People

Fred Nikgohar
Founder and CEO

Fred Nikgohar is founder and Chief Executive at RoboDynamics. At this capacity he drives the vision of the company by interfacing with customers, partners, and his internal team to bring that vision to fruition.

He also maintains an active role as the Chairman of Summit Rock Capital which identifies and invests in commercial real estate properties in the greater Los Angeles area. Fred brings a wealth of hands on experience as a serial entrepreneur with a background that include real estate finance, consumer electronics, web applications, artificial intelligence, and financial consulting. He is an avid reader and has a passion for writing fiction. He has also developed an interest in travel rings and you can find him by the Santa Monica pier on any given day when he's not at the office.

Ari Saif
Embedded Systems

Ari's role is to drive the technology vision of the company. While his official title involves electronics design, he has a hands on role in mechanical and software research and development that goes on at RoboDynamics. He has been a distinguished researcher in both academia as well as private enterprises - most recently at Sun Microsystems.

Ari has a Masters in Mathematics from Tehran Polytechnic University as well as a Masters in Electronics Engineering from USC. He is currently finishing his doctoral thesis in VLSI from USC.

Alex Mills
Roboticist

Alex is the Robot Wrangler at RoboDynamics. He is in charge for the well being of all the robots roaming the RoboDynamics offices - and has intimate knowledge on each prototype, their nuances, and their quirks. He is a master of Systems Admin having worked for top-tier ISPs as well as maintaining server farms for web application providers.

Rumor has it that he also cooks a mean pasta - not that we would know cause he has never actually cooked for us. He is a true technology geek and keeps a clean Machine Shop at our offices. Alex has a degree in Chemical Engineering from University of California, San Diego.

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Farhad Mohit
Advisor

Farhad is our business mentor at RoboDynamics. His wealth of entrepreneurial experiences are an indispensible asset to RoboDynamics as we navigate our way to realizing our vision.

Farhad started Shopzilla and helped manage it through the bubble of 2000, to profitability by 2003, and a successful acquisition for $569M by EW Scripps in 2005. In the process Shopzilla became and remains one of the largest, fastest growing and most successful shopping search engines in the world.

In 1996 he founded BizRate, based on his grad school thesis, which has since become the largest customer feedback network in the world. The sites has garnered millions of customer ratings each month and helped tens of thousands of online stores establish trust with new customers, by display of the BizRate Certified medals.

Most recently Farhad started DotSpots which is still in stealth-mode.

Farhad holds a Bachelor of Science in Mathematics/Applied Science and Economics with a specialization in Computing from the University of California, Los Angeles, and an MBA in Entrepreneurial Management from the Wharton School.

 

Brian O'Neal
Advisor
Bio coming soon.

Dr. Behnam Salemi
Roboticist
 

Behnam was the first employee at RoboDynamics when we got going in our garage. Together with Fred he built the first three prototypes of our Robotic Telepresence platform named Analog, IO, and IO2. By all accounts, Behnam is the engineering inspiration of RoboDynamics and besides his considerable wealth of engineering expertise in various fields, he brings creative problem solving and positivity to the process.

Behnam is currently a Distinguished Researcher at USC's Information Science Institute in Marina del Rey where he has done outstanding work on Reconfigurable Robotics, Digital Chromosomes, Machine Vision, and Space Assembly. In 1997 Behnam was part of the championship team that won the RoboCup competition in the middle-weight robot class.

Behnam holds a Masters in Electronic Engineering from Tehran Polytechnic as well as another from USC, and a PhD in Computer Science from USC.

 

Dr. George Bekey
Advisor
 

Dr. Bekey is known in our industry as the "Godfather of Robotics". He is an authority on robot research and design, and is known for his scientific achievements, broad technological perspective and humanistic approach. A member of the American Academy of Engineering, Dr. Bekey was chosen by the United States National Science Foundation (NSF) and National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) to lead a 2005-2006 assessment of the state of robotics in the United States, Western Europe and the Pacific Rim. The team's findings culminated in a report to its federal sponsors on American competitive advantages and weaknesses on the international stage.

Aside from his role as Chairman Emeritus of USC Robotics, Dr. Bekey is an advisor to numerous companies and organizations which include medical devices, robotics, electronics, computer science, as well as charitable and humanitarian fields.

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It should also be noted that our success would not have been possible without the contributions of all the people who have worked for us, advised us, criticized us, and continue to root for us...

Eric and Lori Kratzer - for their amazing hospitality
Sepi Chitsaz - for doing it all
Ed Kogan - for his optimism
Shasha Bakhtiar - for his dedication
Alex Lea - for bringing youth
Dr. Chariar Assad - for his humor
Richard Pumilia - for legal guidance and mentorship

and

Sharon Haughey - for her unwavering support.