Ian Westmacott, PhD

Ian Westmacott, Ph.D., is the Director of the Software and Application Innovation Lab, a professional software development lab at the Hariri Institute dedicated to supporting BU research. He leads a team that works with faculty and students to develop software, systems, and AI infrastructure tailored to their research needs. 

Westmacott is an experienced software engineering leader with expertise in software development, applied machine learning, computer vision, robotics, video analytics, and intelligent systems. Before joining Boston University, he held senior engineering leadership positions at Symbotic, Veo Robotics, and Amazon, where he led multidisciplinary teams developing large-scale software platforms and AI-driven technologies. His work has focused on translating cutting-edge research into products that improve industrial automation, safety, and intelligent decision-making.

Westmacott earned his Ph.D. in Computer Science from Boston University, where his research explored type-based program transformations and region inference. He also holds a B.S. in Computer Science from Suffolk University. He has authored numerous technical publications and holds more than 30 patents in video analysis and security technologies.