Michael C. Grant, Ph.D. – Biography

Michael C. Grant, Ph.D. is an independent researcher and consultant in computational mathematics, specializing in optimization, signal processing, and simulation. He is the primary developer and maintainer of CVX, a modeling framework for disciplined convex programming that is now in wide use in university and commercial settings, in both teaching and research.

Dr. Grant received a B.S. degree from the University of Texas at Austin in 1990, and M.S. and Ph.D. degrees from Stanford University in 1992 and 2005, respectively. He was the recipient of a National Merit Scholarship, a Virginia and Ernest Cockrell, Jr. Scholarship in Engineering, and a National Science Foundation Fellowship.

After the completion of his doctorate, Dr. Grant remained at Stanford to continue his research, serving as a consulting assistant professor in the Information Systems Laboratory in the Department of Electrical Engineering. He also served as a research associate in the Department of Energy Resources Engineering, where he assisted in the development of the Smart Fields Consortium, a multidisciplinary program tasked with applying advanced optimization methods to petroleum reservoir development.

Dr. Grant was a co-founder and vice president of Numerical Technologies, Inc. (later acquired by Synopsys), which applied advanced numerical methods to the simulation, verification, and design of the semiconductor lithography process. He was also an early contributor to Clarity Wireless, Inc. (later acquired by Cisco Systems, Inc.), which designed and produced advanced wireless networking algorithms, chipsets, and equipment.

Dr. Grant currently lives in Austin, TX with his wife and daughter.