PeopleofSuperintelligence

Researcher

Franz Josef Och

Also known as Franz Och, Franz J. Och

Franz Josef Och built his career around statistical machine translation. He worked on the method from 1997 and completed a dissertation at RWTH Aachen in 2002. His software scored highest among 23 translation systems in a 2003 test, and in 2004 he joined Google to head its machine translation group. Human Longevity hired him as chief data scientist in July 2014. He co-authored the Gemini 2.5 report, which was first submitted to arXiv in July 2025.

Timeline

  1. 1997–2002

    A dissertation in Aachen

    He works on statistical machine translation from 1997 and completes a dissertation at RWTH Aachen in 2002.

  2. 2002–2004

    A research post at USC

    He works as a researcher at USC in Los Angeles from 2002 to 2004.

  3. 2003

    Top scores in translation tests

    In 2003 his software scores highest among 23 Arabic- and Chinese-to-English translation systems in tests by the U.S. Commerce Department.

  4. 2003

    Minimum error rate training

    In 2003 he publishes Minimum Error Rate Training in Statistical Machine Translation.

  5. 2004–2014

    Heading Google's machine translation group

    He joins Google in 2004 as a research scientist and manager, heading its machine translation group.

  6. April 2006

    Statistical translation goes live

    In April 2006 he posts on the Google Research blog as a research scientist, announcing that Google's statistical translation system is live.

  7. July 2014

    Chief data scientist at Human Longevity

    In July 2014 Human Longevity hires him as chief data scientist, an expert in machine learning and machine translation.

  8. July 2025

    Co-author of the Gemini 2.5 report

    He is one of the listed authors of the Gemini 2.5 report, which first appears on arXiv in July 2025.

Sources and credits

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  1. Franz Josef Och - Wikipedia en.wikipedia.org. Checked 15 October 2026.
  2. Franz Och Joins HLI as Chief Data Scientist | Human Longevity humanlongevity.com. Checked 15 October 2026.
  3. Franz Josef Och – Wikipedia de.wikipedia.org. Checked 15 October 2026.
  4. Computer Language Translation System Romances the Rosetta Stone - USC Viterbi | School of Engineering viterbischool.usc.edu. Checked 15 October 2026.
  5. Minimum Error Rate Training in Statistical Machine Translation - ACL Anthology aclanthology.org. Checked 15 October 2026.
  6. Statistical machine translation live research.google. Checked 15 October 2026.
  7. [2507.06261] Gemini 2.5: Pushing the Frontier with Advanced Reasoning, Multimodality, Long Context, and Next Generation Agentic Capabilities arxiv.org. Checked 15 October 2026.