Alina Parast

Senior Vice President & Chief Information Officer, Championx

Search every verified Alina Parast interview, podcast appearance, and on-the-record quote — each transcript cross-checked by AI and human review to confirm speaker identity. Alina Parast, Senior Vice President and Chief Information Officer at ChampionX, discussed her role and initiatives in a September 2023 interview on the Technovation podcast. Parast stated that she is responsible for global infrastructure, cybersecurity, enterprise platforms, data and analytics, and AI initiatives. She noted that ChampionX operates in the energy sector, providing chemistry solutions, artificial lift solutions, and engineered equipment. Parast said her team has partnered with R&D to apply AI to accelerate research and development, including using AI models to discover new chemistries and molecules. She emphasized the importance of educating R&D teams about AI's capabilities and limitations, and that subject matter experts must validate AI outputs. Parast also described the company's approach to cybersecurity, stating that it is "everyone's responsibility" and that they use innovative training methods, including a British-style mystery mini-series focused on cybersecurity. She said ChampionX uses cybersecurity scorecards to assess vendors and themselves, and that they have partnered with companies to improve their investor-focused cybersecurity posture. Parast shared a guiding principle of "less is more," advocating for simplicity in tools and platforms, inspired by Apple's approach, because "if you can't explain it, you can't support it or roll it out effectively."