Abhishek Dubey PhD

VANDERBILT UNIVERSITY-spawned Mobius.AI Inc. Co-Founder and Chief Science Officer Abhishek Dubey PhD confirmed the startup has chosen Callan "Cal" Westenberg MBA as its first CEO.

Westenberg, 37, is to begin working full-time Nov. 1 to advance MobiusAI's platform business, which is focused on specialized needs of the transportation sector.

On their interim corporate website, the MobiusAI team explains the company aims to revolutionize the transportation industry "with a reconfigurable artificial intelligence platform for complex online planning and optimization of large vehicular fleets. Our products elevate efficiency and sustainability while reducing uncertainty through the use of non-myopic sequential decision procedures, and are scalable to large fleets." The company's marketing pitch is nicely stated in this LinkedIn entry.

Stacie Bratcher MBA

MobiusAI's board chair is Bowling Green-based Stacie Bratcher MBA MS, whose LinkedIn profile shows her as a senior fellow of Health Evolution, as well as CEO of New Haven-based Wellinks, the latter a member of the Nashville Health Care Council.

The company's chief revenue officer is Grayson McClain PhD, who is a professor of engineering management in the Vanderbilt School of Engineering. Before joining the Vanderbilt faculty, McClain had a 15-year career in strategy, process improvement, QC/CX and related roles.

Dubey acknowledged that Vanderbilt is a co-founder of MobiusAI, but declined to identify other board members.

Dubey, 37, is a Vanderbilt associate professor of computer science and computer engineering and a senior research scientist in the university's Institute for Software Integrated Systems (VU-ISIS), which is where much of Dubey's research on transportation and logistics AI has been conducted. His LinkedIn.

Much of the impetus for formation of MobiusAI seems to have flowed from work by Dubey and his colleagues to partner in an NSF-backed statewide coalition to shape the future of mobility; efforts to improve ride-sharing and other microtransit performance; participation in Tennessee's TNGO program; and other efforts to optimize multi-modal mixed-fleet transportation services.

In 2023, Dubey was among computer scientists who received a National Science Foundation Career Award to design online decision procedures for societal-scale cyber-physical systems such as traffic networks, emergency response systems and power grids.

Cal Westenberg MBA

Dubey said Westenberg is working part-time at MobiusAI, and has, among other things, begun outreach in behalf of Mobius to members of the venture community.

Westenberg is simultaneously winding-up his COO duties with his current employer, which is now also a Mobius ally and potential future customer: Navarre Corporation, a non-emergent transportation services provider supporting military veterans under the auspices of the Veterans Administration.

Prior to Navarre, Westenberg was site leader for Amazon's Nashville operations, launching delivery stations in Lebanon and La Vergne.

The newly signed CEO is a Michigander who earned his bachelor's in psychology and criminal justice at the University of Michigan and later earned an executive MBA from Vanderbilt University Owen Graduate School of Management. LinkedIn.

Westenberg served nearly eight years as a U.S. Army officer, with battalion-, company- and platoon-level assignments, including duties in logistical and combat operations while deployed in Afghanistan, in 2013.

Asked about advisors, Dubey confirmed Mobius has received some support through the Holland & Knight law firm.

He also cited assistance from Cameron Sargent PhD, a licensing analyst within Vanderbilt's Center for Technology Transfer and Commercialization (CTTC). VNC notes Sargent's LinkedIn currently shows him as a member of the MobiusAI board of directors. Update: Sargent advised VNC that he holds the Mobius board seat as a representative of Vanderbilt University.

Dubey also said that Peter Rousos JD, who was for two decades the director of Vanderbilt economic and venture development efforts within CTTC, has long been a go-to advisor. The CTTC website today lists Rousos as founder of CTTC's Entrepreneur-in-Residence Program.

The abovementioned Rousos retired from Vanderbilt effective in December 2023. He is a co-founder Nashville-based The Innovation Studio, which was registered in Delaware in March 2023.

The Innovation Studio is described in one Rousos profile as "an enterprise that founds, operates, manages, and sells startup companies. The Studio partners with large companies to identify pressing industry-wide problems that can be solved using industrial artificial intelligence." VNC

.last edited 0826 20 August 2024