Dian Jiao (Jason)
I spent a decade scaling some of the world's largest commerce and education platforms. Then I went back to school — more than once — to study neuroscience, and how to bridge it with AI. Now I build neurotechnology grounded in my own peer-reviewed research.
A scientist with a P&L.
A serial entrepreneur with a bibliography.
Literally: I've translated four books — on how the brain works and on how innovation happens — including Joseph LeDoux's The Four Realms of Existence, the book that named the company I now run. And figuratively: my whole career has been carrying ideas across borders that rarely talk to each other. Business and science. Brains and machines. The lab bench and the balance sheet.
I started in strategy at Ogilvy, then moved into e-commerce, where I helped scale a fashion group's sales on Singles' Day — the November 11 shopping festival that outsells Black Friday, Cyber Monday and Amazon Prime Day combined — across the years its total GMV grew from $732M to $38.4B. From there I spent a decade in education technology: co-founding a learning company, coaching product and growth teams, and serving as Vice President at Sunlands Technology Group (NYSE: STG) through its $163M IPO, then VP & CMO at OneSmart International Education Group (NYSE: ONE), a group with ~£450M in revenue and 430+ learning centres.
In 2020 I founded LEMOEDU and, at the same time, went back to school — to study the science of learning I'd spent a decade operating around. Then the landscape didn't just shift — it caved: a regulatory storm swept the education sector, the venture capital that had flooded in for a decade pulled out almost overnight, and much of the industry I'd spent my career in folded in a single season. In hindsight, the best bad timing of my life — I stepped back from operating and committed fully to research and writing. Since then I've earned graduate degrees in educational neuroscience, computer science, and applied neuroscience, published five peer-reviewed papers, and built NeuroRealm — where the research finally becomes something you can hold.
I'm a Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Marketing, a Senior Member of the IEEE, and a professional member of the Society for Neuroscience — which is a long way of saying I never could pick a lane, so I learned to build the bridges instead.
1. That $38.4B is the whole Singles' Day festival's GMV at its 2019 peak — during my years leading a fashion group's e-commerce on the platform — not my personal number. I did not personally sell $38.4B of anything, before you ask. 2. OneSmart International Education Group (NYSE: ONE) at peak, where I served as VP & CMO. 3. Peer-reviewed, 2025 — Neurocomputing, Discover Artificial Intelligence, two Frontiers journals, and Learning: Research & Practice: the seam where neuroscience meets machine learning. 4. Trained in both worlds — neuroscience (Johns Hopkins; the IoPPN, King's College London) and computer science (University of Pennsylvania).
I translated a book called The Four Realms of Existence. It rearranged mine. These are the four I keep moving between — and the reason "realm" ended up in the company name.
A decade scaling retail and education platforms — IPOs, P&Ls, and Singles' Days. It taught me that ideas only matter once they reach someone.
Where I came fromAI biofeedback, cortical network models, digital therapeutics. A master's in computer science from Penn to make sure I could build, not just brief.
What I build withSleep, insomnia, metacognition, dyslexia, cognitive decline. The neuroscience that pulled me out of the boardroom.
What I studyBooks, translation, teaching, the occasional bad pun in a keynote. The realm where the other three go to make sense to a human being.
How I connect peoplePeer-reviewed work at the seam of neuroscience, AI, and digital health — the research that NeuroRealm is built to put into practice. Full list on Google Scholar.
Jiao, D. — Neurocomputing, 658, 131802. doi:10.1016/j.neucom.2025.131802 ↗
Jiao, D. — the keystone paper behind NeuroRealm's approach to sleep. Front. Digit. Health, 7:1552396. doi:10.3389/fdgth.2025.1552396 ↗
Jiao, D. — Discover Artificial Intelligence, 5, Article 69. doi:10.1007/s44163-025-00325-6 ↗
Jiao, D. — Front. Aging Neurosci., 17:1534198. doi:10.3389/fnagi.2025.1534198 ↗
Jiao, D. — Learning: Research and Practice, 1–25. doi:10.1080/23735082.2025.2517052 ↗
One I wrote; four I carried into another language — split between the two subjects I can't stop reading about: how the mind works, and how innovation happens. It's the same instinct both ways: I translate the ideas that change how I think, then name and build things from them. The Four Realms of Existence is why this company is called NeuroRealm.
A widely acclaimed book on brain-targeted teaching (CBTT) — read by educational leaders and researchers. The method behind much of my later work on how the brain learns.
Selected talks, forums, and appointments across education, technology, and neuroscience.
Selected coverage — from scaling education platforms as VP & CMO to recent work in neuroscience and AI. Headlines in plain English; where a source is online, it's linked.
The company where the research becomes something you can hold — private, on-device neurotechnology for the states of the mind, beginning with sleep.
For research, collaboration, translation, or a good argument about neuroscience and AI.