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In this talk, I’ll walk you through my research on medical and industrial exoskeletons at the University of California, Berkeley, as well as the development work at the two companies I founded in the United States. I’ll then focus on two main points.
First, the darker side of the overwhelming push across U.S. universities to encourage entrepreneurial work.
Second—and despite the first point—my next venture: how it took shape in my mind, influenced by the geographic and political landscape of West–East economic rivalries.
My goal is to create genuine motivation for some of you to join me, either as a co-founder or collaborator, to help bring this new venture to maturity.
Professor Kazerooni is a Professor of Mechanical Engineering at the University of California, Berkeley, where he also serves as the Director of the Berkeley Robotics and Human Engineering Laboratory. With over 35 years of experience in mechanical engineering and a doctorate from MIT, he is a leading expert in robotics. He is the inventor of more than 200 US and International patents, over 80% of which have been licensed, and has been inducted into the U.S. National Academy of Inventors.
In addition to his academic teaching and research, Professor Kazerooni is an active entrepreneur. In 2005, he founded Ekso Bionics (eksobionics.com), which became a publicly traded company in 2014 and now supplies the Ekso medical exoskeleton to rehabilitation centers worldwide. He later founded suitX (suitx.com), a venture capital-, industry-, and government-funded company providing industrial and medical exoskeletons. suitX was acquired in late 2021 by Ottobock, the largest medical device company in Europe.
Clean water and clean air are vital for public health. This project focuses on developing high-efficiency and environmentally sustainable filters for removing harmful air/water pollutants. The team has developed novel architectures and functionalities for the filters to achieve high permeance, high removal efficiency, and excellent reusability.
