CLOSE-UP: Osato, Nigerian who sends drones to space, works for US army and owns a university
Nigerians are connecting bright dots on the map of the world; breaking new grounds, setting new records, and as Osatohanmwen Osemwengie will put it, “researching what doesn’t exist yet”!
Osemwengie, who hails from Edo state, left the country in the early 80s and has become a force to reckon with in Robotics Engineering. If there was a Nobel for Robotics Engineering Osato, as he is called, may have won one.
He still holds on to his strong ties in Nigeria and May have visited the country in December 2016, after his mother’s 85th birthday.
“My mom is celebrating her 85 years birthday today…you are very special, mom! Happy birthday! I am looking forward to celebrating Christmas and New Year with you in Nigeria this year,” he wrote in a note to his mother.
SIX MASTERS, FOUR PhD
The academic, who has bagged six masters degrees and four doctorate degrees, served as an administrator at the College of Education, Benin, where he was named educator of the year.
“Six master degrees, not bad. I was in the State of Ohio on Monday December 12th, 2016 for my Masters of Business Administration (MBA) graduation.
“This is my 6th master degree and will begin work on my 7th master degree in January 2017, and my 4th PhD. degree at University of Texas at Dallas in September of 2017.
“You know the proverb, ‘all work and no play makes jack a dull boy’ well, for me, all work and my play is acquiring graduate degrees. Learning is relaxing and takes my mind of my job projects.”
WORKS WITH NASA, SENDS DRONES TO SPACE
The robotic genius, who was a star at the 2008 world robotics championship, also works with National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), and has succeeded in sending drones to different planets, Mars and Jupiter inclusive.
“NASA’s Next Mars Rover Progresses toward 2020 launch. Many years ago I worked on prototype of Mars Curiosity Rover that has roam Mars for more than 4 years and counting,” Osato said of his work with NASA.
“We are now working on the next rover set to launch in 2020”.
In a CNN report, Osato and a team of engineers at the NASA Jet Propulsion Lab, California, “received a signal from 540 million miles across the solar system, confirming our Juno spacecraft has successfully started orbiting Jupiter, the largest planet in our solar system”.
Speaking on the new grounds broken, he said “now my team’s turn to land humans on MARS. Go NASA, Go Vertical”.
HE’S A CEO, OWNS AN AMERICAN UNIVERSITY, WORKS FOR US ARMY
Osato owns a drones company, by the name Ubiquity Interface Inc., which is being run by himself as CEO, Ken, his brother, a retired lieutenant colonel in the US Army, and a team of foreign engineers.
His latest research released in February, 2017, has been submitted to the US Army, and is titled “QuantumDB API for Database Security and Integrity Enhancements”.
“QuantumDB is a database system required for implementation of secured database management system by the Army and Department of Defense within non-clustered environment in tactical space where computing and storage resources are limited,” the research abstract reads.
Company Profile
In 2011, he founded the “world’s first tuition free, engineering degree-granting university,” Open Robotics University.
The University, which was powered by Google+, awards bachelor, masters and doctorate degrees in robotics engineering for free.
The university headquarters is in Ohio. Open Robotics University currently has students in 45 cities in 25 countries.
It is unclear if the university still exists. Some claim, it went defunct in 2013.
HE IS ALSO A FAMILY MAN
In 2016, he visited his major US base, in Ohio, where he met with his family and shared how much he will miss them, when he returns to Florida.
“My greatest moment from my visit to Ohio for my graduation was spending some time with my children. I have not seen them in two years,” he wrote in a Facebook post.
Osato and Family
“My daughter has been working in Japan for two years, and my son busy with college and now returning to graduate school. Sad to leave Ohio, again, I will be going to visit brothers in Texas for four days, before returning to my base in Jacksonville, Florida.”
Osato was a facilitator for the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation- sponsored Ohio Leadership for Integrating Technology Initiative (OLIT).
One of the andrews that left in the eighties. Guess who was the head of Government at the time he
Left?
In 30yesrs Nigeria will see the effect of the current backward drift with many of those who have just left shining in other climes. Good for him but dad for the country.
buhari!lol
unfortunately, it is people like you and the critics that dont spend the energy in making the bad people change but destroy the effort of one who wants to change the country for good. If the country was not bad, would it need fixing. was it 4 years of Buhari that made Nigeria what it is today? As much as I dont like the situation of Nigeria, please think of solution and not blame.
Nigeria has produced a lot of great minds. Too bad the economic conditions don’t encourage great thinkers hence the brain drain.
Congratulations to Mr. Osato for his acamedic exploits and attainment. Meanwhile, I woud like o ask why despite our academic achievements, great corporation and industries of these world are not founded by blacks – The Microsofts, Google, Ford Motors, Toyota, CNN etc. Is our education only to have PHD’s and it ends there? Let us deploy these ‘too much learning” to creating great corporation and industries that would outlive us. My 10 pence any way.