Former Great Gray and Auction Technology Group CTO to lead Submittable’s platform, data and AI strategy
MISSOULA, Mont., Oct. 12, 2026 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — Submittable, the leading giving and grants platform powering social impact programs worldwide, today announced Pratyush Rai as chief technology officer. Rai will lead Submittable’s engineering, infrastructure and product technology teams, with a focus on scaling the platform and accelerating its use of AI across grants management and corporate social responsibility (CSR) programs.
Rai joins a growing leadership team under CEO Ben Chodor as Submittable accelerates its investment in AI, giving philanthropic funders, governments and corporations better tools to run their social impact programs.
“Pratyush has built and scaled technology organizations at companies where reliability, security and speed all matter,” Chodor said. “Our customers trust us with programs that fund communities. Pratyush is the right leader to strengthen that foundation while we bring AI into the work in ways that save our customers real time.”
Rai brings more than 14 years of experience leading technology at PE-backed and publicly traded companies, with a focus on platform modernization, data and AI, and acquisition integration. Most recently, he founded Vaanee AI, an AI-powered writing coach for students, after serving as CTO of Great Gray Trust Company, a Madison Dearborn Partners portfolio company, where he led technology, data and AI, DevOps and information security. There he introduced agentic AI across software delivery and operations, accelerating technology delivery while generating substantial operational savings.
Before Great Gray, Rai was Group CTO of Auction Technology Group (LSE: ATG), a global SaaS marketplace business. He integrated eight marketplaces, consolidated three platforms and launched embedded payments that scaled beyond $2 billion in processed volume. Earlier, he was CTO of Kaplan North America and led technology at Macmillan, after starting as an engineer at Amazon and NBCUniversal.
“The opportunity for AI at Submittable is ultimately about creating more capacity for people doing important work. We can use AI to reduce the friction of applying for, administering and reviewing grants, make program data easier to understand and help organizations measure their impact,” Rai said. “At the same time, we can use AI across Submittable to dramatically improve how quickly we learn, build and serve our customers.”
“The important principle is that AI should amplify human judgment and impact, not replace it,” he continued.
Rai holds an MBA in entrepreneurship and strategy from NYU Stern School of Business, an MS in computer science from Syracuse University and a BE in computer science from the University of Leicester.
About Submittable
Submittable is the leading social impact platform empowering mission-driven people to do their best, most impactful work. Through its grants management and CSR software solutions, Submittable helps power purpose for incredible brands looking to manage their social good programs and maximize their impact in their communities.
Media Contact: Keriann Strickland, CMO | press@submittable.com
A photo accompanying this announcement is available at https://www.globenewswire.com/NewsRoom/AttachmentNg/b4e48492-3b58-43be-8b32-47bb8504fa49
