Walid el Abed Founder & CEO of Global Data Excellence “GDE” who has a doctorate in Linguistics and Computer Science, is known for the proposition of a new model called the Semantic Meta Model (SMM) (Meta Modèle Sémantique - MMS). He is also a researcher at the Tesnière Centre specialized in Computational Linguistics and Natural Language Processing at the University of Franche-Comté.
Walid el Abed's research interests and expertise are in the fields of artificial intelligence, data science, data value, governance and business excellence. He is also the inventor of a new discipline “Data Excellence” with a holistic framework embedded into a software system (Data Excellence Management System “DEMS”) with the vision to elevate data to excellence empowering a data-driven society governed by value for perpetual excellence.
Since 2000, Walid el Abed has introduced and taught the Data Excellence discipline at the Tesnière Centre specialized in Computational Linguistics and Natural Language Processing at the University of Franche-Comté and also at the CNAM (Centre National des Arts et Métiers) and Paris Dauphine University, and finally at the Fribourg University of Law as a philosophical, economic, political and organizational model. Dr el Abed is a pioneer in data-related topics, with 20 years of on-field experience across various sectors.
He started his career in 1995 in the automotive industry before moving to the IT sector in 1998 and then to the  financial and business consulting sector in 2001. After diverse missions for large financial, manufacturing  enterprises and governments, Dr el Abed joined the food & beverage industry at Nestlé headquarters as a  Business Excellence Manager driving the data strategy for the group. In 2007 he founded Global Data  Excellence (GDE). GDE is a Swiss ICT company based in Geneva. Walid el Abed has given lectures at several data conferences.
He is a co-founder and board member of the French association EXQI (Excellence, Quality, Information) that groups several scientists around the Data Excellence discipline. He is also one of the scientists involved in the creation of the IQCP (Information Quality Certified Professional) certification established by the IAIDQ (International Association for Information and Data Quality). Dr Walid el Abed is the founder of the Scientific Society PEC “Perpetual Excellence Community”; a Swiss non-profit organization, based in Geneva. In 2015 The Data Excellence Management System DEMS has been qualified as "an alternative future" by a Gartner analyst.