Summary
Gavin Kenneally is the co-founder and CEO of Ghost Robotics, the Philadelphia-based maker of the Vision 60 military quadruped robot. He led the Vision 60’s mechanical design as the company’s first head of product before becoming CEO in 2022, following the death of co-founder Jiren Parikh.
Career
Kenneally earned a Bachelor of Engineering in mechanical engineering, specializing in mechatronics, from Concordia University in Montreal in 2012. He then began a PhD program in Mechanical Engineering and Applied Mechanics (MEAM) at the University of Pennsylvania, joining Professor Daniel Koditschek’s Kod*lab, where his research focused on actuator transparency and the energetic cost of proprioception in legged robots, along with work on door-opening and stair-climbing behaviors (GRASP Lab; Kod*lab). He completed his PhD in 2021, while already working at the company he had co-founded years earlier.
In 2015, while still a PhD student, Kenneally co-founded Ghost Robotics with fellow Kod*lab researcher Avik De and CEO Jiren Parikh, commercializing direct-drive legged robot technology developed in Koditschek’s lab. Kenneally became Ghost Robotics’ Chief Product Officer in February 2016, responsible for the mechanical design of the company’s flagship Vision 60 quadrupedal unmanned ground vehicle. He moved into the Chief Operating Officer role in November 2021, and became CEO in March 2022 after Jiren Parikh’s death (LinkedIn).
As CEO, Kenneally has led Ghost Robotics through a period of rapid growth and controversy, including the U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s disclosure of border-surveillance testing of Vision 60 robots, a patent dispute with rival Boston Dynamics that was settled in 2025, and LIG Nex1’s 2024 acquisition of a 60% controlling stake in the company. He has authored roughly half a dozen academic papers and is listed as an inventor on thirteen patents related to legged robot design (Robotics Summit & Expo).
Source Notes
This profile draws on Kenneally’s LinkedIn profile, his University of Pennsylvania GRASP Lab and Kod*lab pages, and speaker biographies from the Robotics Summit & Expo and The Robot Report. His exact birth year and hometown are not disclosed in available sources and have been intentionally left blank rather than estimated.