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Keynote | Plenary
Recorded Speech From Pete Buttigieg
U.S. Secretary of Transportation
Pete Buttigieg serves as the 19th Secretary of Transportation, having been sworn in on February 3, 2021.
His focus as Secretary is to deliver the world’s leading transportation system for the American people and economy. He has worked to achieve organizational excellence in the department’s operations, and to focus the department on five policy goals: safety, jobs, equity, climate, and innovation. In his first year at the Department, he prioritized supporting the development and passage of President Biden’s signature Bipartisan Infrastructure Law. Since the law’s passage, Secretary Buttigieg and his team have focused on effectively delivering the investments provided by this legislation, enabling the most significant improvements in U.S. transportation infrastructure in over half a century.
The Secretary has also focused on intervening to support American supply chains dealing with shockwaves from the pandemic, including measures to help cut in half the long-dwelling container congestion at America’s largest ports. Other major initiatives in his early tenure have included a comprehensive national roadway safety strategy to reduce deaths and serious injuries; delivery of emergency COVID-19relief funds to transit agencies across America; and awards of over $9.5 billion in discretionary funding to enhance transportation through over 800 projects in communities across America.
The first openly gay person confirmed to serve in a president’s Cabinet, Secretary Buttigieg previously served two terms as mayor of his hometown, South Bend, Indiana, where he worked across the aisle to transform the city’s future. Household income grew, poverty fell, and unemployment was cut in half. His work on transportation as mayor was nationally recognized, including an award for innovative streetscape design from the U.S. Department of Transportation where he now serves.
He also served for seven years as an officer in the U.S. Navy Reserve, taking a leave of absence from the mayor’s office for a deployment to Afghanistan in 2014.
The son of Joseph Buttigieg, who immigrated to the United States from Malta, and Jennifer Anne Montgomery, a fifth-generation Hoosier, Secretary Buttigieg is a graduate of Harvard University and Oxford, where he was a Rhodes Scholar and completed a degree in philosophy, politics, and economics. He lives with his husband Chasten, their two children, Gus and Penelope, and their two dogs.
Dr. Robert Hampshire
Secretary for Research and Technology and Chief Science Officer
U.S. Department of Transportation
Dr. Robert C. Hampshire serves as the Deputy Assistant Secretary for Research and Technology and Chief Science Officer. Hampshire was previously an associate professor at the Gerald R. Ford School of Public Policy at the University of Michigan. He was also a research associate professor in both the U-M Transportation Research Institute (UMTRI) and Michigan Institute for Data Science (MIDAS), and an affiliated faculty member in the Department of Industrial and Operations Engineering (IOE).
His unique blend of engineering systems research with public policy has made him a leader in not only transportation research, but also on the disparate impact of policy decisions in transportation systems. This has led to important strides in our understanding of transportation equity. His research applies operations research, data science, and systems approaches to analyze novel transportation systems such as smart parking, connected vehicles, autonomous vehicles, ride-hailing, bike sharing, car sharing, as well as, pedestrian and bicyclist safety. His research focuses on environmental impacts, equity, and access to opportunities. His work has been cited widely, and covered by major press outlets. He has worked extensively with both public and private sector partners worldwide. He has also been a faculty member at Carnegie Mellon University and a visiting professor at Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Hampshire received a PhD in operations research and financial engineering from Princeton University.
Dr. Steven Cliff
Administrator of the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration
Dr. Steven Cliff, Administrator of NHTSA, oversees the nation’s vehicle safety agency that sets vehicle safety standards, identifies safety defects and manages recalls, and educates Americans to help them drive, ride, and walk safely. NHTSA’s work also includes establishing fuel economy regulations and helping facilitate the testing and deployment of advanced vehicle technologies. The agency has a budget of more than $1 billion and more than 600 full-time employees across the country.
Cliff brings an extensive scientific and regulatory background to his leadership role at NHTSA. Most recently, he served as the deputy executive officer at the California Air Resources Board, an organization he first joined in 2008 as an air pollution specialist. Since then, he held a variety of positions at CARB, eventually overseeing its climate program. From 2014 to 2016, Cliff joined the California Department of Transportation as the assistant director for sustainability. He returned to CARB in 2016 when then-Governor Jerry Brown of California appointed him senior advisor to CARB’s board chair.
Cliff’s most recent work as deputy executive officer at CARB included program oversight of regulations for passenger vehicle emissions, medium- and heavy-duty engine emissions, implementation of vehicle and engine emissions and on-board diagnostics certification, transportation land-use planning and analysis, and incentive and investment programs for reducing emissions. He worked with environmental and equity advocates, senior industry officials, association representatives, and other stakeholders on program development.
Cliff played an active role at the University of California, Davis for nearly two decades. In 2001, he joined the school’s Applied Sciences department as a research professor, later becoming affiliated with the school’s Air Quality Research Center. Through the years, he has supported independent air quality and climate research programs while balancing his time at CARB, including being an approved program coordinator at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory’s Advanced Light Source.
Cliff received a bachelor’s degree and doctorate in chemistry from the University of California, San Diego. He then completed a postdoc on atmospheric sciences at the University of California, Davis’ Department of Land, Air and Water Resources.
Earl Adams, Jr.
Chief Counsel for Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration.
Earl Adams, Jr. is the Chief Counsel for the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration. He is responsible for legal policy on all aspects of Agency programs and activities including the development, issuance, interpretation, enforcement, and defense of the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Regulations before state and federal courts. He also supervises a team of approximately 50 attorneys that provide legal support on budget, procurement, fiscal law, ethics, personnel and employment related matters.
Earl is litigator and regulatory attorney with extensive experience representing clients in both federal and state courts in commercial disputes and advising on compliance matters. Prior to joining FMCSA, Earl was a partner in the litigation department of a national law and served as the Managing Partner of the firm’s Washington, DC office. There, he advised a diverse list of clients to comply with regulatory obligations and to compel government action across several sectors, including transportation, public utilities, and renewable energy. He is also a former chairman and board member of the Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority, which manages Reagan National and Dulles International Airports.
In the public sector, Earl served with distinction as chief of staff to the former Lieutenant Governor (now Congressman) of Maryland, Anthony G. Brown. As a member of Governor Martin O’Malley’s Executive Cabinet, he managed the Office of the Lt. Governor and a portfolio of policy and budget issues and priorities.
Earl earned a Juris Doctor from Boston College Law School, a Master of Public Administration from the Harvard Kennedy School and a Bachelor of Arts, cum laude, from Morehouse College.
Earl is deeply committed to the critical safety mission of the U.S. Department of Transportation and the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration.
Vinn White
Senior Advisor for Innovation, Office of the Secretary, U.S. Department of Transportation
Vinn is a Senior Advisor for Innovation in the Office of the Secretary within the U.S. Department of Transportation. He is responsible for coordinating Secretarial initiatives on emerging transportation technologies, such as automated driving systems, unmanned aircraft systems, connectivity, and innovative mobility models. Currently, he is focused on building strategic partnerships across the Department to support the implementation of innovation related opportunities within the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law (BIL).
Vinn is returning to the USDOT after having previously served as the Acting Assistant Secretary/Deputy Assistant Secretary for the Department in 2016. Vinn also worked as a Senior Policy Advisor for former Secretary Foxx, where he was the chief architect for USDOT's 30-Year Transportation plan, Beyond Traffic. He served as a senior policy team member to implement freight provisions of the Fixing America's Surface Transportation (FAST) Act and oversaw policy considerations of the Department's innovation portfolio, including informing aspects related to vehicle-to-vehicle technology, automation advancements, smart cities and Internet-of-Things (IoT) applications.
Vinn has also served as a senior policy advisor to Governor Murphy, where he engaged staff from across the Executive Department, industry stakeholders, Federal partners, and the Commissioner and staff at the NJ Department of Transportation to execute a bold mobility agenda moving goods and people from around the Garden State.
Tom Alkim
MAPtm
Tom Alkim is Strategic Advisor Connected & Automated Mobility at the Dutch company MAPtm, which provides consultancy, digital and operational services in the ITS domain. He has almost 25 years of experience in the public sector, working in the field of dynamic traffic management, C-ITS and Connected & Automated Mobility for Rijkswaterstaat, Dutch Ministry of Infrastructure & Water Management and the European Commission, Directorate General Research & Innovation. He was part of the core team that was responsible for the Declaration of Amsterdam and the European Truck Platooning Challenge during the Dutch EU presidency in 2016. Tom is an International Member on the Transportation Research Board (TRB) Standing Committee on Vehicle-Highway Automation (ACP30).
Sue Bai
Honda Research Institute USA, Inc.
Sue Bai is a chief engineer and division director in Honda Research Institute USA, Inc.
Bai’s areas of research include wireless communication for in-vehicle navigation systems, telematics system design and development, and connected and automated vehicle system research. She currently leads a team that supports Honda’s transportation safety and mobility goals through connected vehicle
and V2X communication systems.
Bai has held leading roles on SAE V2X technical standards committees for many years, working toimprove safety and mobility for a variety of road users including vehicles, pedestrians, cyclists and road workers. She is also the Honda technical leader for various industry-government collaborative projects including the Ohio Smart Mobility Corridor that, when fully operational, will be the longest stretch of continuously connected highway in the world.
Bai is a Ph.D. candidate focusing on automated vehicle human factors at University of Michigan. She also holds Master of Science degrees in Computer Science, Electrical Engineering, and Industrial and Systems Engineering.
Daniel Bartz
Volkswagen Group Vehicle Safety Office
Daniel Bartz has worked in the field of automated vehicles for over 20 years across the automotive, defense and startup industries. He has Bachelor of Science degrees in Mechanical and Electrical Engineering from Kettering University and a Master's Degree in Robotics from Carnegie Mellon University. He was involved in the 2005 and 2007 DARPA Challenges.
Mr. Bartz is the Principal Engineer for Automated Driving at the Volkswagen Group Vehicle Safety Office. Previously he chaired SAE’s On-Road Automated Driving Committee and chairs the SAE ORAD Reference Architecture taskforce which recently published J3131 Definitions for Terms Related to Automated Driving Systems Reference Architecture.
Jan Becker
Apex.AI, Inc.
Jan Becker is President, CEO, and Co-Founder of Apex.AI, Inc. He is also the Managing Director of the Apex.AI GmbH, our subsidiary in Germany.
Before founding Apex.AI, he was Senior Director at Faraday Future, responsible for Autonomous Driving, and Director at Robert Bosch LLC, responsible for Automated Driving in North America. He also served as a Senior Manager and Principal Engineer at the Bosch Research and Technology Center in Palo Alto, CA, USA, and a senior research engineer for Corporate Research at Robert Bosch GmbH, Germany.
Since 2010, Jan has been Lecturer at Stanford University for autonomous vehicles and driver assistance. Previously, he was a visiting scholar at the University’s Artificial Intelligence Lab and a member of the Stanford Racing Team for the 2007 DARPA Urban Challenge. In 2019, Jan was appointed to serve on the external Advisory Board of MARELLI to provide strategic advice to the MARELLI Board. In 2018, he co-founded the Autoware Foundation and was on the foundation’s board of directors until 2020. Jan earned a Ph.D. in control engineering from the Technical University of Braunschweig, Germany, a master’s degree in mechanical and aerospace engineering from the State University of New York at Buffalo, USA, and a master’s degree in electrical engineering from the Technical University of Darmstadt, Germany.
Richard Bishop
Bishop Consulting
Bishop Consulting provides strategy and partnership development in the domain of intelligent, connected, and automated vehicles, advising automotive manufacturers, suppliers, and tech firms.
Current clients span auto-makers, sensors, AI, automated trucking, automated buses, and infrastructure owner-operators. BC advises government agencies around the world as well.
Mr. Bishop serves as 2nd Vice Chair of the American Trucking Association’s Automated and Electric Truck Study Group.
He is founder and chair of the International Task Force on Vehicle Highway Automation, which held its 24th Annual Meeting in 2021.
Prior to establishing Bishop Consulting in 1997, Mr. Bishop was Program Manager for Vehicle-Highway Automation at the USDOT Federal Highway Administration, where he was government lead for the National Automated Highway Systems Consortium.
He holds engineering degrees from Auburn University and Johns Hopkins University, plus an M.A. Transformational Leadership and Social Change from Tai-Sophia Institute.
Bryan Canfield
C.H. Robinson
Bryan Canfield is the Director of Strategic Alliances and Channel Sales at C.H. Robinson. Throughout his 14-year career with the company, he has led the development of new services within e-commerce and last mile transportation. As a Certified Supply Chain Professional, Bryan has consulted with many of the company’s largest customers on complex multi-modal solutions to improve their service while reducing their costs. Today, he leads C.H. Robinson’s autonomous trucking strategy. As the largest shipper of truckload freight in North America, C.H. Robinson is preparing for the impact autonomous trucks will have on the transportation landscape and their customers’ businesses.
Amy Chu
Automated Vehicle Safety Consortium
Amy Chu is the Director of the Automated Vehicle Safety Consortium (AVSC), a program of SAE Industry Technologies Consortia (SAE ITC®). In this role, she leads a group of industry member companies focused on refining and sharing safety principles for SAE Level 4 and 5 automated driving systems. Amy has devoted nearly 20 years to the automotive industry, previously at HARMAN International where she stood up the automotive cybersecurity engineering center of excellence. She has vast program management and product delivery experience and holds a Bachelor of Science in Electrical Engineering from Michigan State University.
Henriette Cornet
International Association of Public Transport (Brussels, Belgium)
Dr. Henriette Cornet is leading the Thematic Area of Automated Mobility at UITP (International Association of Public Transport) in Brussels, Belgium, where she supervises discussions and activities linked with Connected and Cooperative Automated Mobility (CCAM). She is also Project Coordinator of the European-funded project SHOW ‘Shared automation operating models for worldwide adoption’, one of the largest worldwide initiatives on the deployment of shared fleets of Automated Vehicles.
She graduated from the University of Technology of Troyes, France, as an Engineer in Material and Environmental Sciences in 2007. She received her doctoral degree from the Technical University of Munich in 2012. The topic of her PhD thesis was the development of a sustainability screening tool for decision-making assistance in the field of urban mobility.
From 2011 to 2016, she worked as consultant for the automotive industry in Germany (BMW, Audi) within R&D projects about electromobility and alternative fuels. She was also involved as project manager in several European-funded projects about energy management.
From 2017 to 2020, she worked in the research institute TUMCREATE in Singapore as Principal Investigator of the team ‘Design for Autonomous Mobility’. Her team investigated human-centric methods for design of Autonomous Vehicles for public transport in Singapore.
Her expertise is in Automated Mobility, investigating through projects and international collaborations the benefits, limitations, and requirements of the technology from a multi-stakeholder perspective.
Andrea De Candido
European Commission
Since April 2022, Mr. Andrea De Candido is responsible for the Connected, Cooperative and Automated Mobility dossier in the frame of the Future Urban and Mobility Systems Unit of the Directorate General for Research & Innovation of the European Commission.
Mr. De Candido first joined the Commission in 2013 to work on large scale Research Infrastructures. In 2017, he moved to another position to then become responsible for the Unit dealing with research and industrial policy in the civil security dimension.
Before joining the EU Institutions Mr. De Candido had a 25-year long career in the Italian Army where he retired from in 2013 with the rank of Lt. Colonel.
Heather Ducharme
Director, Future Digital Business Products, Global Innovation General Motors
Heather Ducharme is the Director of Future Digital Business Products at General Motors where she builds, incubates, and scales new businesses and products for business customers’ digital experiences beyond the vehicle.
Since starting her career at GM in 2007 as a Subscriber Relationship Marketing Lead, Heather has held various business management positions where she has supported customer experience, operations and grown new business platforms and partnerships. She most recently worked as the Head of SiriusXM directing global P&L and partner relationships. As the Business Planning Manager for Chief Operations Office from 2016 to 2018, Heather was additionally responsible for supporting the daily operations of OnStar’s Retail and Commercial P&L. Her achievements have been recognized within GM where she received the GM Transformer Award and eight GM Connections Awards. Prior to joining GM, Heather held positions in sales, marketing, and advertising.
Heather received an MBA in leadership from John Hancock University and a BA from Bowling Green State University and holds two patents focused on improving the customer experience through technology. She currently sits on Wayne State’s Management Advisory Board as the Chair President and as Vice President of General Motors Women’s ERG.
Tyler Duvall
Cavnue
Tyler Duvall is Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder of Cavnue, a company focused on accelerating the full potential of connected and autonomous vehicles to make roads safer, less congested, shared, and sustainable. Before joining Cavnue, Duvall was CEO of SH 130 Concession Company in central Texas. Prior to SH 130, he was a Principal at McKinsey & Company, where he advised a wide variety of private and public sector entities on strategic, operational and organizational topics. Duvall also served in several roles in the U.S. Department of Transportation, including as Acting Under Secretary for Policy, the agency’s third highest ranking official. He led the Department’s efforts to modernize transportation infrastructure through new procurement, technology and financing approaches. Duvall earned a B.A. in economics from Washington and Lee University and a J.D. from the University of Virginia School of Law.
Michael Feldman
Jacksonville Transportation Authority
As the Jacksonville Transportation Authority’s (JTA) Assistant Vice President of Automation, Michael Feldman currently manages all projects specific to the Ultimate Urban Circulator (U2C) which aims to leverage existing infrastructure, use of artificial intelligence and emerging technologies such as autonomous vehicles to connect various neighborhoods and districts throughout the downtown core of Jacksonville, FL. Prior to joining the JTA, Michael served as an U.S. Army Officer in the Military Intelligence Corps where he completed 3 deployments in support of Operation Enduring Freedom. Upon separating from the military in 2013, he held multiple leadership roles within supply chain and operations where he specialized in robotics platforms in customer fulfillment centers as an Amazon Robotics Process Engineer. Prior to his current role, he was a Senior Program Manager for Amazon ACES specializing in Amazon Logistics Last Mile Operations.
Michael holds a B.S. from Florida State University, Master’s Degree from University of South Florida, and an MBA from the University of Tennessee, and is currently working on his Doctorate in Business Administration at Jacksonville University.
Dr. Laura Fraade-Blanar
Waymo
Dr. Laura Fraade-Blanar is a Senior Safety Researcher at Waymo focused on the epidemiology of motor vehicle safety. Previously, Dr. Fraade-Blanar worked at RAND Corporation, the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, and the World Health Organization - Office for the Americas. She holds a Ph.D. in Public Health from the University of Washington, and a Masters and Bachelors from Johns Hopkins University.
Julia Friedlander
San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency
Julia Friedlander, Senior Manager - Autonomous Vehicles, Streets Division, San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency (SFMTA). Julia Friedlander is a public servant whose career in public policy, management and law in New York City and San Francisco has centered on periods of transformational change, including the HIV public health crisis, restructuring of the telecommunications market and emergence of high speed internet, the LGBT civil rights and marriage equality movements, and restructuring of transportation governance in San Francisco to support multi-modal use of public rights-of-way. She served as General Counsel to the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency for 11 years and – after a four year sojourn outside the transportation arena – returned to the Agency in 2018, wearing a policy hat, to focus on federal, state and local policy related to the future of automated driving.
Dezbah Hatathli
Arizona Department of Transportation (ADOT)
Dezbah Hatathli currently serves as a Community Outreach Manager for ADOT’s Government Relations team. She leads the Department’s development and implementation of policies surrounding autonomous & connected vehicles, future transportation, and mobility technologies.
Dezbah earned her bachelor's degree from Dartmouth College. Her vast and varied work history includes experience in the fields of archaeology & cultural preservation, public safety and autonomous vehicles. She is also a member of the Navajo Nation.
Sydnee Journel
Aurora
Sydnee Journel is a Government Relations Manager at Aurora, a technology company working to deliver the benefits of self-driving technology safely, quickly, and broadly. In this capacity, Sydnee works with state government officials, local leaders, and community-based organizations across the United States to advance Aurora's policy initiatives. Prior to Aurora, Sydnee was the City Policy & Government Affairs Manager at Waymo (formerly Google's Self‑Driving Car Project) and also served as the Assistant Director of Community Relations for Stanford University. Before Stanford, she worked for a local trade association, the Silicon Valley Leadership Group. Outside of work, Sydnee serves on the California Transportation Foundation Board and the Palo Alto Chamber of Commerce Board. Sydnee holds an MBA from the Yale School of Management, and an MS & BS in Earth Systems from Stanford University.
Alain L. Kornhauser
Princeton University
Alain Kornhauser is Professor of Operations Research & Financial Engineering at Princeton University. He studied Aerospace Engineering at Penn State where he obtained a BS and MS and Princeton, earning a PhD. In 1971 he joined the Aerospace Engineering faculty at U of Minnesota where he applied automation, network analysis and optimal control to the design of Personal Rapid Transit (PRT) Systems. He returned to Princeton in 1972 continuing and extending his pivotal work to more conventional forms of transportation. In 1979 he founded ALK Technologies, Inc. to help the private North American Railroad System emerge from bankruptcy by rationalizing its network structure and transitioning to emerging computer technology. ALK created the standard digital map database and computerized routing systems that continue to be relied upon by essentially all railroad and trucking companies in North America. He transitioned this technology to the consumer marketplace where he pioneered the development and market acceptance of turn-by-turn navigation systems. After 33.5 years, he sold ALK to Trimble Navigation in December 2012.
At Princeton, Prof. Kornhauser has now completed his 50th year on the faculty. He serves as Director of the Transportation Program where he continues his basic research in Transportation focused on the real-time operation of large fleets of driverless vehicles and on the development of Deep-Learning Neural Networks that safely drive road vehicles. He was the Faculty Leader of Princeton’s entries the 2005 DARPA Grand Challenge and 2007 Urban Challenge. He is particularly focused on the use of aTaxis to deliver Equitable, Affordable, High-quality Mobility to everyone, especially economically challenged households. He is Faculty Chair of Princeton Autonomous Vehicle Engineering (PAVE), Editor of the Smart Driving Cars Newsletter (www.SmartDrivingCar.com), Co-host of the SmartDrivingCar Podcasts, Organizer of the Annual Princeton SmartDrivingCars Summits, Board Chair of the Advanced Transit Association (ATRA), Board Member of the New Jersey Commission on Science, Information and technology, and a member of New Jersey’s legislated Autonomous Vehicle Task Force. In addition to his teaching and research duties he serves as the ORFE’s Department’s Director of Undergraduate Studies. Professor Kornhauser completed 14 NYC Marathons.
Chaiwoo Lee
MIT AgeLab
Chaiwoo Lee is a Research Scientist at the MIT AgeLab, a research program dedicated to inventing new ideas and creatively translating technologies into practical solutions that improve the quality of life of older adults and those who care for them.
Chaiwoo’s research focuses on understanding acceptance and use of technologies across generations, and looks into people’s perceptions, attitudes and experiences with new devices and services. Her recent studies explored a variety of technology domains such as the smart home, vehicle automation, sharing economy services, virtual reality, artificial intelligence, robotics and more. Across different application domains, her research seeks to deeply understand user behaviors and decisions, to discuss issues around societal impacts, and to find implications for human-centered design of future products and services. Her studies and perspectives have been presented in academic journals and conferences, as well as through popular outlets such as The Wall Street Journal, The Boston Globe and Bloomberg Businessweek.
Chaiwoo received her Ph.D. in Engineering Systems from MIT, and her M.S. and B.S. in Industrial Engineering from Seoul National University.
Sam Loesche
Waabi
Sam Loesche is the Head of Policy and Public Affairs at Waabi. Sam previously led federal policy and government affairs at autonomous trucking developer Embark Trucks. Prior to that he spent eight years as the head of transportation policy at the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, the largest transportation labor union in the U.S. Sam is a surface transportation policy expert who specializes in autonomous trucking and freight issues. He serves as the chairman of the AUVSI's trucking advocacy committee, was a member of the Biden-Harris Campaign’s Infrastructure Policy Committee, and has sat on numerous panels and working groups within US DOT, Congress, and various state agencies. He has been featured in 60 minutes, Rolling Stone, the LA Times, and numerous other national publications. A graduate of Kenyon College, he currently resides in Maryland.
Lindsey Loewen
Aurora
Lindsey Loewen has made a career in building Safety Management Systems (SMS) for firms of varying needs, operations, sizes and cultures in the military, aerospace and self-driving space. He has been a thought-leader during critical junctures in SMS for multiple industries, including the increased requirements of IOSA ISM 10th and 11th Edition, the federal mandate of SMS through the FAA’s Part-5 regulation and the "exceeds expectations" response to the NTSB’s recommendation to implement a SMS for self-driving companies.
Lisa Miller
The Eastern Transportation Coalition
Lisa Miller is an Innovation Program Associate with The Eastern Transportation Coalition (TETC). Lisa is responsible for Connected/Automated Vehicle (CAV) programming for the Coalition.
Prior to her current position, Lisa was the Outreach and Growth Manager at the Utah Department of Transportation. Lisa acted as a Public Information Officer for UDOT and interacted with local media during large scale special events and severe weather. Lisa was also responsible for outreach for the UDOT Transportation Technology Group, focusing on media involvement, program management, strategic communications and outreach.
Lisa is a past president of ITS Wisconsin and the current Vice President for the Utah Section ITE.
Ms. Miller holds a Bachelor of Arts in Communications from the University of Wisconsin – Milwaukee and a Master’s Degree in Journalism and Mass Communication from South Dakota State University.
Alan Ohnsman
Forbes Senior Editor
Alan is an award-winning journalist who has tracked technology-driven changes in transportation since the 1990s. He writes about self-driving and electric vehicles, automotive AI, trains, batteries, hydrogen and new mobility options.
Alan joined Forbes in 2016 after a stint as chief communications officer for online car-shopping service TrueCar. Previously, he was a reporter and editor with Bloomberg News for 15 years, initially in Tokyo. His fascination with cutting-edge transportation was stoked by a dozen years in Japan, where he was also a BusinessWeek correspondent and staff writer and editor for Asahi Evening News and Tokyo Journal. In between journalism jobs he worked as an equity research editor for Lehman Brothers and Salomon Brothers.
Alan lives in Glendale, California, with his wife, son and two cats. He also plays drums and sings for rock duo Combo Villains.
David Quinalty
Waymo
David Quinalty, Head of Federal Policy & Government Affairs, Waymo. David has worked at the intersection of emerging technologies and highly regulated industries for nearly two decades. David joined Waymo in 2017, where he leads its federal policy team and its engagement with federal stakeholders. Prior to Waymo, David worked in the U.S. Senate for more than twelve years in a number of roles, including as Deputy Staff Director of the Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation; as the committee’s Policy Director for Communications and Technology; and in the office of Senator John Ensign. He has been recognized by Politico as an Emerging Leader Who Will Change Tech Policy and named a Top Lobbyist multiple times by The Hill.
David serves as chair of the board of directors of the Autonomous Vehicle Industry Association and on the advisory council of the Center for Democracy & Technology. He received his bachelor’s degree in political science from the University of California, Los Angeles, and lives in Washington, D.C. with his wife, Danielle.
Zeke Reyna
Texas Department of Transportation
Zeke Reyna works as a Strategic Research Analyst for the Texas Department of Transportation focusing on connected and automated vehicles, urban air mobility, and other emerging technology-related policies at the state and federal level. In this role, he serves as the principal staffer for the statewide Texas Connected and Automated Vehicle Task Force, which was created in January 2019. Additionally, Zeke heads up the department’s internal Connected and Automated Vehicle Workgroup. Zeke also leads the Texas Transportation Commission’s Urban Air Mobility Advisory Committee, which was legislatively created to help prepare Texas for the next generation of aviation. Finally, as TxDOT’s chief staffer serving RUC West since 2014, Zeke currently sits on the steering committee executive team as Vice Chair.
Previously, Zeke worked as a staffer in both the Texas Senate and Texas House of Representatives, most recently as the Senior Transportation and Licensing Policy Advisor to Texas Speaker of the House, Joe Straus. In previous positions at TxDOT, Zeke served as the commission aide to former Texas Transportation Commissioner Fred Underwood. Zeke graduated from the University of Texas at Austin with a B.A. in Government. He resides with his wife and three children in Austin, Texas.
Lisa Rivers
Connecticut Department of Transportation
Lisa Rivers is a Transit Manager at the Connecticut Department of Transportation in the Office of Transit & Ridesharing. Her responsibilities include program management of the CTfastrak Automated Bus Project as well as bus planning activities statewide, development and management of statewide programs to improve public transportation, the CTrides transportation demand management program, and marketing.
Bernard C. Soriano
California Department of Motor Vehicles
Bernard C. Soriano, Ph.D., is a Deputy Director for the California Department of Motor Vehicles and is in charge of the department’s autonomous vehicles program. He has over 35 years of engineering and management experience in the private and public sector. He previously held engineering and management positions at Hughes Space and Communications, where he designed attitude control systems for commercial and military satellites and was involved in their launch missions.
Dr. Soriano holds a Ph.D. in Engineering from U.C. Irvine, a M.S. in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Southern California, and a B.S. in Mechanical and Aeronautical Engineering from U.C. Davis. He also holds an M.B.A. from California State University, Sacramento. He was a Lieutenant in the U.S. Navy Reserve and has numerous publications and patents. His honors and achievements include selection as a finalist in the NASA astronaut program.
Dr. Soriano was also a member of the part-time faculty at the California State University, Sacramento, where he taught courses in the College of Engineering and the College of Business Administration.
Mr. Yoichi Sugimoto
Honda R&D Co., Ltd.
Mr. Yoichi Sugimoto is SIP-adus Sub-Program Director, Executive Chief Engineer, Innovative Research Excellence, Honda R&D Co., Ltd. Yoichi Sugimoto started working at Honda R&D in 1986. Involved in R&D of brake control technologies, he put the technologies including the world’s 1st Collision Mitigation Brake System (CMBS) into practical use. In 2012, he was transferred to Honda R&D Americas, engaged in the advanced research of the ITS field. Since he returned to his post in 2015, he has been in charge of technologies of the active safety, driving support, and automated driving fields, and led the world’s 1st level 3 automated driving car launched in 2021.
Since 2016, he has been assigned to the Sub-PD of SIP-adus.
Brett Suma
Loadsmith
Brett Suma is the Founder and CEO of Loadsmith, the industry leading Capacity as a Service (CaaS) Platform that digitally connects the Loadsmith Freight Network via its propriety driver application to its power-only first and last mile while leveraging the autonomous middle mile. With a career spanning 20+ years in the transportation and logistics industry, Brett has been tasked with solving some of the more complex logistical problem sets by deploying technologies that enhance freight network design and optimization, asset management and utilization as well as driver efficiency and overall work satisfaction.
By adopting autonomous technology in the middle mile, Loadsmith is poised to become the first fully autonomous CaaS Platform of its kind. Transforming beyond legacy OTR driving, the autonomous middle mile then becomes a force-multiplier in the creation of more attractive first and last mile driving opportunities. It is this confluence of technology and transformative work that requires forward thinking organizations to create new platforms, leveraging technology and creating more consistent, less volatile capacity capabilities.
Levasseur Tellis
Ford
Mr. Levasseur Tellis is the Engineering lead for ensuring Regulatory Compliance for self-driving vehicles.
Levasseur leads a team of Engineers tasked with developing Engineering solutions to handle Emergency stops by self-driving vehicles due to occupant request, vehicle failure, as well as First Responder interactions with Ford.
He received his Master’s degree in Electrical Engineering in 1998 from the Florida A&M University (FAMU), at the Florida A&M – Florida State College of Engineering in Tallahassee, Florida where his Master’s thesis focused on Fault-tolerant computing and Parallel distributed computing over workstation cluster architectures. He received his Bachelor’s degree from FAMU in Electrical Engineering in 1996.
Since 1998, Levasseur has worked for the Ford Motor Company as a Research Engineer on various Active Safety and Driver Assistance features and enablers such as Forward Collision Warning, Collision Mitigation by Braking, Pedestrian Detection, and Vehicle to Vehicle and Vehicle to Infrastructure Communication.
In his over twenty-year career at Ford, Levasseur has earned over 50 U.S. Patents and several dozen European Patents related to Active Safety and Driver Assistance Technology.
Levasseur has served as the Principal Investigator for the Crash Avoidance Metrics Partnership (CAMP) Automated Vehicle Research (AVR) for Enhanced safety consortium; a consortium funded by NHTSA and tasked with developing top-level safety principles for levels of automation. He is currently the Ford Principal investigator for the Automated Mobility Project through the Virginia Tech Transportation Institute.
Levasseur lives in Southeast Michigan with his wife, Tracey Payne-Tellis and their children.
John Verdon
Waymo
John Verdon is the Trucking Lead for Business Development & Partnerships at Waymo, an autonomous driving technology company with a mission to make it safe and easy for people and things to get where they're going.
In his role, John leads and executes business development and partnerships strategy for Waymo Via trucking. Prior to Waymo, John was the Head of Partnerships at KeepTruckin, where he led a team of BD, partner management, sales and operations professionals responsible for executing, scaling, and successfully managing strategic business agreements with Fortune 500 companies. Before that, he spent a decade in financial services, including BD, risk consulting, and government bond trading.
An experienced business development professional and team builder, John is focused on accelerating innovation and growth via strategic partnerships, and his major strengths include building partner ecosystems (including ISV, OEM, VAR and Retail), identifying joint product solutions, and defining strategy. He also has extensive relationships within, and deep knowledge of, the transportation and logistics segment.
John holds a BSc in Economics from the London School of Economics and Political Science.
Michael Wagner
Edge Case Research
Michael is the CEO and co-founder of Edge Case Research, a company dedicated to making autonomy safer. His experience with autonomous vehicles began nearly twenty years ago at Carnegie Mellon University. He built lunar rovers for Red Whittaker, autonomous scientific robots that explored Antarctica, and self-driving technology for tackling harsh off-road terrain. Today, he applies this experience to help make Edge Case the trusted risk-management partner for companies building self-driving trucks, autonomous robotaxis, and smarter passenger cars.
Under his leadership, the company has expanded to include offices across the United States and Germany. Edge Case applies its system safety engineering expertise and risk mitigation solutions to clients ranging from self-driving car startups to multinational corporations. Edge Case’s work on the UL 4600 autonomy safety standard as well as its continuing involvement in the development and implementation of safety standards help to extend its global reach.
Emily Warren
Head of Public Policy, Embark
Emily Warren has worked on the front lines of transportation policy and tech regulation for nearly two decades. As Head of Public Policy for Embark, she leads the company's work to develop enabling policies for autonomous long-haul trucking. She also serves as a Venture Partner for Fontinalis, a mobility-focused venture capital firm. Emily started her career as a Congressional aide and municipal financial analyst before joining the original Lyft team in 2012. At Lyft, she led teams focused on transportation policy and community engagement during the formative years of the ridehailing industry. Emily later held public policy leadership roles at Lime and Amazon. She serves on the advisory board of the UCLA Institute of Transportation Studies and as a board director for the Autonomous Vehicle Industry Association and the Shared Use Mobility Center.
David Welch
Bloomberg
David Welch is Bloomberg’s Detroit bureau chief and has covered the auto industry for 20 years. He also covered merger and acquisitions for Bloomberg in New York. Before joining Bloomberg in 2009, he was BusinessWeek magazine’s Detroit bureau chief, where he was a finalist for Business Journalist of the Year. He has an MBA from Michigan State and an economics degree from the University of Pittsburgh.
Lee White
TuSimple
Lee White is the Vice President of Strategy for TuSimple. In 2020 and 2021, Lee led the effort on developing TuSimple’s Autonomous Freight Network. His current focus is in guiding our customers as well as the internal strategic initiatives required to adopt, integrate, and scale the TuSimple AV driver. Prior to joining TuSimple, Lee spent 35 years with logistics leader UPS and was involved in several transportation technology projects including platooning and autonomous trucking. Lee earned a bachelor’s degree in economics from University of Georgia.
Ariel Wolf
Venable
Ariel Wolf leads Venable’s Autonomous and Connected Mobility group, where he counsels clients facing complex legal and policy issues at the intersection of automation, electrification, connectivity, data privacy, and cybersecurity. Ariel is a recognized thought leader who works closely with vehicle manufacturers, technology companies, advanced equipment suppliers, and software developers to navigate the emerging landscape being transformed by autonomous vehicles (AVs) and mobility technology.
Ariel's legal work includes serving as general counsel to the Autonomous Vehicle Industry Association (AVIA), the nation’s leading coalition of AV developers, to advance federal, state, and international regulatory priorities for the AV industry. He provides sophisticated legal counseling to clients through the application of general transportation law to novel use cases and technologies, and is a seasoned advocate who represents clients before agencies that include the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) and the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration. Previously, as a senior official in the U.S. Department of Transportation (USDOT), Ariel launched the Department's Non-traditional and Emerging Transportation Technology (NETT) Council, oversaw the Department's efforts on spectrum policy, and developed policies governing automated vehicles, drones, hyperloop, and other innovative technologies.
In addition to his legal work, Ariel leverages nearly two decades of government affairs experience to engage with federal and state policymakers and negotiate regulatory frameworks that govern AVs and related emerging mobility technology. He has testified before the U.S. Congress and across the country on autonomous and connected vehicle legislation and is frequently quoted by national media outlets on transportation developments. Ariel is a member of Venable’s Privacy Group and his work has been recognized by Legal 500.