Chris Urmson — SPARQNOW

At-a-Glance

Serves as CEO and co-founder of Aurora since 2017, a company focused on realizing the benefits of self-driving technology.
Led Google's self-driving car project for nearly eight years (2009-2016), which later spun off into Waymo.
Served as an Assistant Research Professor at Carnegie Mellon University, with research concentrating on motion planning and perception for robotic vehicles.
Provided technical leadership for Carnegie Mellon University's robotic vehicles that participated in the DARPA Grand Challenges (2004, 2005) and won the DARPA Urban Challenge in 2007.
Holds a PhD in Robotics from Carnegie Mellon University (2005) and a BEng in Computer Engineering from the University of Manitoba (1998).

Biography

Chris Urmson is a Canadian engineer, academic, and entrepreneur, currently serving as the CEO and co-founder of Aurora Innovation. He co-founded Aurora in 2017 with the mission to develop self-driving technology safely, quickly, and broadly. The company focuses on driverless car software, data, and hardware, aiming to apply machine learning to the motion planning and perception components of autonomy.