Luisa, a native of Bremen, Germany, sought an internship in Silicon Valley, the global center of technology innovation. Plus aligned with her values and background: Her father was a truck driver, and she felt passionate about working for an autonomous driving technology company focused on making commercial and passenger vehicles safer, more efficient and more sustainable.
“It aligned perfectly with what I wanted for our planet’s future,” Luisa said.
Luisa represents one of eleven summer interns working across different Plus teams: perception, motion planning, controls, systems, data, marketing, and operations. Ten are based in the Santa Clara office and one in Munich.
In celebration of National Intern Day, the cohort discussed their projects and the meaningful impact of their Plus internship experience.
Plus Culture: Diverse, Team-Oriented and Fun
This summer marked the first in-person internship experience for many Plus interns. Beyond building meaningful projects, Plus emphasizes mentorship opportunities and encourages interns to engage with managers and each other.
Xingyu, a controls intern, highlighted collaboration as his favorite aspect: “You can collaborate within your team and with other team members seamlessly. There’s no inter-team communication barrier or delay, so it makes your R&D very smooth.”
Derek, a systems intern, noted Plus’s diversity yields interesting discussions and innovative problem-solving: “We have teammates from all over the world, and whenever we talk with one another, we bring different cultural styles, perspectives, and ideas.”
Austin, a perception intern, observed that group recreational activities such as ping pong tournaments and weekend hikes strengthen bonds: “The culture here is a perfect combination of productivity and fun.”
Taking Ownership and Making Real-World Impact
Working independently on real-world autonomous driving projects represents a major internship benefit at Plus.
Jaidev, a perception team intern with prior computer vision research experience in self-driving technology, described his experience: “Starting from my first day at Plus, I knew that my mentor was always available to help but I felt a sense of freedom and ownership in my computer vision projects. This helped build my confidence and increased my productivity.”
Harsh, also on the perception team, generates occupancy grids from multi-view images to identify obstacles and inform vehicle path planning: “I’m excited about the project because it allows me to work on new techniques and technologies that will be integrated into the overall system.”
The intern projects have tangible impact on Plus’s core autonomous driving software.
The Demo Ride: Technology Innovation in Action
Taking a demo ride on a Plus autonomous vehicle highlights the summer internship experience. This reinforces the company’s leadership in self-driving innovation, Xingyu noted: “Interning here is a unique opportunity.”
Yulun, a motion planning intern, praised the seamless demo performance: “The system as a whole is very robust and resists all kinds of false positive cases. It’s a very impressive commercial product.”
Lessons Learned: Engage and Remain Confident
Taking initiative and connecting with Plus team members across departments represents a key to maximizing internship value, the cohort emphasized.
This includes attending weekly engineering presentations and engaging with operational experts and drivers who offer perspectives on engineering, marketing and operations.
Yinjia, a data team intern, values his team’s weekly Thursday presentations where different speakers address engineering topics of their choice: These sessions prove informative for learning about various team tasks.
Maintaining confidence while working alongside industry experts constitutes another success factor. Interns receive treatment as full team members, Luisa observed: “It’s not: ‘Oh, I’m only an intern.’ We’re made to feel we’re capable of achieving great things.”