Dave Ferguson
Dave is the co-founder of a technology company, Nuro, which is focused on accelerating the benefits of robotics in everyday life. In five years his company, which is based in California, has grown to employ 630 people and developed the first self-driving vehicle to receive a permit to operate on US roads. During the pandemic he volunteered his company’s technology to enable contactless delivery of food and medicine to essential workers in the community.
Before starting Nuro he was a principal engineer on Google’s self-driving program, and one of his algorithms is currently being used for long range autonomy on NASA’s Mars rovers.
He is passionate about getting other young Kiwi into the tech sector and has just created a scholarship for robotics students at University of Otago. His vision is to create a world where robots can take over the more mundane areas of our lives allowing us to have more time to connect with people and do the things we love.