Augie K Fabela II, Co-founder and Executive Chairman of FastForward.ai, a Silicon Valley startup offering AI-powered E-commerce-as-a-Service (EaaS), is betting on artificial intelligence (AI) reshaping all areas of life, from how we shop to how we communicate and everything in between.
Fabela, who is also Board Chairman of Nasdaq-listed global digital operator VEON, made his name in the 1990s as the young American entrepreneur who helped bring mobile connectivity to countries of the former Soviet Union. More than two decades later, Fabela is once again positioning himself at the center of a major shift in consumer behaviour, driven by tech innovation – the advancement of AI.
A Track Record of Firsts
Born in Chicago to Colombian and Mexican parents, Fabela started working at an early age. He had his own paper route before graduating from Stanford University, where he earned both a Bachelor’s degree in International Relations and a Master’s in Policy Studies in just four years. After a couple of years working in Tokyo for Japan’s largest mass media conglomerate, Fujisankei Group, Fabela returned to the United States and eventually set his sights on Eastern Europe just as the Soviet Union was on the brink of collapse.
Still in his early twenties and visiting Moscow as liberalization and free speech were gaining momentum, Fabela met a senior Russian scientist, Dr. Dmitry Zimin. Together they went on to co-found VimpelCom, one of Russia’s first private mobile operators and the country’s first company to list on the New York Stock Exchange via a historic IPO in 1996.
Their incredible entrepreneurial journey was recently told by UK-based filmmaker Vera Krichevskaya, in the award-winning documentary Connected. The film depicts important historic and personal milestones, such as the rise of mobile telecommunications, Fabela and Zimin’s unlikely yet unwavering friendship and various seismic geopolitical shifts, showing how they all came together to redefine what staying connected means for millions of people today.
Over two decades later, VEON, which transformed from VimpelCom into one of the world’s largest telecom groups operating digital businesses across fast-growing frontier markets, is no longer in Russia – it fully exited the country in 2023. However, VEON and Fabela as its Chairman of the Board remain at the cutting edge of technology.
The digital operator is currently working on developing culturally-relevant large language models (LLMs) trained on local sources in emerging markets where VEON operates, and leveraging these LLMs to preserve these countries’ cultural sovereignty as well as better serve the needs of local consumers, as AI becomes an increasingly integral part of our lives.
In June, VEON announced that its Ukrainian digital operator Kyivstar has joined forces with Ukraine’s Ministry of Digital Transformation to develop the country’s first national LLM trained on Ukrainian-language data. “This agreement marks a significant step toward establishing a sovereign, secure, and locally attuned AI ecosystem that supports economic development and gives Ukrainians powerful tools to enrich their daily lives,” Fabela said in an interview with The AI Journal. “A Ukrainian LLM will enable people to engage with advanced AI capabilities grounded in the full cultural nuance, linguistic richness, and national context of Ukraine’’
Pursuing similar goals in Central Asia, Beeline Kazakhstan – VEON’s digital operator in the country – together with its software development company QazCode, launched KazLLM – the Kazakh language LLM, built in partnership with the Institute of Smart Systems and Artificial Intelligence at Nazarbayev University and Astana Hub. This ground-breaking, culturally significant work was carried out in coordination with the Kazakhstan Ministry of Digital Development.
The creation of KazLLM made it possible for VEON’s digital operator to roll out AI Tutor – an AI-powered learning assistant designed to support children’s and adults’ learning experience in Kazakh language, marking an important step in digital inclusion and educational access in Kazakhstan.
“Artificial intelligence has the power to transform how people learn and connect with their communities. With AI Tutor, we’re making education more inclusive and accessible for native Kazakh speakers and those eager to learn the language,’’ Fabela said. “This is the promise behind our AI strategy: to use AI as a force that enhances human potential. We’re committed to delivering similar innovations across our other markets, where our extensive digital reach allows us to scale meaningful, locally tailored solutions to millions.”
To help support and expand this cutting-edge work, Beeline Kazakhstan at the end of July moved to its new headquarters in Almaty – a purpose-built space that brings together the company’s telecom, AI and digital teams under one roof. Fabela was there, on the ground, hailing the new building as a sign that new products are already in the works, and are now being developed in a more high-tech, collaborative space.
FastForward.ai: A Head Start on AI’s Everyday Potential
Before VEON began leading sovereign LLM initiatives under Fabela’s guidance, the tech executive had already recognized the far-reaching impact AI could have on people’s everyday lives. In The Impatience Economy, his bestselling book, Fabela argued that the next generation of digital services must be instant, intuitive, and embedded directly into the platforms where people already spend their time. In his view, AI was not just a back-end technology – it was poised to reshape the way people learn, shop, communicate, and make decisions.
It was this insight that led to him establishing FastForward.ai, a Silicon Valley-based startup that brings AI-powered commerce directly into social and messaging apps. The company anticipated what would soon become a broader industry trend: enabling brands to meet consumers in-app, without forcing them to visit a website or download a new tool.
Launched in Silicon Valley, FastForward.ai built a white-label platform that allows large enterprises to offer real-time marketing, customer support, and seamless one-click purchases inside apps like WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, and Viber. Using AI to personalize offers and automate responses, the platform gives brands a direct line to consumers, bypassing the traditional digital friction points.
The idea was considered cutting-edge at the time of its launch and attracted early backing from General Catalyst and Ulu Ventures. By 2020, the company had raised $8 million in seed funding and signed enterprise contracts across more than 30 countries. Clients span a wide range of sectors – from healthcare and retail to financial services – each looking for more effective ways to engage mobile-first audiences.
“FastForward.ai was built on the belief that technology should simplify life, not complicate it,” Fabela said. “That means integrating commerce into the everyday flow of digital interactions, rather than forcing users to break away from how and where they already communicate.”
Looking Ahead
From pioneering mobile telecoms in the countries of the former Soviet Union to backing sovereign LLMs across emerging markets, Augie Fabela has repeatedly aligned himself with key inflection points in global tech. His ventures, both corporate and entrepreneurial, have often anticipated where digital life is heading before the mainstream catches up.
Whether it’s scaling AI-powered education tools in Kazakhstan or embedding e-commerce into chat platforms globally, Fabela’s work reflects a consistent thesis: that technology, when thoughtfully deployed, has the power to enhance daily life at scale. What comes next for Fabela remains open-ended, but if history is any guide, it will likely involve getting there before others do.
“The pace of innovation doesn’t stop and the world doesn’t wait,” Fabela said. “Neither can we.”
