TIME100 AI 2026 · Innovators
Uljan Sharka
Founder and CEO, Domyn
He moved from Albania to Italy in 2008 without knowing a word of Italian; now his company leads the EU's Europa frontier AI model consortium.
- Born
- 1992
- Now
- Founder and CEO, Domyn
- Studied
- No degree listed
Interesting facts
- Before AI
His first iPhone inspired him to join Apple; with no degree, he got in through Apple's certification program and later worked in Silicon Valley.
eye4ai.eu - Numbers
In 2018 his company iGenius raised $7 million, the largest round ever put in by a group of angel investors in Italy.
albaniatech.org - Side project
In 2024 the company released Italia, an open-source language model trained only on Italian.
albaniatech.org - First
The European Commission picked a Domyn-led group to build a fully open-source AI model covering all 24 official EU languages.
time.com - In their words
Argues AI autonomy is overhyped, calling AI systems nothing more than "digital books" of data.
axios.com
Career
- DomynFounder and CEO2016 to now
- AppleTechnical Coordinator2012–2015
