Professor Robert (Bob) Williamson’s interest in technology started at age eight tinkering with electronics, and in the 1970s operated a ham radio station (call-sign VK4ARW).
He studied electrical engineering at QUT, obtained a Master of Engineering Science and PhD (in electrical Engineering) from the University of Queensland and since 1990 has been at the Australian National University, currently in the Research School of Computer Science.
He was instrumental in the creation of NICTA, and served as foundation Canberra laboratory director, and then later as scientific director.
He currently leads NICTA’s machine learning research group and his personal technical research is focussed on theoretical aspects of machine learning. His current project aims to build a problem-oriented foundation for all of machine learning by focusing on the end-problem being solved, rather than the technique used.
He is a fellow of the Australian Academy of Science.
[September 2015]