Ivo Stivoric is the 2026 Innovative Leader of the Year

In keeping with a tradition among leaders at X, the Moonshot Factory, Ivo Stivoric has a quirky title: Lt. Trouble + Maker. Since joining more than a dozen years ago, Stivoric has led a host of diverse projects, from industrial robots to ocean health initiatives. His portfolio has included Taara, a wireless communications technology that uses light beams instead of cables; Tapestry, a sort of Google Maps for the electric grid; Chorus, which provides AI-powered tracking tools to make supply chain operations more efficient; and Materra, which uses AI and molecular-level scanning to help sort trash and rescue valuable, reusable materials from waste streams. “Ivo has a nose for the act of creation, how fragile it is, how much molding and shaping it takes, how long it can take, and where to go looking for those special seed crystals that make particularly special initial conditions for innovation,” says Astro Teller, X’s Captain of Moonshots (CEO). “Many of X’s best graduates over the past decade have grown up under his guidance and many of those would have been stopped along the way if it hadn’t been for his interventions and his vision.” {"blockType":"mv-promo-block","data":{"imageDe…