering, Medicine, Business, Law, and Sustainability) through three primary lines of activity: (1) early-career talent programs including the Data Science Scholars program (16 new scholars in 2024–2025) and the Postdoctoral Fellows program (4 fellows per year); (2) faculty-led research centers covering causal science, open and reproducible science (CORES), sustainability data science, health data science, the Center for Decoding the Universe (C4DU, jointly with KIPAC), computational market design, and neural data science; and (3) community and convening programs including the annual Stanford Data Science Conference, Women in Data-Driven Discovery (WiD3), Rising Stars in Data Science, the Sustainability Data Science (SuDS) Conference, and the Data Science for Social Good (DSSG) summer fellowship.

The institute's core technical asset is Marlowe, Stanford's GPU-based computational instrument — an NVIDIA DGX H100 SuperPod comprising 31 H100 nodes (248 H100 80GB GPUs total), 2.5 PB of DDN Lustre high-performance storage, 2 TB RAM per node, 30 TB node-local NVMe, 900 GB/s GPU-to-GPU bandwidth via NVSwitch, and 3.2 Tbps InfiniBand connectivity. Marlowe is offered free to approved Stanford investigators with introductory GPU-hour awards, and is supported by a dedicated research data science team. As of May 2026, Stanford merged its AI and data science efforts under a single institute retaining the Stanford HAI name, with James Landay as head and Fei-Fei Li as Special Advisor on AI.

SDS is a nonprofit academic unit within Stanford University, funded through philanthropic giving (individuals, foundations, and corporations) and a Corporate Affiliates Program. It generates no commercial revenue; all programs, compute access, and events are provided free of charge to Stanford affiliates, and external programs such as DSSG, DSURP, and Rising Stars are fellowship-supported. Leadership includes Executive Director Chris Mentzel, Faculty Director Emmanuel Candès, Director Guido W. Imbens (2021 Nobel laureate in Economic Sciences), and Associate Director Chiara Sabatti.

Name

Stanford Data Science

Legal name

Stanford University

Website

https://datascience.stanford.edu

Company type

Private

Founded year

2022

Operating status

Operating

Headcount range

1–10 employees

Short description

Stanford Data Science is a nonprofit academic research institute within Stanford University that advances data-driven discovery through PhD and postdoctoral fellowship programs, seven faculty-led research centers, and the Marlowe NVIDIA DGX H100 GPU SuperPod, serving Stanford faculty, students, and external collaborators.

Ownership category

akta.pro rank

Product category

Higher Education Research Institute

NAICS

Other Scientific and Technical Consulting Services (54169), Computer Systems Design and Related Services (54151)

SIC

Services-Computer Programming, Data Processing, Etc. (7370), Services-Commercial Physical & Biological Research (8731)

akta.pro primary industry

Technical Universities with Computing, Data & AI Focus (EDAHAEAK)

akta.pro secondary industry

Data Science & Analytics (Data Literacy, SQL, Visualization) (EDAMACAF)

Keywords

• Data science research
• Academic research institute
• GPU computing cluster
• Postdoctoral fellowship programs
• Interdisciplinary AI research

Headquarters

HQ city

Stanford

HQ country

United States

HQ region

North America

Offices1 record

Markets served

GTM type

B2B

Offering type

Services

Cost components

Personnel, Technology or R&D, Infrastructure, Operations, Marketing or Sales

Revenue model

1. Philanthropic Giving: Stanford Data Science relies on philanthropic support from individuals, foundations, and corporations. Endowed gifts provide a lasting foundation for SDS and faculty hired in partnership with Stanford's schools and institutes. Annual, unrestricted gifts support core activities including the Data Science Scholars program, SDS Postdoctoral Fellows, faculty-led research centers, and curriculum development. Gifts are tax-deductible under Stanford University's 501(c)(3) status.
2. Industry Affiliates Program: Corporate partners join the SDS Corporate Affiliates Program, providing financial and strategic support in exchange for engagement with Stanford's data science research community, talent pipeline, and collaborative opportunities.

Pricing tiers

Go-to-market motion3 records

Distribution channels5 records

Marketing channels9 records

Core offering

Stanford Data Science operates an interdisciplinary research and education institute that funds PhD scholarships, postdoctoral fellowships, faculty-led research centers, and a GPU supercomputing platform (Marlowe) for Stanford researchers. It convenes the data science community through conferences (Annual Conference, Sustainability Data Science, Women in Data-Driven Discovery, Rising Stars), Distinguished Lectures, and seminars, and runs social-impact summer programs (Data Science for Social Good) that pair students with external project partners.

Product overview

Stanford Data Science is a university-wide institute at Stanford University that enables data-driven discovery and expands data science education. The institute operates as a portfolio of interconnected programs and research centers, including the Marlowe GPU-based computational cluster for high-performance AI research, PhD Data Science Scholars and Postdoctoral Fellows programs for training the next generation of researchers, the Data Science for Social Good summer fellowship program, and multiple faculty-led research centers covering Open and Reproducible Science (CORES), Causal Science (SC2), Health Data Science, Sustainability Data Science, and the Center for Decoding the Universe. Additional programs include Women in Data Science (WiDS) conferences and the Rising Stars in Data Science workshop.

Differentiator

Problem solved

Functional benefit

Brands

• Marlowe: Stanford's GPU-based computational instrument, a high-performance compute cluster for creating, analyzing, and using large-scale models.
• Data Science Scholars Program
• Data Science Fellows Program
• Data Science for Social Good
• Rising Stars in Data Science
• Women in Data-Driven Discovery (WiD3)
• Ram and Vijay Shriram Data Science Fellows

Products and services

• Marlowe GPU-Based Computational Instrument Stanford's high-performance compute cluster (NVIDIA DGX H100 Superpod with 31 H100 nodes, 248 H100 GPUs, 2.5 PB DDN Lustre storage, 900 GB/s GPU-to-GPU bandwidth via NVSwitch, 3.2Tbps InfiniBand) available to Stanford investigators for creating, analyzing, and using large-scale AI models.
• Data Science Scholars Program PhD student fellowship program supporting exceptional graduate students advancing data science methods in their research; awarded 50% compensation over two years and drawn from five Stanford schools.
• Data Science Postdoctoral Fellows Program Postdoctoral fellowship program hiring recent PhDs of exceptional promise for interdisciplinary research combining data science with domains like physical, life, social sciences, humanities, medicine, and engineering.
• Data Science for Social Good (DSSG) Summer Program Summer fellowship program inviting undergraduate and graduate students to work on data science projects with social impact, mentored by faculty and advanced researchers; pairs fellows with external project partners (e.g., Code for Africa, Stanford RegLab, Human Trafficking Data Lab).
• Women in Data Science (WiDS) Program Program celebrating and accelerating careers of women in data science, including the annual Women in Data-Driven Discovery (WiD3) conference and workshops.
• Rising Stars in Data Science Workshop Workshop supporting transition to roles such as postdoctoral scholar, research scientist, industry researcher, or tenure-track faculty for graduate students near PhD completion; co-hosted with UC San Diego and University of Chicago.
• SDS Corporate Affiliates Program Industry engagement program where corporate partners provide financial and strategic support in exchange for access to Stanford's data science research community, talent pipeline, and collaborative opportunities.
• CORES (Center for Open and REproducible Science) Multi-school center developing resources and supporting activities that promote open science practices and methodological innovations for transparent and reproducible research, including the Open Science Champion and Innovator awards.
• Stanford Causal Science Center (SC2) Faculty-led research center focusing on causal inference methodologies and their applications across various domains of scholarship; led by Nobel laureate Guido Imbens.
• Center for Decoding the Universe (C4DU) Research center focused on AI and data science applications in astrophysics and fundamental physics research; joint initiative of Stanford Data Science and KIPAC.
• Sustainability Data Science Center Research center focused on applying data science to sustainability and climate change challenges; co-organizer of the annual Sustainability Data Science (SuDS) Conference.
• Health Data Science Center Research center applying data science methods to health and medical research challenges.

Quantifiable outcome

• 16 new Data Science Scholars awarded in 2024-2025 cohort from five Stanford schools
• +4 more outcomes

Named customers7 records

Segments4 records

Ideal customer profiles4 records

Technology focussed No

API detail

Has API

No

API docs

API detail

Core technology

AI maturity

App detail

AI capability6 records

Feature3 records

Partnerships

Eleven partnerships are on record, tiered core and minor.

• Stanford Institute for Human-Centered AI (HAI)coreStrategic or Co-development Partner · 1 January 2026As of May 2026, Stanford merged its AI and data science efforts under a single institute retaining the Stanford HAI name. James Landay serves as head of the combined institute. Co-founder Fei-Fei Li serves as Special Advisor on AI and co-chair of the advisory council alongside John Hennessy. The merged institute encompasses both HAI and Stanford Data Science.
• NVIDIAcoreTechnology or Integration · 1 January 2025Marlowe is built on the NVIDIA DGX H100 Superpod reference architecture. NVIDIA provides the hardware platform (31 H100 nodes, 248 GPUs) and a joint initiative connecting Stanford researchers with NVIDIA solutions architects and research teams for early-stage software support, optimization guidance, and access to advanced NVIDIA software libraries. Zoe Ryan (Solutions Architect) and Bruce McGowan (Senior Account Manager) at NVIDIA support the collaboration.
• Stanford Doerr School of SustainabilitycoreStrategic or Co-development Partner · 1 January 2025The Stanford Doerr School of Sustainability co-organizes the annual Sustainability Data Science (SuDS) Conference with Stanford Data Science. The 2025 conference was held at the new Computing and Data Science (CoDa) building. The partnership bridges data science methods with sustainability science and climate change research.
• R ConsortiumcoreStrategic or Co-development Partner · 14 May 2020The R Consortium is a co-sponsor of the COVID-19 Data Forum, a multidisciplinary online meeting series organized by Stanford Data Science to discuss data-related aspects of the pandemic. The forum brought together topic experts to focus on data access, sharing, essential data resources for modeling, and decision-making support. The R Consortium Board of Directors chair Joseph Rickert serves on the Organizing Committee.
• KIPAC (Kavli Institute for Particle Astrophysics and Cosmology)coreStrategic or Co-development PartnerThe Center for Decoding the Universe (C4DU) is a joint initiative of Stanford Data Science and KIPAC. KIPAC scientists collaborate with SDS researchers on fundamental AI and data science applied to astrophysics problems. The center is actively recruiting a Research Scientist with a background in AI/astrophysics.
• Stanford Wu Tsai Neurosciences InstitutecoreStrategic or Co-development PartnerThe Wu Tsai Neurosciences Institute collaborated with Stanford Data Science and the Statistics Department on a new faculty position in Data Science and Neuroscience, seeking candidates for theoretical and computational neuroscience at the tenure-track level.
• Stanford Law School RegLabminorStrategic or Co-development PartnerRegLab partnered with Stanford Data Science through the Data Science for Social Good program to use machine learning, AI, and causal inference to modernize government regulation of CAFO (concentrated animal feeding operation) wastewater polluters.
• Code for AfricaminorStrategic or Co-development PartnerCode for Africa partnered with Stanford Data Science through the 2020 Data Science for Social Good program to build a database of networks of corporations and persons involved in land transfer and ownership in Kenya, supporting journalists fighting corruption and promoting good governance.
• Stanford Human Trafficking Data LabminorStrategic or Co-development PartnerThe Human Trafficking Data Lab at Stanford partnered with SDS through the Data Science for Social Good program to help the Brazilian Federal Labor Prosecution Office target firms involved in human trafficking, using the Intuition Engine — an ensemble predictive model combining regression, NLP, deep learning, and network analysis.
• COVID-19 Host Genetics Initiative / Harvard Medical SchoolminorOthersAndrea Ganna from the COVID-19 Host Genetics Initiative and Harvard Medical School participated as a speaker in the COVID-19 Data Forum webinar on August 13, 2020, focused on making COVID-19 clinical data available and useful.
• EndPandemic National Data Consortium / Saama TechnologiesminorOthersKen Massey from EndPandemic National Data Consortium and Saama Technologies participated as a speaker in the COVID-19 Data Forum webinar on clinical data, discussing efforts to make COVID-19 clinical data available and useful.

Scale indicators8 records

Recent moves7 records

Expansion highlights5 records

Regional players

• Oxford Department of Statistics: Oxford's longstanding statistics and data science hub, with parallel emphasis on causal inference, methodological research, and cross-disciplinary collaboration. Comparable in academic rigor but operating in a different geographic market.

Emerging players

• Allen Institute for AI (AI2): A non-university research institute focused on fundamental AI research with a strong open-science ethos. Comparable to SDS in its research-only, mission-driven posture and CORES-aligned open science philosophy.

Direct peers

• UC Berkeley Division of Computing, Data Science, and Society (CDSS): Berkeley's campus-wide data science and computing unit, founded around the same time, with parallel mission of interdisciplinary data science education and research. Most direct structural peer to Stanford Data Science.
• Harvard Data Science Initiative: Harvard's university-wide data science initiative, focused on methodological research and cross-school collaboration. Operates with similar postdoctoral and faculty programs and a comparable philanthropy-driven funding model.
• Berkeley Institute for Data Science (BIDS): Berkeley's data science research institute with a similar emphasis on open science, reproducibility, and cross-disciplinary methods. Comparable to Stanford's CORES in scope and mission.
• NYU Center for Data Science: One of the earliest university-wide data science institutes (founded 2013), with an explicit PhD training program in data science. Comparable to Stanford Data Science in its emphasis on interdisciplinary methods and external student pathways.
• MIT Schwarzman College of Computing: MIT's flagship institute for computing and AI cross-disciplinary research and education, with similar faculty hiring, fellowship, and research-center model. Directly comparable in scale and ambition to Stanford Data Science.
• University of Chicago Data Science Institute: UChicago's data science institute and co-host of the Rising Stars in Data Science workshop with Stanford. Direct peer in mission, talent programs, and career-development workshops for early-career researchers.

Broad incumbents

• Carnegie Mellon School of Computer Science: CMU's broad computer science school with deep expertise in AI, machine learning, and data science at scale. A larger, more established incumbent providing overlapping capabilities across research, education, and industry partnerships.
• Stanford Institute for Human-Centered AI (HAI): Stanford HAI, the household-name AI institute at Stanford that merged with SDS in May 2026. Operating as a broader AI research and policy organization, it is the dominant institutional AI brand at Stanford and SDS's parent structure going forward.

Market position

Strengths4 records

Weaknesses4 records

Competitive moat5 records

Key risks5 records

Key highlights6 records

Customer concentration

• YouTubeyoutube.com/c/StanfordDataScience
• LinkedInlinkedin.com/company/stanford-data-science

Revenue estimate

Valuation estimate

Number of profiles

Profiles3 records

Funding overview

Funding rounds

Investors

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M&A

Investments

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Frequently asked questions about Stanford Data Science