People

255 founders, leaders, engineers and researchers behind humanoid robots. Every role links to its source.

Jérôme Monceaux
Founder · Enchanted Tools
Dennis Hong
Founder and director · UCLA RoMeLa
SA
Han Fengtao
CEO and co-founder · Spirit AI
Jonathan Hurst
Co-founder · Agility Robotics
Lerrel Pinto
Co-Founder · Fauna Robotics
Łukasz Koźlik
Founder · Clone Robotics
Marc Raibert
Founder · Boston Dynamics
Peng Zhihui
Founder · AgiBot
Robert Playter
Co-founder · Boston Dynamics
Sun Kai
Co-founder (also chief scientist of Hesai Technology) · Sharpa (Sharpa Robotics)
SR
Tony Zhao
Co-founder · Sunday Robotics
Xiang Shaoqing
Co-founder (also CTO of Hesai Technology) · Sharpa (Sharpa Robotics)
Aadeel Akhtar
Founder and CEO · PSYONIC
T
Al Costa
Founder · TeknTrash
Alex Gu
Founder, CEO · Fourier Intelligence
Alona Pammer (née Kharchenko)
Co-Founder and CTO · Devanthro
Arjun Sethi
Founder · Foundation
Artem Sokolov
Founder · Humanoid.ai
MR
Benedek Forrai
Founder · Mimic Robotics
Bernt Børnich
Founder, CEO · 1X Technologies
Brennand Pierce
Founder; also co-founder of Bear Robotics · Kinisi Robotics
FA
Brett Adcock
Founder, CEO · Figure AI
A
Bruno Maisonnier
Founder · Aldebaran
ByoungSoo Kim
Founder · Robotis
LR
Chao Yu
Founder & CEO · Lumos Robotics
M
Chen Chunyu
Founder · MagicLab
Chen Jianyu
Founder · Robotera
SR
Cheng Chi
Co-founder · Sunday Robotics
UR
Chetan Parthiban
Founder · Ultra Robotics Co.
Chongyang Wang
Founder · Dexmate
Chris Malachowsky
Founder · NVIDIA
Curtis Priem
Founder · NVIDIA
Damion Shelton
Founder · Agility Robotics
Daniel Ong
Founder · MenloAI
GB
Daniele Pucci
Founder, CEO · Generative Bionics
David Reger
Founder, CEO · NEURA Robotics
R
David Rodriguez
Co-Founder · Robot.com
Davide Faconti
Co-founder · PAL Robotics
Deng Taihua
Founder · AgiBot
Dhanush Radhakrishnan
Co-founder · Clone Robotics
Dr. Luis Sentis
Co-founder / founding member and innovation advisor · Apptronik
Dr. Nick Paine
Founder · Apptronik
MR
Elvis Nava
Co-founder and CTO · Mimic Robotics
Evan Wineland
Founder · Weave Robotics, Inc.
Fabio Puglia
Founder · Oversonic Robotics
R
Felipe Chávez Cortés
CEO and co-founder · Robot.com
Francesco Ferro
Founder · PAL Robotics
Gabriel Skantze
Founder · Furhat Robotics AB
Gao Jiyang
Founder · Galaxea Dynamics
Geordie Rose
Founder · Sanctuary AI
Hao Cheng
Founder and CEO · Booster Robotics
He Tao
Founder · Xpeng
Hiroya Masuoka
Founder, CEO · Highlanders
R
Jason Oviedo
Founder · Robot.com
Jeff Cardenas
Co-founder and CEO · Apptronik
Jensen Huang
Founder, CEO · NVIDIA
NR
Jiang Zheyuan
Founder · Noetix Robotics
Joan Oliver
Co-founder · PAL Robotics
SR
John McCarthy
Founder · Stanford Robotics Lab
UR
Jon Miller Schwartz
Founder · Ultra Robotics Co.
Jonas Beskow
Founder · Furhat Robotics AB
Josh Merel
Founder · Fauna Robotics
Kaan Doğrusöz
Co-founder · Weave Robotics, Inc.
Kenneth M. Ford
Founder · IHMC (Florida Institute for Human & Machine Cognition)
Lai Jie
Founder and CEO · Astribot
Lee Jeong-ho
Founder · Rainbow Robotics
Lei Jun
Founder, Chairman and CEO · Xiaomi
Li Tong
Founder · KEENON Robotics
Li Yifan
Co-founder (also CEO of Hesai Technology; strategic guidance, no day-to-day role) · Sharpa (Sharpa Robotics)
Lin Bin
Co-founder and Vice-chairman · Xiaomi
Liu Peichao
Founder · DOBOT Robotics
Marc Tarpenning
Founder · Tesla
Martin Eberhard
Founder · Tesla
PR
Matthieu Lapeyre
Co-founder · Pollen Robotics
UR
Max Friefeld
Founder · Ultra Robotics Co.
Mike LeBlanc
Founder · Foundation
Mikhail Jones
Founder · Agility Robotics
Nancy Cornelius
Co-founder, first employee, later CFO · Boston Dynamics
Nicole Zhu
Founder · MenloAI
Oh Jun-ho
Founder, KAIST professor · Rainbow Robotics
UR
Oliver Ortlieb
Founder · Ultra Robotics Co.
Olivia Norton
Founder · Sanctuary AI
Oriol Torres
Co-founder · PAL Robotics
Paolo Denti
Founder · Oversonic Robotics
Peter Meusel
Founder · Agile Robots SE
PR
Pierre Rouanet
Co-founder · Pollen Robotics
Preben Wik
Founder · Furhat Robotics AB
Rafael Hostettler
Founder · Devanthro
ER
Ren Guowen
Co-founder · EngineAI Robotics
Renjie Guo
Founder · Zeroth Robotics
Richard Greenhill
Founder and non-executive director · Shadow Robot Company
Rob Cochran
Founder · Fauna Robotics
ZH
Rong Xiong
Co-founder, Chief Scientist · Zhejiang Humanoid Robot Innovation Center
Samer Al Moubayed
Founder · Furhat Robotics AB
Sankaet Pathak
Founder · Foundation
R
Sergio Pachón
Founder · Robot.com
MR
Stefan Weirich
Founder · Mimic Robotics
MR
Stephan-Daniel Gravert
Founder · Mimic Robotics
Suzanne Gildert
Founder · Sanctuary AI
Tao Chen
Founder · Dexmate
R
Tuo Hua
Founder, chairman and general manager · ROKAE
Tyler Habowski
Co-founder · Kyber Labs
XS
Wang Hao
Co-founder · X Square Robot
Wang He
Founder · Beijing Galbot AI Co., Ltd.
XS
Wang Qian
Founder · X Square Robot
NM
Wei Ding
Co-founder and CEO · Noble Machines
Wei Zhang
Founder · Limx Dynamics
Will Jackson
Founder · Engineered Arts Ltd
M
Wu Changzheng
Founder · MagicLab
Xia Heng
Founder · Xpeng
Xiaoguang Zhang
Founder · Westwood Robotics
Xingxing Wang
Founder, CTO · Unitree Robotics
Xu Huazhe
Founder · Galaxea Dynamics
SA
Yang Gao
Co-founder and Chief Scientist · Spirit AI
Yi Huang
Founder · RoboParty
Yonatan Robbins
Co-founder · Kyber Labs
Yong-jae Kim
Founder · WIRobotics
AR
Yunseol Eom
Founder and CEO · AEI Robot
Yuzhe Qin
Founder · Dexmate
Zen Koh
Founder · Fourier Intelligence
ER
Zhao Tongyang
Founder · EngineAI Robotics
Zhaopeng Chen
Founder · Agile Robots SE
Zhou Jian
Founder · UBTECH Robotics
Jim Fan
Research Scientist; Senior Research Scientist; co-Lead of GEAR · NVIDIA
Marco Da Silva
VP and General Manager, Spot · Boston Dynamics
Pras Velagapudi
Chief Technology Officer · Agility Robotics
WU
Professor Shigeki Sugano
Faculty member, Department of Mechanical Engineering (later Professor, Faculty of Science and Engineering) · Waseda University
Zhengyi Luo
Research Scientist, GEAR Lab · NVIDIA
Aaron Luke
Director of Product Management (OpenUSD Standards), Omniverse Libraries · NVIDIA
Abrar Anwar
Robotics Researcher, Isaac Loco-Manipulation team · NVIDIA
CM
Alex Waibel
Professor of Computer Science; Associate Director, Language Technologies Institute · Carnegie Mellon University
CM
Andrea Bajcsy
Assistant Professor, Robotics Institute; leads Interactive and Trustworthy Robotics Lab (Intent Lab) · Carnegie Mellon University
Arjun Lakshmipathy
Staff Research Scientist (dexterous manipulation for Atlas) · Boston Dynamics
Bingjie Tang
Senior Robotics Machine Learning Engineer, Optimus team · Tesla
Caelan Garrett
Senior Research Scientist, NVIDIA Research (Seattle Robotics Lab) · NVIDIA
Chris Paxton
AI Innovation Lead · Agility Robotics
Dar Sleeper
VP of Product and Design (leads product and design; first non-engineering hire) · 1X Technologies
CM
Deepak Pathak
Raj Reddy Associate Professor, School of Computer Science (Robotics Institute) · Carnegie Mellon University
Deepu Talla
Vice President of Robotics and Edge AI · NVIDIA
Elon Musk
Early investor, chairman, then CEO and product architect · Tesla
Eric Heiden
Research Scientist · NVIDIA
II
Giorgio Metta
Scientific Director · Istituto Italiano di Tecnologia (IIT)
NY
Irmak Guzey
Second-year PhD student · New York University (NYU)
Jianfei Yang
Assistant Professor (tenure-track); Director, MARS Lab · Nanyang Technological University (NTU Singapore)
Jiangran Lyu
Collaborating scientist, Cosmos Lab (not an internship) · NVIDIA
JK Han
Researcher (RoMeLa team) · OP3
NY
Karen Adolph
Professor of Psychology and Neural Science; leads the Infant Action Lab · New York University (NYU)
Lucas Manuelli
Senior Staff Research Scientist; technical lead, Large Behavior Models · Boston Dynamics
Mehrdad Farimani
Robot design consultant · Sanctuary AI
Robert Platt
Technical lead for control and autonomy · Robonaut 2
Tamim Asfour
Full Professor of Humanoid Robotics; Head of High Performance Humanoid Technologies (H²T) · Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (H²T)
CM
Tonghe Zhang
M.S. student, Robotics Institute · Carnegie Mellon University
CM
Wenli Xiao
PhD student, Robotics (advisor Guanya Shi) · Carnegie Mellon University
Yifan Hou
Senior Research Scientist, GEAR Lab · NVIDIA
H
Yinhuai Wang
First author · Human.X
Adam Steltzner
Chief engineer, Mars 2020 Perseverance · NASA Perseverance
Alberto Rodriguez
Director of Robot Behavior, Atlas · Boston Dynamics
Alex Fon
Retail & RFID Business Manager · PAL Robotics
Alex Perkins
Senior Technical Director and Chief Roboticist, Stretch · Boston Dynamics
CM
Alisa Allaire
PhD student, Robotics Institute (advisor: Chris Atkeson) · Carnegie Mellon University
Alona Pammer
Co-founder and CTO · Robody
LH
Ananye Agarwal
Co-creator · LEAP Hand
Antonio Zea
Researcher, Intelligent Sensor-Actuator-Systems (ISAS) Laboratory · Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (H²T)
CM
Aran Nayebi
Assistant Professor, Machine Learning Department; lead of NeuroAgents Lab · Carnegie Mellon University
Arnaud Robert
President · Hexagon
Ashley Goldstein
Lead Tech Marketing Engineer (Omniverse and OpenUSD) · NVIDIA
Ashok Elluswamy
Program lead (took over in June 2025) · Optimus
WU
Atsuo Takanishi
Professor, School of Science and Engineering; Director, Humanoid Robotics Institute · Waseda University
Bowen Wen
Staff Research Scientist, NVIDIA Research · NVIDIA
Byron Boots
Principal Research Scientist, Seattle Robotics Lab (NVIDIA Research) · NVIDIA
C. Mandery
Research Scientist / postdoctoral researcher, H²T Lab (Humanoid Robotics) · Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (H²T)
Carlos Vivas
Chief Business Officer · PAL Robotics
NY
Chad DeChant
Postdoc researcher (with Marcelo Mattar; safe episodic memory and planning in AI agents) · New York University (NYU)
CM
Chris Atkeson
Professor, Robotics Institute (also Human-Computer Interaction Institute) · Carnegie Mellon University
CM
Christopher G. Atkeson
Professor, Robotics Institute and Human-Computer Interaction Institute · Carnegie Mellon University
Clemens Eppner
Research Scientist, Seattle Robotics Lab (NVIDIA Research) · NVIDIA
Daniel Diaz
Chief Business Officer (joined as Chief Strategy Officer) · Agility Robotics
Daniel Ho
Director of Evaluation · 1X Technologies
CM
David Held
Associate Professor, Robotics Institute; Director, RPAD Lab · Carnegie Mellon University
Dennis Da
Robotics and AI R&D Engineer, SimTech team · NVIDIA
Dongheui Lee
Group Leader, Human-Centered Assistive Robotics, Institute of Robotics and Mechatronics · DLR Institute of Robotics and Mechatronics
CM
Drew Bagnell
Consulting Professor, Robotics Institute and Machine Learning Department (earlier Associate Professor) · Carnegie Mellon University
PR
Elsa Kervella
Sales and Marketing Director · Pollen Robotics
Eric Zheng
Director, Humanoid Robotics Data Training Center · RealMan Robotics
Fatima Anes
Performance lead for Isaac Lab 3.0 · NVIDIA
Felix Hundhausen
Research Scientist, High Performance Humanoid Technologies (H²T) Lab · Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (H²T)
Franziska Krebs
Research Scientist / PhD student, Chair of High Performance Humanoid Technologies (H²T) · Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (H²T)
Gerardo Bledt
Lead Locomotion Engineer · Apptronik
Gerd Hirzinger
Co-creator (institute head, co-author of Rollin' Justin paper) · Rollin' Justin
Gill Pratt
Chief Scientist and Executive Fellow for Research · Toyota Motor Corporation
CM
Guanya Shi
Assistant Professor, Robotics Institute and School of Computer Science; leads LeCAR Lab · Carnegie Mellon University
Haofei Lu
Research intern (supervisor: Prof. Li Yi) · Beijing Galbot AI Co., Ltd.
Haoquan Fang
Research Intern, Cosmos Lab · NVIDIA
CM
Henny Admoni
Associate Professor, Robotics Institute; Director, HARP Lab · Carnegie Mellon University
Hongyu Li
Researcher (Isaac team) · NVIDIA
CM
Howie Choset
Kavčić-Moura Professor of Computer Science in Robotics; co-director of the Biorobotics Lab · Carnegie Mellon University
Iretiayo Akinola
Senior Research Scientist · NVIDIA
Jared Isaacman
Administrator · NASA Johnson Space Center
Jason Peng
Research Scientist · NVIDIA
CM
Jeff Ichnowski
Assistant Professor, Robotics Institute · Carnegie Mellon University
CM
Jia Xie
Master's student; member of LeCAR Lab (since Fall 2025) · Carnegie Mellon University
Jianan Wang
AI researcher and VP · Astribot
Jinoh Lee
Senior Research Scientist, Institute of Robotics and Mechatronics · DLR Institute of Robotics and Mechatronics
Joana Plewnia
Research Scientist and PhD student, H²T group, Institute of Anthropomatics and Robotics · Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (H²T)
John McNamee
Project manager, Mars 2020 Perseverance · NASA Perseverance
Jordi Pagès
Head of Intralogistics (earlier Product Manager, TIAGo family, from 2014; joined 2009 for robot visual perception) · PAL Robotics
SR
Junyao Shi
Researcher (Machine Learning Researcher) · Sunday Robotics
LH
Kenneth Shaw
Creator (first author) · LEAP Hand
JR
Kosuke Takeuchi
JSK Robotics Laboratory, University of Tokyo
Leonard Bärmann
Researcher, Institute for Anthropomatics and Robotics · Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (H²T)
Les Carpus
Inception Global Head of Physical AI · NVIDIA
Letian Wang
VP of Product · Robotera
Luca Marchionni
CTO · PAL Robotics
NY
Ludovic Righetti
Glenn Y. Louie Professor (previously Associate Professor), Tandon School of Engineering, ECE and MAE · New York University (NYU)
Masato Hirose
Executive Chief Engineer, led ASIMO development · ASIMO
JR
Masayuki Inaba
JSK Robotics Laboratory, University of Tokyo
CM
Matt Mason
Faculty, School of Computer Science and Robotics Institute (Professor) · Carnegie Mellon University
CM
Max Simchowitz
Assistant Professor, Machine Learning Department (courtesy appointment, Robotics Institute) · Carnegie Mellon University
Melonee Wise
Chief Product Officer (CTO from May 2023; CPO from 2024-05-15) · Agility Robotics
Mengda Xu
Research Scientist, GEAR Lab · NVIDIA
Mike Murphy
Senior Technical Director & Chief Systems Engineer (Stretch) · Boston Dynamics
Milan Kovac
Led the Optimus program (VP, head of engineering) until June 2025 · Optimus
Miles Macklin
Director of Simulation Technology · NVIDIA
Ming-Yu Liu
Vice President, Cosmos Lab · NVIDIA
N. Vahrenkamp
Researcher, H²T group (PhD 2011, diploma 2005) · Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (H²T)
Nadun Ranakawa Arachchige
Research Intern, GEAR · NVIDIA
CM
Nancy Pollard
Professor, Robotics Institute · Carnegie Mellon University
Nicolaus Radford
Led work on the robot · Robonaut 2
Noah Kravitz
Senior Writer / Host, NVIDIA AI Podcast · NVIDIA
CM
Oliver Kroemer
Assistant Professor, Robotics Institute; leads Intelligent Autonomous Manipulation Lab · Carnegie Mellon University
Peggy Johnson
CEO · Agility Robotics
Quan Nguyen
Chief Scientific Officer · VinMotion
Raphael Grimm
Research associate and PhD student, H²T Lab (Institute for Anthropomatics and Robotics) · Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (H²T)
Rev Lebaredian
Vice President of Omniverse and Simulation Technology · NVIDIA
Rich Walker
Managing Director · Shadow Robot Company
Robert Ambrose
Led development · Robonaut 2
Rohit Prasad
CEO · Boston Dynamics
SR
Satvik Sharma
PhD Student, co-advised by Jeannette Bohg and Dorsa Sadigh · Stanford Robotics Lab
Seth Davis
Senior Program Manager, Atlas team · Boston Dynamics
Shenyuan Gao
Research Scientist, GEAR Lab · NVIDIA
Shuuji Kajita
Leader of the Humanoid Research Group, lead creator · HRP-4C
Spencer Huang
Product Line Manager, Robotics Software · NVIDIA
T. Asfour
Professor of Humanoid Robotics Systems; Head of High Performance Humanoid Technologies (H²T) chair · Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (H²T)
WU
Tetsuya Ogata
Professor · Waseda University
Tony Yang
Sales manager · Unitree Robotics
Tucker Hermans
Senior Research Scientist (consulting), Seattle Robotics Lab · NVIDIA
Uwe D. Hanebeck
Chaired Professor of Computer Science; Director, Intelligent Sensor-Actuator-Systems Laboratory (ISAS) · Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (H²T)
Victor Suen
Vice President, Head of North America · Fourier Intelligence
Will Liang
Affiliated researcher (working with Jim Fan and Yuke Zhu) · NVIDIA
William T. Townsend
Founder of Barrett Technology; author of the BarrettHand BH8-250 grasper paper · BarrettHand™
Xuezhou Zhu
VP of Research · Sharpa (Sharpa Robotics)
Yashraj Narang
Research Manager, Seattle Robotics Lab (leads Simulation and Behavior Generation team) · NVIDIA
Yejin Choi
Senior Director · NVIDIA
Yuke Zhu
Director and Distinguished Research Scientist, NVIDIA Research; Co-lead of GEAR · NVIDIA
CM
Zackory Erickson
Raj Reddy Assistant Professor, Robotics Institute; leads the RCHI Lab · Carnegie Mellon University

Roles are collected from company pages, articles and talks and checked by our editors. Titles can change; the source shows when it was stated.