Person
1 episodes · 22 quoted claims
Mattias Ulbrich is both CIO of Porsche and CEO of Porsche Digital, a Porsche subsidiary focused on new technologies.
“I'm the CIO of Porsche and at the same time the CEO of Porsche Digital, a subsidiary of Porsche, where we really focus on the new stuff”
Porsche Digital has locations in Atlanta, Silicon Valley, China, Tel Aviv and Germany.
“we are in in the United States, like Atlanta and Silicon Valley, but we are as well in China, for example, we are in Tel Aviv, and of course, in Germany.”
Porsche's US headquarters is in Atlanta, which is why Porsche Digital operates there.
“the Porsche headquarter is there, right? That's the reason why we are there, because we have a very close collaboration with the headquarter in in the United States, in Atlanta”
Ulbrich began his career at Hewlett Packard in the 1990s.
“I started my career at uh Hewlett Packard a long time ago in the nineteen's.”
Ulbrich joined Audi at its Neckarsulm plant, where the A8 is built.
“Then I had the opportunity to join Audi at the time in Neckarsulm. This is a plant where the A eight, for example, is built.”
Ulbrich served as CIO of SEAT in Barcelona.
“I had a great time in Barcelona, where I was the CIO of SEAT at that time.”
Ulbrich spent six years at Volkswagen Group headquarters in Wolfsburg, responsible for worldwide IT services.
“After that, I had six years in Wolfsburg, the headquarter of the Volkswagen Group. I was responsible for the IT services worldwide.”
Ulbrich was CIO of Audi for six years.
“And after that, I became the CIO of Audi. I took this position for six years.”
Before joining Porsche, Ulbrich studied digital transformation at MIT and in Saint Gallen, Switzerland.
“So I moved to MIT and Saint Gallen here in in in Switzerland to learn more about the term of, let's say, transformation, digital transformation”
At the end of the 1990s, cars contained many electronic devices that initially communicated poorly with each other, which drew Ulbrich to automotive work.
“it was a time at the end of the nineteen's, where there were so many different electronic devices in the car.”
Porsche uses AI to predict orders so the right cars reach dealerships, which Ulbrich says is difficult in China.
“how we can predict for order to deliver markets, uh, to have the right cars in the dealerships. That is not easy, for example, in China.”
Porsche's design studio in Weissach uses AI to support design ideas.
“I was in the design uh studio here in Weissach uh two weeks ago, and we had a long discussion how they use AI to really support their design ideas.”
Porsche designers can reshape digital models with AI support before building the first physical model.
“they can use different models and and really reshape the digital model before they go into the first physical model.”
Porsche has an acoustic anomaly assistant that works with engineers to understand noise anomalies such as those in car doors.
“we have, for example, an acoustic anomaly assistant that works really with the with the engineer to understand um anomalies, uh, that we have, for example, in the door”
A specialist in Porsche Digital's Berlin lab wrote an application that could identify the type of coffee a machine made by listening to it.
“an IS specialist uh wrote an application that could listen to the coffee machine and know what kind of coffee is done.”
Porsche R&D staff said they could not listen for door noises overnight, which motivated the acoustic AI project.
“we are listening to our door all the day, but we can't listen at the night, for example, because we are not there.”
About 200 people work on Porsche's AI program.
“the AI program is, um, let's say, it's 200 person that really work on that in in the Porsche organization”
Ulbrich trained every IT person in his organization on AI.
“I started to train really every IT person in my organization.”
Some engineers moved into Porsche's IT organization to help run its AI platform.
“The they they moved from engineering to the IT to drive this as a platform. We have an AI platform”
Ulbrich says about 40% of his organization are new people and 60% were already at the company.
“we have maybe 40% new people and 60% that were already in the organization.”
Ulbrich says finance needs more external hires for AI because it has less technology knowledge than engineering.
“In finance, for example, you have totally different approach, and you have to bring more external people to really drive those ideas”
Ulbrich cites the Porsche Taycan as an example of Porsche's effort to put better cars on the road for sustainability.
“Porsche is doing a lot to to getting better cars on the road, like the Taycan, for example”