United StatesBrian McClendon
Holds a degree in electrical engineering from the University of Kansas (1986) and spent eight years at Silicon Graphics developing high-end workstation 3D graphics. Co-founded and angel-invested in Keyhole, Inc., a geospatial data visualization company purchased by Google in 2004 to produce Google Earth; Keyhole itself was spun off from Intrinsic Graphics, of which he was also a co-founder. At Google, spent the next decade leading the Geo engineering team, playing a key role in the development and evolution of Google Earth, Google Maps, Street View, Local Search, and GroundTruth—tools that helped map over 220 countries and serve over 1 billion monthly users. Left Google to join Uber in June 2015 to work on mapping and machine learning. Joined Niantic, Inc. in November 2021 as a senior vice president of augmented reality, research and mapping; in May 2025, following Niantic's sale of its games business to Scopely, joined Niantic Spatial, Inc. as chief technology officer. Elected a member of the National Academy of Engineering in 2015.