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San Francisco, United States

Experience

Feb 2022 - Present

4 years 1 month

Staff Technical Program Manager

Kyte Systems

Supervising four key technical initiatives across engineering teams (for example: geo-spatial data storage and processing)
Establishing an alerting and on-call system that monitors the health of all frontend and backend systems and orchestrates the availability of 30 engineers by skill set, timezone and team affiliation
Created a technical onboarding program for new Kyte engineers: shortened onboarding time from 5–7 weeks to 3 weeks, increased onboarding satisfaction from 45% to 85%, established a technical knowledge base for self-paced learning.

May 2021 - Jan 2022

9 months

Sr. Backend Engineer – Algorithms & Inference Team

Kyte Systems

Scaled the system for scheduling car delivery drivers to serve 13 US markets, increasing driver satisfaction and on-time rate
Redesigned and built a customer verification system, validating driver licenses, financial transactions and court record data
Onboarded and mentored junior colleagues on team collaboration, code contributions and optimizing impact

Mar 2019 - Apr 2021

2 years 2 months

Sr. Technical Program Manager – Maps/Environment Modeling/Planning

Mercedes-Benz R&D

Co-lead together with department manager the technical roadmap and quarterly planning for the Maps/Environment Modeling/Path Planning teams for Mercedes-Benz’ L4 autonomous car project (80+ engineers, 10 scrum teams, 4 countries)
Steered technical concept work efforts, for example for new vehicle prototypes, feature implementations, code quality and software architecture
Defined, coordinated and tracked the feature development for the autonomous fleet that got deployed to a public test phase in partnership with the City of San Jose, CA

Oct 2018 - Mar 2019

6 months

Sr. Engineer Machine Learning – Environment Modeling

Mercedes-Benz R&D

In addition to previous role, built up ownership for technical components and responsibility for department-spanning tasks
Planned and executed development of ML-based algorithms through all stages: from first prototype to testing to fleet deployment
Headed the research strategy and code development for traffic light state estimation

May 2017 - Sep 2018

1 year 5 months

Machine Learning Engineer – Environment Modeling

Mercedes-Benz R&D

Worked on Level 4 autonomous vehicles in the field of scene understanding & prediction, traffic light handling, high-level planning using C++, ROS, Python, numpy, TensorFlow and custom frameworks
Performed software testing and evaluation using testing suites, simulation and in-vehicle tests
Acquired various Daimler driver licenses and tested systems on prototype vehicles on test tracks and public roads

Dec 2016 - Apr 2017

5 months

Visiting Researcher – Chair of Robotics, AI and Real-time Systems

TU Munich

Facilitated data analysis from self-driving cars through novel methods to represent complex driving scenarios (“Velocity Grids”)

May 2016 - Dec 2016

8 months

Master’s Thesis Internship – Simulation and Vehicle Testing

Mercedes-Benz R&D

Created a processing pipeline for the analysis of data recordings from autonomous vehicles
Designed and implemented deep learning algorithms to automatically identify specific driving scenarios, published state-of-the-art results at IV 2017

Industries Experience

See where this freelancer has spent most of their professional time. Longer bars indicate deeper hands-on experience, while shorter ones reflect targeted or project-based work.

Experienced in Automotive (5.5 years), Information Technology (4 years), and Education (0.5 years).

Automotive

Information Technology

Education

Business Areas Experience

The graph below provides a cumulative view of the freelancer's experience across multiple business areas, calculated from completed and active engagements. It highlights the areas where the freelancer has most frequently contributed to planning, execution, and delivery of business outcomes.

Experienced in Product Development (8.5 years), Project Management (6 years), Research and Development (3 years), Quality Assurance (1.5 years), Information Technology (0.5 years), and Logistics (0.5 years).

Product Development

Project Management

Research and Development

Quality Assurance

Information Technology

Logistics

Skills

Software Experience Building Software Systems Along All Stages: Ideate, Design, Review, Implement, Test, Deploy, Monitor.
Development Backend Systems Using Docker, Python, Flask, Sqlalchemy, Postgresql, Numpy, Pandas Etc.
Testing On All Levels (Pytest, Mocking, Api Testing)
Defining System Monitoring And Alerting (Datadog, Sentry, Pagerduty)
Robotics & Deep Learning For Autonomous Systems, Environment Modeling, Semantic Scene Interpretation
Machine Learningrobotic System Development With C++, Ros And Custom Frameworks
Project Experienced Managing Engineering Programs Across Time Zones And Business Units (Okr Tools, Jira, Gitlab)
Management Leading Teams Using Collaborative Methods, While Keeping Sharp Focus On Project Goals
Defining, Monitoring, Actively Steering And Reporting Project Kpi’s
Strong Communicator, Comfortable With Public Speaking, Moderating Discussions, And Leading Workshops

Languages

German

Native

English

Advanced

French

Intermediate

Education

Technical University of Munich & UPMC Paris

Mechanical Engineering, Master of Science · Mechanical Engineering · Munich, Germany

Technical University of Munich & BCIT Vancouver

Engineering Science, Bachelor of Science · Engineering Science · Munich, Germany

Certifications & licenses

Daimler Driver Licenses

Daimler

Profile

Created

July 2022

Last Update

July 2024

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Frequently asked questions

Do you have questions? Here you can find further information.

Where is Richard based?

Richard is based in San Francisco, United States.

What languages does Richard speak?

Richard speaks the following languages: German (Native), English (Advanced), French (Intermediate).

How many years of experience does Richard have?

Richard has at least 10 years of experience. During this time, Richard has worked in at least 7 different roles and for 3 different companies. The average length of individual experience is 1 year and 5 months. Note that Richard may not have shared all experience and actually has more experience.

What roles would Richard be best suited for?

Based on recent experience, Richard would be well-suited for roles such as: Staff Technical Program Manager, Sr. Backend Engineer – Algorithms & Inference Team, Sr. Technical Program Manager – Maps/Environment Modeling/Planning.

What is Richard's latest experience?

Richard's most recent position is Staff Technical Program Manager at Kyte Systems.

What companies has Richard worked for in recent years?

In recent years, Richard has worked for Kyte Systems and Mercedes-Benz R&D.

Which industries is Richard most experienced in?

Richard is most experienced in industries like Automotive, Information Technology (IT), and Education.

Which business areas is Richard most experienced in?

Richard is most experienced in business areas like Product Development, Project Management, and Research and Development (R&D). Richard also has some experience in Quality Assurance (QA), Information Technology (IT), and Logistics.

Which industries has Richard worked in recently?

Richard has recently worked in industries like Information Technology (IT) and Automotive.

Which business areas has Richard worked in recently?

Richard has recently worked in business areas like Product Development, Project Management, and Information Technology (IT).

What is Richard's education?

Richard holds a Master in Mechanical Engineering from Technical University of Munich & UPMC Paris and a Bachelor in Engineering Science from Technical University of Munich & BCIT Vancouver.

Does Richard have any certificates?

Richard has 1 certificate: Daimler Driver Licenses.

What is the availability of Richard?

Richard is immediately available for suitable projects.

What is the rate of Richard?

Richard's rate depends on the specific project requirements. Please use the Meet button on the profile to schedule a meeting and discuss the details.