Jimmy Wang

Respect the hustle of Jimmy Wang, this guy is legit the real deal in autonomous driving tech. So, he jumped into the scene back in YC S17, right? Like, he’s been deep in the trenches of AI, sensors, and self-driving systems for a while now. Before all that, he was crushing it at places like HERE Technologies and earthmine, big names in mapping and street-level imagery. Dude was leading research on 3D mapping, working on big-scale projects that made city streets come alive in 3D. Basically, he’s been building the backbone of how cars see and understand the world.

But Jimmy’s story isn’t just about big corp gigs. Nah, he’s an entrepreneur at heart. He co-founded Zendar in 2017, and that’s where he’s really made waves. Zendar’s all about making the craziest, highest-res radar systems for self-driving cars, like, they’re trying to make autonomous driving safer and way more accessible. Imagine building tech that can see the world better than anything out there, that’s Jimmy’s jam. He’s now the Chief Product Officer, but he was CTO before, so he’s hands-on with the tech and vision.

What’s cool is, Jimmy didn’t just fall into this. He’s got a PhD from UC Berkeley in Vision Science, specializing in unsupervised machine learning and computer vision. That’s some advanced stuff. Plus, he’s got degrees in computer and biomedical engineering from UNSW, so he’s got that solid academic foundation. The dude’s been doing research and building tech forever, but he also has that entrepreneurial fire, he was a founding engineer at AutoX, one of the early autonomous startups. He’s not just about theory; he’s about making shit happen.

All of this? It tells a story of someone super driven, who’s always been obsessed with making cars see better and safer. His process from academic labs to mapping giants, to co-founding a startup that’s pushing the envelope with automotive radar, that’s the kind of guy who’s not afraid to jump in, get his hands dirty, and build the future. Basically, Jimmy’s the type of founder who’s not just dreaming about self-driving cars, he’s making the tech that will actually get us there. No cap, he’s a straight-up innovator, and you can tell he’s in it for real, not just for the money. That’s why he’s so important.