Smartbird announced that it has appointed Nadia Carlsten as president and chief executive officer. Carlsten has also joined the company’s board of directors.
The company, formerly known as Allbirds, has completed its previously announced agreement to sell the Allbirds brand and footwear assets. Following the transition to Smartbird, the company is now focused on providing dedicated AI infrastructure as a managed service.
Smartbird also strengthened its balance sheet by increasing the size of its convertible financing facility from $50 million to $100 million. The expanded capital base is expected to provide additional resources as the company executes its AI infrastructure strategy.
Carlsten brings experience across AI compute infrastructure, advanced computing, product strategy, commercial execution, partnerships, go-to-market strategy, and capital allocation. She previously served as CEO of DCAI, an AI company focused on large-scale GPU compute infrastructure and enterprise AI, where she launched a sovereign AI supercomputer in partnership with NVIDIA.
Carlsten also served as vice president of product at SandboxAQ, a Google spin-off, where she led product strategy across AI, security, and hardware platforms. Earlier in her career, she worked at Amazon Web Services, where she helped launch Amazon’s quantum computing service.
She is also a member of the World Economic Forum’s Global Future Council on Next Generation Computing, where she advises on the strategic implications of advanced computing and AI infrastructure. Carlsten holds bachelor’s degrees in chemistry and physics from the University of Virginia and a doctorate in engineering from the University of California, Berkeley.
Carlsten replaces Joe Vernachio, who is resigning from the company and its board of directors. Annie Mitchell will continue serving as chief financial officer, a role she has held for the past three years.
Smartbird also announced that independent director Lily Yan Hughes has been appointed board chair. Hughes has served as an independent director of the company since October 2025 and has extensive technology experience, along with a 30-year track record across corporate governance, capital markets, and corporate finance.
Smartbird said the AI infrastructure market is entering a new phase as enterprises move from experimentation to production-scale AI deployment. The company is targeting demand for dedicated infrastructure that offers flexibility, control, performance, and cost efficiency compared with traditional hyperscale cloud offerings.
Smartbird delivers dedicated AI infrastructure as a managed service, giving customers the performance and control of private AI clusters without requiring them to finance, operate, or maintain the underlying infrastructure. The company manages the lifecycle from procurement and deployment to operations and hardware refreshes.
Smartbird said it is in active discussions with prospective customers across its target verticals and is designing its first cluster deployments.
Effective today, the company’s name has changed from Allbirds to Smartbird. Its Class A common stock will continue trading on the Nasdaq Global Select Market under the ticker symbol BIRD, and its CUSIP number remains unchanged.
KEY QUOTES:
“We are thrilled to usher in this new era of the company with Nadia at the helm. Her groundbreaking work and visionary mindset will be instrumental in establishing a foothold in the market and building a scalable long-term solution for enterprise customers. The board selected Nadia because of the breadth of her experience and demonstrated success delivering breakthrough ideas and initiatives at scale. The pairing of her vision and expertise with Annie’s continued financial leadership make us confident in the trajectory of the business and our ability to build long-term shareholder value.”
Lily Yan Hughes, Board Chair of Smartbird
“Smartbird is entering the market at a pivotal moment in the evolution of AI infrastructure. AI is rapidly becoming mission-critical for organizations across every industry, yet many organizations lack a practical path to deploy and operate the dedicated infrastructure these workloads require. There is a clear opportunity to meet the growing need for enterprise-grade AI infrastructure that delivers control and performance without the capital and operational burden of hardware ownership. With a differentiated strategy, significant capital, and the opportunity to build an exceptional team, we are uniquely positioned to capitalize on one of the most significant infrastructure opportunities of the next decade.”
Dr. Nadia Carlsten, CEO of Smartbird
