Jessica Robinson is Executive Director of the Michigan Mobility Institute where she works to accelerate the development of talent for the growing mobility industry. Starting in 2021, the Michigan Mobility Institute will offer the first-of-its-kind Master of Mobility program. The Institute is the first initiative of the Detroit Mobility Lab which she co-founded to focus on building the mobility talent infrastructure necessary to shape the sector’s future within the City of Detroit.
Jessica previously led the development of next-generation mobility efforts at Ford Smart Mobility where she was Director, City Solutions, a group focused on working with cities. This field-based team worked to understand local priorities and to identify new mobility solutions to meet current and future transportation needs. An early leader in the mobility industry, she scaled Zipcar’s innovative car sharing model as Seattle Marketing Manager, San Francisco Bay Area Locations Manager, and in new cities and airports in North America as Market Launch Manager.
In recognition of her public-private work, Jessica was named a 2017 Next City Vanguard, a competitive distinction for top young urban innovators working to make change in cities. She is Advisory Board Chair for PlanetM, an initiative of the Michigan Economic Development Corporation, set up to create a partnership of mobility organizations, communities, educational institutions, R&D, and government working together to connect Michigan with those working on innovations that will define the future of transportation.
Jessica’s background in technology and innovation includes prior work launching startup accelerator programs at Techstars with industry-leading corporate partners to further a global ecosystem focused on empowering entrepreneurs. She is an active startup mentor, advisor to the student-run Zell Lurie Commercialization Fund at the University of Michigan, and micro lender who invests in women entrepreneurs and business owners in Detroit.
Jessica graduated with highest honors from the University of Massachusetts with a BA in Anthropology and brings an unexpected perspective to the challenges that fall at the intersection of mobility and technology.
The session with this speaker is powered by re:publica on Sequencer Tour, which is a lighthouse project of Wunderbar Together. We thank the German Federal Foreign Office for making this possible.