Professor Venu Govindaraju
Venu Govindaraju, PhD is an Indian-American Computer Scientist and a pioneer in artificial intelligence and machine learning. He is the Senior Vice President for Research, Innovation, and Economic Development and a SUNY Distinguished Professor of Computer Science and Engineering at the University at Buffalo, The State University of New York, with over three decades of experience in handwriting recognition, document image analysis, pattern recognition, and biometrics.
Venu is the Founding Director of the Center for Unified Biometrics and Sensors (CUBS), the Director and Principal Investigator of the National AI Institute for Exceptional Education (AI4ExceptionalEd), and a Board Member of Empire AI. He is recognized in the United States Congressional Record as a "trailblazer whose pioneering research has transformed artificial intelligence and document analysis, leaving an indelible mark on technological innovation and societal progress."
Venu is known for leading the team that developed the world's first autonomous system capable of deciphering handwritten addresses, a breakthrough that transformed the United States Postal Service and the global postal industry, saving billions of dollars by automating the processing and precise delivery of over 25 billion handwritten mail pieces per year.
In 1996, Venu earned a patent for his research on handwriting recognition and document processing, which became core to automated mail delivery. He was the prime technical lead responsible for technology transfer to Lockheed Martin and Siemens Corporation for deployment by the US Postal Service, Australia Post, and the UK Royal Mail.
The technology's success led to licensing agreements that expanded its impact globally, and it remains widely regarded as one of the first success stories in artificial intelligence. Read AI for Good: The purpose behind Dr Venu Govindaraju's postal services and speech therapy initiatives and AI is a game changer for students with disabilities. Schools are still learning to harness it.
Venu's work continues to change lives as Principal Investigator for the National AI Institute for Exceptional Education, supported by a $20 million grant from the National Science Foundation and the Department of Education's Institute of Education Sciences. The institute is a partnership of multidisciplinary faculty from eight other institutions, including Cornell University, Penn State, Stanford University, and the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign.
Venu and his team of researchers seek to aid the work of speech-language pathologists in identifying children with speech and language delays, conditions that can lead to long-term academic and social-emotional struggles if left untreated. This initiative will impact over 480 K-12 students in New York classrooms before national expansion. Read Researchers Turn to AI to Help Diagnose Children's Speech Disorders.
In 2020, Venu established the Institute for Artificial Intelligence and Data Science (IAD) at the University at Buffalo, which brings together researchers, labs, institutes, and centers of excellence focused on advancements in AI, data science, computational science, and related areas of research. He serves as Cochair of the State University of New York (SUNY) AI Task Group and is an Advisor to the SUNY-IBM AI Research Alliance, a $2 billion strategic partnership between the State of New York, SUNY, and IBM to create a global research hub for developing next-generation AI hardware.
Since 2025, Venu has served on the Board of Directors of Empire AI, a New York State consortium whose $500 million computing center will be built on the University at Buffalo's North campus, making it among the most powerful computing centers on a university campus. He also serves on the Operations and Finance Committees of Empire AI. Read Empire AI research getting head start at UB.
Venu founded the Center for Unified Biometrics and Sensors (CUBS) in 2003, with the mission of advancing the science of biometric technologies for both civilian and homeland security applications by integrating pattern recognition and machine learning algorithms with sensor technology.
Previously, from 1992 to 2003, he served as a Research Scientist and later Associate Director at the Center of Excellence for Document Analysis and Recognition (CEDAR) at the University at Buffalo. He became Associate Professor in the Department of Computer Science and Engineering at the University at Buffalo in 2000, a Full Professor in 2002, a University at Buffalo Distinguished Professor from 2008 to 2010, and was named SUNY Distinguished Professor, the highest faculty rank in the State University of New York system, in 2010.
From 2014 to 2025, Venu served as Vice President for Research and Economic Development before being promoted to Senior Vice President. Read Govindaraju's role expanded to include AI, other emerging fields.
Venu earned his PhD in Computer Science in 1992 from the University at Buffalo. He earned his Master's Degree of Science in Computer Science in 1988 from the University at Buffalo. He earned his Bachelor's Degree of Technology with Honors in Computer Science and Engineering in 1986 from the Indian Institute of Technology, Kharagpur.
Venu has coauthored over 460 scientific papers and six books, including Handbook of Statistics Vol 48: Deep Learning, Handbook of Statistics Vol 33: Big Data, and Guide to OCR for Indic Scripts: Document Recognition and Retrieval. He holds six patents and has served on the editorial boards of premier journals, including the IEEE Transactions on Pattern Analysis and Machine Intelligence.
He served as Editor-in-Chief of the IEEE Biometrics Council Compendium and as President of the IEEE Biometrics Council from 2015 to 2017. He has been the primary advisor to 47 doctoral students and has led sponsored projects funded by federal agencies and industry totaling approximately $100 million during his career.
Venu is a Fellow of the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM), the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE), the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), the International Association for Pattern Recognition (IAPR), the International Society for Optics and Photonics (SPIE), and a Fellow of the National Academy of Inventors (NAI).
In 2025, he became a Member of the Pan American Academy of Engineering. He received the Person of the Year Award from the Council of Heritage and Arts of India in 2024 for his groundbreaking contributions to AI, the University at Buffalo President's Medal in 2024, the IAPR/ICDAR Outstanding Achievements Award in 2015, the IIT Kharagpur Distinguished Alumnus Award in 2014, the IEEE Technical Achievement Award in 2010, the MIT Global Indus Technovator Award in 2004, and the ICDAR Outstanding Young Investigator Award in 2001. He has also been recognized by leaders in Congress, the New York State Assembly, and the County of Erie.
Venu was born in Vijayawada, India, and lives in Buffalo, New York.
Watch AI is a Game Changer for Students with Disabilities and Venu Govindaraju on Future Biometrics Research. Watch Connect NY: Harnessing Artificial Intelligence.
Listen to Humans in the Loop: Jinjun Xiong and Venu Govindaraju and Achieving Joy and Mastery in Public Schools: The Evolution of AI in WNY. Listen to Training AI to Spot Dyslexia.
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