Executives of the Year: Dawn Baker

When you operate an online marketplace for refurbished electronics, sustainability isn’t a side quest—it’s a primary goal, says Back Market chief technology officer Dawn Baker. “We have an environmental mission at our heart,” Baker says. “What that means for me, as a technology leader, is looking at how we optimize our compute, because we have to make sure we’re not using more than we need.” That’s especially true now, with AI offering enormous opportunities but consuming extraordinary resources. “It’s the opposite of environmentally friendly. And yet, there are important use cases,” Baker continues. “It’s about using AI smartly and not falling for the hype by trying to use it for everything.”  

Because many consumers remain skeptical of refurbished goods, the Paris-based company has focused its AI-related investments on public-facing functions like customer care, fraud detection, pricing intelligence, and quality assurance. Says Baker, “Investing in customer experiences that build trust … doesn’t just benefit us; it benefits the entire category by getting people to think about how to make everything they have last longer.”