Kognic, the industry-leading annotation platform for sensor-fusion data, today announced the opening of its newest office in Shanghai, China. In the past year, the company has expanded its international footprint with offices in Tokyo and the United States, in addition to its existing office in Munich and headquarters in Gothenburg, Sweden.
Kognic provides the industry’s most productive annotation platform for sensor-fusion data in performance-critical, AI applications such as autonomous driving and robotics. The Kognic Platform has become a core toolset in the fields of Advanced Driving Assistance Systems (ADAS) and Autonomous Driving (AD), and is currently being used by technology leaders such as Qualcomm, Bosch, Continental and Zenseact, which provide ADAS/AD systems that power vehicles for global OEMs such as BMW and Volvo Cars.
“Kognic’s geographic expansion in Asia will help us to accelerate our growth by working with major automotive brands that have already established a presence here,” said Daniel Langkilde, Co-founder and CEO, Kognic. “We are building upon our foundation in Europe to make our annotation platform available to a broader international client base at a pivotal time for the automotive industry, as the industry navigates the transition from traditional manufacturing to new forms of innovative software-driven technology.”
In order to meet global demand for Kognic’s annotation platform, the company welcomes Dr. Gary Overett as Managing Director, China. An expert in developing and delivering ADAS/AD into the Chinese market, Dr. Overett will focus on growing Kognic’s delivery team and managing in-market relations from the Shanghai Lingang Special Area, where Kognic China will be based.
“We recognise China as a leading innovator in the intelligent vehicle domain. As a market with record numbers of LiDAR equipped vehicles, and the largest industrial robotics build out in history, Kognic China is excited to see our Platform help customers in China to feed their AI pipelines with the exceptional quality and volume of sensor-fusion data. We greatly appreciate the welcoming support we have received in Lingang as a hotspot for AI innovation,” Gary Overett said.
Dr Overett previously served as a Computer Vision Expert at Zenseact, where he helped to secure Chinese delivery and data compliance for Volvo. Prior to that, he held senior roles in Autonomous Driving at Xiaopeng Motors, a leading Chinese EV Brand, where he launched their AD data collection and AI assisted auto-labelling initiatives alongside teams in Guangzhou & Silicon-Valley. Gary also led the Mobile Vision Robotics Lab at Carnegie Mellon University and the SYSU-CMU Joint Institute of Engineering in Guangzhou, China.
In the past twelve months, Kognic has achieved a number of significant goals relating to growth, including 60% YoY revenue growth, closing of a first phase of Series B fundraising, expansion of all key accounts, and is on target to continue its pace of momentum in the coming year. Kognic was also honored as Sensor Perception Solution of the Year by the Tech.AD USA Awards 2023.