Inside Plus: Yefei Peng, Vice President of Data

Dr. Yefei Peng has over 15 years of experience in the areas of machine learning, data mining, and predictive modeling. With a notable career at Yahoo, Google, and Uber, where he led pricing programs and drove China’s growth, Yefei later served as senior director of engineering at one of the world’s largest fintech companies where he oversaw the company’s AI-driven digital finance platform.

Q: Could you share some insights about your background and why you decided to join Plus?

A: “Throughout my entire career, I have focused on data and machine learning. The self-driving industry, particularly the progress made in autonomous commercial vehicles, has been remarkable in recent years. Plus has already made significant strides in commercializing its first product, and that’s what inspired me to become part of this exciting adventure. I wanted to contribute to transforming the transportation industry with advanced technology.”

Q: Describe your role at Plus.

A: “Self-driving systems are powered by machine learning models and generate a huge amount of data. My team’s focus is to derive valuable insights from data and extract high-quality information for the continuous improvement of our autonomous driving technology. We collect and process extensive volumes of real-time and offline data to enable our automated learning and validation process while building highly scalable infrastructure.”

Q: How would you describe the Plus culture?

A: “Building self-driving vehicles is an endeavor that requires a deep integration of various engineering disciplines. We have a top-notch team with people from very diverse backgrounds and expertise. While we each use our individual creativity and problem-solving skills, we also collaborate greatly across the engineering team and with other departments.”

Q: What aspect of your job do you find most rewarding?

A: “The most fulfilling part of my job is when we deliver our product to our customers and receive their feedback and endorsements. Witnessing how Plus’s open software platform has been enabling high-performance, safe, and affordable autonomous driving capabilities at scale for our customers is truly unique and rewarding. As we continuously expand the capabilities of our systems, this sense of satisfaction only grows.”

Q: How do you spend your downtime?

A: “I spend my downtime with my wife and kids. I am an avid hiker and was on the mountaineering team during my college days. Running has also been a passion, and I’ve completed 13 marathons. While the pandemic has posed challenges for training and competing, I recently accomplished a half-marathon.”