Andreas Wendel

Andreas Wendel is the VP of Engineering at Kodiak Robotics, where he has built a team of world-class technologists from the ground up to make autonomous long-haul trucking a reality. Previously, Andreas was part of the small team that launched the first driverless car on public roads. He worked as Perception Tech Lead at Waymo from 2013 to 2018, enabling cars to see and understand all important aspects of the environment with extremely robust and efficient machine learning algorithms, and designing Waymo's camera systems.

Andreas received a PhD in Computer Science from Graz University of Technology, Austria, with highest distinction (sub auspiciis Praesidentis). Before joining Google[x]/Waymo, Andreas was the Head of the Aerial Vision Group and lecturer at the Institute of Computer Vision and Graphics at Graz University of Technology, Austria. He was a visiting researcher at Carnegie Mellon's Robotics Institute, and his academic research was focused on computer vision and robotics, specifically image-based 3D reconstruction, localization, and autonomous navigation for micro aerial vehicles. Andreas has received multiple recognitions for his outstanding work, including being named Austria’s Innovator of the Year.