Richard (Rich) Crane is a founder and the chief AI officer and chief technology officer of MILL5, the Boston, Massachusetts, AI and software consulting firm, and a Microsoft MVP in AI with more than three decades in software engineering and cloud architecture (MILL5).
Engineering at Drexel and Microsoft
Crane earned a B.S. in electrical and computer engineering at Drexel University, where he later taught as an adjunct professor (MILL5). Before founding MILL5 he worked at Microsoft on advanced technology initiatives, and over his career he has led projects for Fidelity, Olympus, Wayfair, eBay, Emerson, Staples, BP, and State Street in AI and machine learning, IoT, microservices, and cloud-native applications (MILL5). He is a Microsoft Certified Master in SQL Server and a Microsoft MVP in AI and Development and Foundry (MILL5).
Building AI at MILL5 and Inventing Fire with AI
At MILL5 he leads technology and AI work, including helping clients prove the return on AI investments and move projects from pilot to production on Microsoft Foundry (MILL5 on LinkedIn). He hosts the Inventing Fire with AI podcast, where he talks about using AI to drive innovation and about bridging new technology and real-world use (MILL5).
He also speaks in the Boston developer community; in fall 2026 MILL5 sponsored Boston Code Camp 41, where he was on the speaker list, and he joined the Chief AI Officer Summit at AIAI Boston on October 29 (MILL5 on LinkedIn).