AEye CEO Blair LaCorte Named One of Most Influential Leaders in Transportation and Automotive for 2021

LaCorte Recognized for Lifetime Achievement for His Vision, Leadership, Innovation and Impact across Numerous Government, Commercial and Industry Initiatives

DUBLIN, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--AEye, Inc., (“AEye”) the global leader in active, high-performance LiDAR solutions, today announced that Blair LaCorte, CEO of AEye, has been named one of the Top 100 Leaders in Transportation and Automotive at the International Transportation & Automotive Summit (ITAS). The award recognizes exceptional leaders and visionaries whose innovations are shaping the future of transportation.

Holding multiple patents, LaCorte is an accomplished leader and strategist with a long history of leveraging change management skills to drive operational alignment and growth. He has transformed companies across eight different industries, and has deep functional experience in B2B, technology, logistics, and asset optimization. Blair has been the Executive Director of the world’s largest port network, CEO of an airline, founding member of the National Air Transportation Association, EVP of a DoD global logistics technology company, and is currently CEO of AEye, a leader in automotive autonomy, focused on the automotive and transportation markets.

“I’m honored by the recognition, and enthusiastic about the impact that today’s leaders across the transportation category will have on the future of mobility,” said LaCorte. “My career-long focus is driving growth for transformative companies, in part by emphasizing the importance of innovation and pushing the boundaries of what we think is possible. At AEye, we have a seasoned team and a unique business model that leverages the automotive-grade global supply chain and its manufacturing resources. We believe our next generation active LiDAR platform, combined with our supply chain partnerships, will allow us to drive innovation, reduce costs, and accelerate the adoption of this game-changing technology.”

LaCorte surpassed every measurement used to determine award merit, including Market Demand, Future Readiness, Spirit of Innovation, Industry Impact and Overall Reach. At AEye, Blair has led the team in creating the industry’s only software-configurable LiDAR, which powers both automotive and industrial markets using the same supply chain and modular components. Other achievements in his career include founding the GIS group at Autodesk, which led to users’ ability to leverage the world’s largest installed base of CAD systems for mapping and, eventually, the use of maps in vehicles; Creating RFID technology that tracked and monitored sea containers across the Department of Defense and commercial supply chains and later founding the Global Port Network, a global logistics network that combined logistics efficiency with physical supply chain security; and creating and growing the fastest growing private aviation company in history through use of a new private aviation business model that increases utilization and lowers friction of usage.

The International Transportation & Automotive Summit is a platform for networking and learning amongst a closed group of award-winning peers from the industry. It provides an interdisciplinary global stage for researchers, manufacturers, R&D personnel, practitioners, and other industry professionals to share insights on the most recent innovations, discuss challenges and solutions that can be adopted in the transportation & automotive sector.

About AEye

AEye is the premier provider of high-performance, active LiDAR systems for vehicle autonomy, advanced driver-assistance systems (ADAS), and robotic vision applications. AEye’s AI-enabled and software-definable iDAR™ (Intelligent Detection and Ranging) platform combines solid-state active LiDAR, an optionally fused low-light HD camera, and integrated deterministic artificial intelligence to capture more intelligent information with less data, enabling faster, more accurate, and more reliable perception. The company is based in the San Francisco Bay Area and backed by world-renowned financial investors including Kleiner Perkins and Taiwania Capital, as well as GM Ventures, Continental AG, Hella Ventures, LG Electronics, Subaru-SBI, Pegasus Ventures (Aisin), Intel Capital, SK Hynix and Airbus Ventures.