Alex Gruebele is a roboticist and mechanical engineer, now building custom software and AI for manufacturers. He did his PhD in robotics at Stanford, where his research focused on flexible sensing and manipulation (including work with Toyota Research Institute). Before moving into software, he worked in machinery at Caterpillar and fixed equipment at ExxonMobil, and built a robotic restaurant startup that served over 10,000 people. Now he runs Tau9 Labs, where he works closely with manufacturing leaders to find where AI will have the highest impact on their operations — from the plant floor to the back office — and the Tau9 team builds and implements it.