Agility Robotics, Boston Dynamics see leadership changes

Aaron Saunders (left) keynoting the 2025 Robotics Summit & Expo and Melonee Wise.

Agility Robotics and Boston Dynamics, two prominent humanoid robotics developers, are experiencing leadership changes. Aaron Saunders, chief technology officer at Boston Dynamics, announced on LinkedIn that he is stepping down from that role. And Melonee Wise, chief product officer at Agility Robotics, is leaving the company at the end of the month, according to The Information. Wise’s departure from Agility Robotics was also confirmed by The Robot Report. 

Saunders spent over two decades at Boston Dynamics. He was an early developer of BigDog, the predecessor of the company’s now commercialized Spot quadruped. As CTO, he led multidisciplinary teams to set the company’s technological vision and align research and development with business needs.

“Now, the dynamic capabilities we pioneered have helped forge an exciting new industry aimed at bringing AI to the physical world,” Saunders said when announcing his departure. “The very conversations and critiques today—YouTube videos and backflips—are a testament to how we shifted the boundary of the possible.”

Earlier this year, Saunders keynoted the Robotics Summit & Expo, a robotics development event in Boston produced by The Robot Report. He gave attendees an inside look at how the company redesigned the Atlas humanoid from the ground up. Saunders holds a master’s in mechanical engineering from the University of Victoria and a bachelor’s from the University of Alberta.

“The entire Boston Dynamics team would like to thank Aaron Saunders for everything he’s done over his incredible 23 years with the company. From BigDog to Spot to Stretch to Atlas and beyond, Aaron’s fingerprints have left their mark on our robots and our organization for years to come. He’s been a great friend and colleague to many of us, and although we are sad to see him go, he has more than earned some time off to be with his family. We wish him the best of luck in all his future endeavors, and we appreciate all he’s done to help build Boston Dynamics into the global leader it is today,” a spokesperson from Boston Dynamics told The Robot Report. 

Wise steps away from Agility

Wise joined Agility Robotics in 2023 as CTO and shifted into the chief product officer role in May 2024. She led Agility’s engineering team in addition to the newly formed product organization.

Agility told employees that Marco Marroquin will become chief hardware officer, reported The Information. In addition, the company plans to move its application software and product divisions under the technology division, reporting to CTO Pras Velagapudi.

Wise has years of experience in the robotics industry. Prior to joining Agility in 2023, she was the vice president of robotics automation at Zebra Technologies. Before that, Wise was CEO of Fetch Robotics until its acquisition by Zebra in 2021 for $290 million.

Wise a recognized robotics innovator

Previously, Wise was the second employee at Willow Garage, where she led a team of engineers developing next-generation robot hardware and software, including the open-source Robot Operating System (ROS), the PR2, and TurtleBot. Wise serves as a robotics board member for the Association for Advancing Automation (A3).

Throughout her career, Wise has received many accolades and awards, including the MIT Technology Review TR35, Supply & Demand Chain Executive’s 2021 Supply Chain Woman of the Year, the 2022 Engelberger Award, and as one of “eight CEOs changing the way we work” by Business Insider.

Wise received a B.S. in mechanical engineering and physics engineering and an M.S. in mechanical engineering from the University of Illinois.

Agility Robotics will be keynoting RoboBusiness, which takes place on Oct. 15 and 16 in Santa Clara, Calif. The company will take part in the panel “Lessons Learned from First Humanoid Deployments.” Other members of the panel include Jim Fan, director of AI and a distinguished scientist at NVIDIA, and Katlyn Lewicke, head of global automation strategy and intel at GXO Logistics.

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