Charles J. Smith (Chief Research Officer and Co-Founder) has started five companies and one foundation. He is known for inventing the royalty-free model at Digital Stock Inc., later sold to Bill Gates, and the confidence-based learning model built into Amplifire. Charles organized the Amplifire Science Advisory Board and leads the efforts to move insights gleaned from cognitive science into the Amplifire algorithm. He is a board member of Nature and Culture International, which has conserved 20 million acres in tropical South America, a co-founder and a board member of the E.O. Wilson Biodiversity Foundation, and previously served on the Director’s Cabinet at Scripps Institution of Oceanography.