An institution for the practical work of AI safety.
USIAIS exists because the deployment of artificial intelligence is moving faster than the institutions, frameworks, and norms designed to govern it. We produce independent research, advise organizations through the practical work of deploying AI responsibly, and assess AI products and the organizations that build them against published safety standards. We are funded by the organizations that benefit from our work — and we maintain complete editorial independence from them.
Five short principles.
- AI safety is operational, not theoretical.
- Most risk lives in deployment decisions, not model architecture.
- Independence is structural.
- The value of our research depends on our freedom from the interests of those we research.
- Standards must be published.
- Any assessment we issue is anchored to a methodology anyone can read.
- Industries are different.
- Healthcare, finance, defense, and consumer technology face different AI risks and require different responses.
- Speed and rigor are not opposites.
- Fast-moving fields need institutions that can act quickly without sacrificing intellectual honesty.
USIAIS operates as a small, deliberately senior team. Each engagement is staffed by people with operating experience, not by analysts handed a checklist. Our advisory work depends on attending to context — the regulatory environment, the customer base, the deployment surface, the internal incentives — and translating that context into specific, actionable counsel.
Our research, certification, and advisory work proceed under a single discipline: everything we publish is anchored to a written methodology, and every assessment we issue can be traced back to that methodology by anyone who reads it. Disagreement with our conclusions is welcome. Confusion about how we reached them is not acceptable.
We charge fees for advisory, consulting, certification, and membership. We disclose every commercial relationship that bears on what we publish. The policy that governs all of this is published in full.
Charlie Marucco
Charlie Marucco is the founder and Director of USIAIS. He spent two decades in enterprise sales and consulting leadership at a public consulting firm, where he built and ran the firm's go-to-market motion for higher education and academic medical center clients, closing more than $200 million in contracts across regulated industries. He works extensively with AI agent systems and brings an operator's perspective to questions of AI safety, governance, and deployment. He writes regularly on AI safety and is based in Northeast Florida.
Headshot replaces silhouette placeholder when provided.
USIAIS is a for-profit research and advisory organization. We generate revenue from advisory services, consulting engagements, certification fees, and corporate membership. The discipline that prevents these revenue sources from compromising our research is policy, not preference.