Connected Car & Autonomous driving executive

TITLE: Vice President R&D Automated Driving

COMPANY: Audi

BASED: Ingolstadt, Germany

NATIONALITY: German

CAREER HIGHLIGHTS: A year after joining Volkswagen Group, Vukotich moved to Audi in 1999 to begin his career as a developer of driver assistance systems. A promotion in 2009 put him in charge of the driver assistance systems portfolio used in all Audi model lines. He was named vice president of r&d for automated driving at the start of this year.

REASON FOR WINNING: Vukotich has helped to put Audi in position to take the early lead in self-driving. The new Audi A8 is the first production car developed with Level 3 conditional autonomous capabilities. Audi’s flagship sedan’s Traffic Jam Pilot allows drivers to safely read a book or check email in congested highway traffic. This is possible because the car is equipped with the most modern sensors, including a lidar laser scanner, as well as numerous backup systems.