PeopleofSuperintelligence

Researcher

Ashutosh Saxena

Ashutosh Saxena helped bring deep learning into robotic grasping through a 2013 paper written with Ian Lenz and Honglak Lee. He earned a Stanford Ph.D. in 2009 with Andrew Ng as advisor and joined Cornell University as a faculty member in 2009. The RSS Test of Time award recognized that paper in 2023. He co-founded Brain of Things with David Cheriton in 2015 and Caspar.AI in 2021, a company that applies AI to data from contactless 3D radar sensors. He is founder and chief AI officer of TorqueAGI, which develops AI foundation models for robots.

Timeline

  1. 2004–2009

    Degrees from IIT Kanpur and Stanford

    At IIT Kanpur he earns a B.Tech in 2004, and at Stanford he completes a Ph.D. in 2009 with Andrew Ng as his advisor.

  2. 2009

    A faculty post at Cornell

    He joins Cornell University as a faculty member in 2009.

  3. 2011–2012

    Sloan and Microsoft fellowships

    In 2011 he is named a Sloan Fellow, and in 2012 he is named a Microsoft Faculty Fellow.

  4. 2014

    RoboBrain and an RSS career award

    In 2014 he receives the Robotics: Science and Systems Career Award. A paper he co-authors with five others describes RoboBrain, a large-scale knowledge engine for robots.

  5. 2015

    Co-founding Brain of Things

    In 2015 he co-founds Brain of Things with David Cheriton.

  6. 2021

    Caspar.AI and radar health sensing

    In 2021 he co-founds Caspar.AI as CEO. The company applies AI to data from contactless 3D radar sensors to monitor health indicators.

  7. 2023

    An RSS Test of Time award

    He shares the RSS Test of Time award in 2023 with Ian Lenz and Honglak Lee, for their 2013 paper on deep learning for robotic grasps.

  8. Since 2025

    Founding TorqueAGI

    He is founder and chief AI officer of TorqueAGI. In January 2025 he founds the company, which develops AI foundation models for robots.

Sources and credits

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  1. Ashutosh Saxena - Wikipedia en.wikipedia.org. Checked 14 October 2026.
  2. Meet Ashutosh Saxena: The serial entrepreneur proving robots can learn stanforddaily.com. Checked 14 October 2026.
  3. Ashutosh Saxena -- Microsoft and Sloan Fellow, Computer Science, Stanford University ai.stanford.edu. Checked 14 October 2026.
  4. [1412.0691] RoboBrain: Large-Scale Knowledge Engine for Robots arxiv.org. Checked 14 October 2026.
  5. Test of Time Award · Robotics: Science and Systems roboticsconference.org. Checked 14 October 2026.
  6. CS Colloquium: Ashutosh Saxena, TorqueAGI | Community Connections Events | Harvey Mudd College hmc.edu. Checked 14 October 2026.