PeopleofSuperintelligence

Researcher

Alex Acero

Also known as Alejandro Acero

Alex Acero is a speech scientist whose Microsoft Research team showed deep neural networks outperforming mixtures of Gaussians in large-vocabulary speech recognition. He joined Microsoft in 1994, and his team at Microsoft Research shipped Bing Translator and worked on Xbox Kinect. Apple hired him in 2013, and he served as Siri Chief Scientist until 2024. He became an IEEE Fellow in 2004, and the IEEE named him the 2026 recipient of the Flanagan Speech and Audio Processing Award. As of October 2026, he is a Distinguished Scientist at Zoom, where he heads AI Incubations.

Now at
Zoom and Cadenza Capital
Works
314
Citations
17,629
h-index
53

Publication numbers from OpenAlex, as of 15 October 2026.

Timeline

  1. 1985–1990

    Degrees from Madrid to Carnegie Mellon

    He receives an engineering degree from the Universidad Politécnica de Madrid in 1985, a Rice University master's in 1987, and a Carnegie Mellon Ph.D. in 1990.

  2. 1991–1993

    Managing Telefónica's speech team

    He manages the speech team for Spain's Telefónica from 1991 to 1993.

  3. 1994–2013

    Deep neural networks at Microsoft Research

    He joins Microsoft in 1994, and his team at Microsoft Research ships Bing Translator and works on Xbox Kinect. He co-authors the textbook Spoken Language Processing in 2001. In 2010, his team shows that deep neural networks outperform mixtures of Gaussians for large-vocabulary speech recognition.

  4. 2004–2010

    Fellow of IEEE and ISCA

    The IEEE names him a Fellow in 2004 for contributions to noise robust speech recognition and speech technology education. ISCA names him a Fellow in 2010 for contributions in research, development and education of spoken language technologies.

  5. 2013–2024

    Siri Chief Scientist at Apple

    He joins Apple in 2013 and serves as Siri Chief Scientist, covering speech recognition and speech synthesis until 2024.

  6. 2014–2015

    IEEE Signal Processing Society president

    He serves as president of the IEEE Signal Processing Society from 2014 to 2015.

  7. 2026

    A Flanagan speech and audio award

    The IEEE names him the 2026 recipient of the IEEE James L. Flanagan Speech and Audio Processing Award.

  8. As of October 2026

    Distinguished Scientist at Zoom

    He is a Distinguished Scientist at Zoom, where he heads AI Incubations. His Siri chief scientist role at Apple ends in 2024. He is also an AI Venture Partner at Cadenza Capital.

Sources and credits

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  1. Grand Challenges in Speech Recognition | UW Department of Electrical & Computer Engineering hedy.ece.uw.edu. Checked 15 October 2026.
  2. Oral-History:Alex Acero - Engineering and Technology History Wiki ethw.org. Checked 15 October 2026.
  3. Alex Acero | ECE Advisory Board advisoryboard.ece.uw.edu. Checked 15 October 2026.
  4. Deep Learning in Speech Recognition | Stanford EE380 abstract web.stanford.edu. Checked 15 October 2026.
  5. ISCA - ISCA Fellow Program isca-speech.org. Checked 15 October 2026.
  6. SPS Members Receive 2026 IEEE Technical Field Awards! | IEEE Signal Processing Society signalprocessingsociety.org. Checked 15 October 2026.
  7. Alex Acero - 2027 IEEE International Conference on Acoustics, Speech, and Signal Processing 2027.ieeeicassp.org. Checked 15 October 2026.