Who am I?
Dr Nathan G.E. Kirchner
serial startup Founder and Advisor, corporate Ventures Advisor, professor, peak-body Founding Director. One of Australia’s Most Innovative, Engineers Australia. One of Australia’s & the US’ Top Ten Young Scientists - Popular Science magazine. Several other significant international recognitions.
My speciality is uncovering & imagining emerging realworld opportunities & forging viable pathways to their realisation. I’ve over 25 years of industry & academia demonstrable track record of successful notable Deep Tech / Robotics / AI / HeSaaS (Hardware enabled Software as a Service) endeavours, securing significant ventures, private, institutional &/or corporate funds to execute, & delivering viable companies, departments, innovation programmes, projects, outcomes & excellence. I drive success in startups, ventures, corporate innovation programmes/projects through leveraging my experience & expertise to underpin explosive growth.
I’ve recently founded & am Chief Science Officer at work_r labs - embodied HRI rich intelligence to empower in robotic systems. I am a venture partner at one of Australia’s leading hardware-first Venture Capital firms; the Founder of Presien - cutting edge AI vision systems for heavy industries; an Advisor for Robotics & Ventures at several very large organisations; an Advisor at a handful of additional Deep Tech / Field Robotics & AI early stage startups through to large corporates; a mentor - investigator for the internationally renowned, Startups Catapulting, Creative Destructions Lab. I’m a Founding Director of the Robotics Australia Group peak body, I sit on the Advisory Board of Qld Robotics & am on the Advisory Board for the Advanced Fabrication Research Lab. I’m an active, accomplished, recognised & awarded researcher & practitioner in this field. Previously I’ve served in high ranking roles such as the Head of Robotics at one of the world's larger private construction companies, the Executive Chair & Chief Strategy Officer at Australian Droid + Robot (field hard & proven advanced robotics for heavy industries), & have held multiple academic appointments at Stanford University in California, the University of Technology Sydney & the Ohio State University.
My formal education includes: Ph.D. Robotics at the Centre for Autonomous Systems University of Technology Sydney, a B.Engineering Mechatronics at the University of New South Wales, B.Science Psychology at the University of Sydney, Stanford University Innovation & Entrepreneurship at the Stanford Graduate School of Business & School of Engineering, Directorship at the Australian Institute of Company Directors, and Higher Education, Teaching & Learning at the University of Technology Sydney.
Bringing elegant simplicity to the bottomless complexity of the venture pathway is my vehicle to deliver impact – Let’s talk!