Sairam Sundaresan

AI Engineering Leader | Author of AI for the Rest of Us | I help engineers land AI roles and companies build valuable products

Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India

About

Ranked by Favikon as: ↳ #1 AI Creator on LinkedIn India ↳ Top 10 AI Creators on LinkedIn Globally Featured in Forbes and Wired For 14 years, I've been obsessed with a single question: how do we teach machines to truly see and understand our world? This quest began at Qualcomm. My 3D reconstruction technology landed in Forbes, and the object tracker I co-designed was used in millions of mobile devices. When someone casually used my work in their palm, I glimpsed what's possible when research meets reality. At Intel Labs, I immersed myself in creating AI systems that bridge the gap between theoretical potential and practical performance—systems that could deliver sophisticated intelligence within real-world constraints. Today at Valeo, I lead a team of AI experts developing computer vision for autonomous vehicles. We're teaching cars to go beyond simple object detection toward true scene understanding. Each breakthrough is a step toward fundamentally transforming how people and goods move worldwide. We are reimagining transportation. Since 2019, I've guided teams at NASA's Frontier Development Lab as their Machine Learning Lead. We've tackled fundamental questions about our Sun and understanding it better. Our breakthroughs have since been published in conferences like NeurIPS. Along the way, I saw a problem I couldn't ignore. I watched brilliant scientists—experts in physics and natural phenomena—blocked from leveraging AI. Not by ability. But by clarity. Incredible AI research remained locked behind jargon. There had to be a better way to get the message across. So, Gradient Ascent was born. In it, I break down complex AI concepts for engineers, product leaders, CEOs, and investors making critical decisions shaping our future. Their response has been humbling. Outside the lab, I'm an award-winning nature photographer and enjoy illustration and music. These pursuits fuel my creative approach to problem-solving. ✍️ Subscribe to my newsletter for insights that transform technical AI jargon into actionable understanding: newsletter.artofsaience.com ——— Note: All opinions are my own and do not reflect the opinions of my employer

Experience

  • Author at Bloomsbury Publishing Plc
    Oct 2025 - Present · 10 mos

    Author of AI for the Rest of Us https://www.bloomsbury.com/us/ai-for-the-rest-of-us-9798881807955/

  • Perception & AI R&D Manager at Valeo
    Apr 2024 - Present · 2 yrs 4 mos

    • Lead a team of 15+ engineers in developing cutting-edge perception R&D solutions for autonomous vehicles. • Drive innovation, resulting in research papers, patents and delivering scalable solutions to a global network of automobile OEMs. • Mentor and empower my engineers, fostering a culture of growth, innovation, and technical excellence.

  • Author at Gradient Ascent
    Sep 2022 - Present · 3 yrs 11 mos

    Gradient Ascent is the go-to AI newsletter trusted by thousands of researchers, engineers, and managers from top tech firms like Google, Meta, Microsoft, and Amazon, as well as top universities and research labs from over 125 countries worldwide.

  • AI/ML Research Scientist at Intel Corporation
    Oct 2018 - Apr 2024 · 5 yrs 7 mos

    Deep Learning algorithm research and development specializing in Computer Vision, NLP, and Multimodal models. Previously: Deep Learning algorithm research and development for the NNP line of AI processors

  • Machine Learning Lead / Mentor at Frontier Development Lab
    Jun 2022 - Aug 2022 · 3 mos

    Mentor and ML lead for the 4pi EUV Solar team