Our vision
Exponent's vision is to engage the brightest scientists and engineers to empower clients with solutions for a safe, healthy, sustainable, and technologically complex world.
What we do
We harness the power of technical excellence, objectivity, and disciplinary diversity to solve some of the toughest science, engineering, and business problems in our complex and interconnected society.
Advancement of Science
For over 50 years, Exponent has been committed to the advancement of science through the service of our employees to our clients and the broader scientific community.
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Diversity and Investment in Our People
Investment in our people is embedded in Exponent’s culture, which actively supports the diversity and development of our professionals by creating a stimulating, growth-oriented, and inclusive environment.
Safety and the Environment
We leverage decades of experience in analyzing accidents and failures to advise clients as they innovate, improve the resiliency of their operations, and ensure the safety and health of their users, while also enhancing local ecosystems.
Our commitments
Advancement of science
OUR IMPACT
Diversity and investment in our people
Safety and the environment
our impact
Our Commitment to the Advancement of Science
We are privileged to conduct high-quality, objective analyses that improve the application of scientific and engineering solutions throughout society.
Our contributions
Academic appointments
More than 50 Exponent consultants currently hold positions at academic institutions, where they serve as:
Professors
Research Professors
Adjunct and Associate Faculty
Lecturers
Instructors
Sample of Institutions We Serve
Sample of Topics We Teach
Scientific Committees and Advisory Boards
Our staff share their unique specialized scientific expertise on over 250 individual scientific and engineering committees and advisory boards. Many of our staff serve in leadership roles or are actively working to develop technical standards.
Peer-reviewed scientific literature
Exponent’s professionals routinely contribute to the advancement of science through peer-reviewed scientific literature, publishing a multitude of articles, book chapters, and books every year.
Authors
Peer-Reviewers
Editors
Our contributions to the scientific literature span a wide range of disciplines. Some examples of those journals include:
Our Impact
Their roles
Sample of Committees Our Staff Serves
Materials Engineering
Structural Engineering
Civil Engineering
Vehicle & Aircraft Technology
Mechanical/ Industrial Engineering
Health Sciences
Electrical Engineering
Failure Analysis
Product Design/ Development
Environmental/ Ecological Sciences
Academic Journals
Up Next: Diversity and Investment in Our People
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Environmental Sciences
Toxicology
Orthopaedics
Public Health
Chemistry and Materials Science
Medicine and Biomedical Engineering
ANSI - American National Standards Institute
ASHRAE - American Society of Heating, Refrigerating, and Air-Conditioning Engineers
ASME - American Society of Mechanical Engineers
ASTM International
IEEE - Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers
ISO - International Standards Organization
NASEM - National Academies of Science, Engineering, and Medicine
66 Different scientific organizations 244 Individual committee positions reported 34 Leadership/fellow positions (9 in Fellow positions – recognized for history or outstanding engineering achievement) 47 Document developers (member instrumental in development/writing) 153 Standard committee members
Engineering Management
Epidemiology/ Toxicology
Arizona State University
Drexel University
Georgetown University School of Medicine
Georgia Institute of Technology
Johns Hopkins University
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
New York University
Stanford University
University of California, Berkeley
University of California, Davis
University of California, Irvine
University of California, Los Angeles
Marine Pollution Bulletin
Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry
Human and Ecological Risk Assessment
Integrated Environmental Assessment and Management
Environmental Science and Technology
Regulatory Toxicology and Pharmacology
Birth Defects Research
Journal of Toxicology and Environmental Health (Parts A and B)
Reproductive Toxicology
Critical Reviews in Toxicology
Journal of Arthroplasty
Journal of Orthopaedic Research
American Journal of Orthopedics
Journal of Pediatric Orthopaedics
Science of the Total Environment
Journal of Occupational and Environmental Medicine
International Archives of Occupational and Environmental Health
Total Knee Arthroplasty
American Journal of Orthpaedics
Chemical Engineering Progress
(Journal of Toxicology and Environmental Health Parts A and B)
Ultrasound in Medicine & Biology
Journal of the American Medical Association
Annals of Biomedical Engineering
Investigative Radiology
Advisors
University of Michigan
NFPA - National Fire Protection Association
SAE International (formerly the Society of Automotive Engineers)
UL - Underwriters Laboratories
American Journal of Epidemiology
Scandinavian Journal of Work, Environment & Health
Risk Analysis
Chemosphere
Polymer Engineering and Science
Journal of Physical Chemistry
Journal of Clinical Microbiology
900+
consulting staff
doctoral-level professionals
500+
Exponent staff serve on editorial review boards or as peer reviewers
35+
50+
Exponent staff teach or have advisory appointments at
colleges and universities
75+
Exponent staff serve
65+
different organizations on
250+
technical & engineering standards committees and scientific advisory boards
900
Exponent staff have published over
articles in scientific and engineering journals
We employ
By the Numbers
Exponent staff have published in scientific and engineering journals
Our Commitment to Diversity and Investment in Our People
Attracting, exciting, developing, and rewarding exceptional people with diverse backgrounds and expertise are central to our corporate mission. As a pre-eminent global engineering and scientific consulting firm, we continuously create opportunity for hundreds of talented staff.
Methodology
Science and engineering consultants who balance exceptional technical prowess and objectivity with sound business acumen
Corporate and support staff who empower expansion into multiple markets
Leaders who inspire outstanding performance
Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion
To enable a culture where diversity, equity, and inclusion are embedded, we have articulated four pillars of action:
Recruiting
People development
Communication
Outreach
We work to ensure that our people receive equitable opportunities and training and that our development pathways are free from bias.
seminar series
Conference support
Thought leadership
Mentoring program
Sponsorship program
Continuing education
Communication and transparency, both internal and external, are key priorities as we work to further embed diversity, equity, and inclusion into our culture.
Employee engagement
Staff surveys
As a leading scientific and engineering organization, we are focused on outreach that leverages science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) to empower the communities around us.
Our impact
We are working to identify and meet candidates from increasingly diverse backgrounds and to minimize bias in our screening processes.
University recruitment program
Affinity groups
Historically Black Colleges and Universities
Other recruiting methods
Senior Sourcing
We visit over 50 universities each year, and virtual webinars allow us to engage graduate students at over 100 universities.
Our outreach to students who are members of affinity groups on campus supports diversification of our candidate pool.
University Recruitment Program
Affinity Groups
We are committed to broadening relationships with historically black colleges and universities with graduate programs in our technical disciplines.
Our recruiting teams also identify diverse candidates from employee referrals, website applicants, and conferences.
Other Recruiting Methods
Our leaders are continuously engaged with experienced consultants in other firms to stay alert to trends in the industry and to recruit.
Our recruiting teams also identify diverse candidates from employee referrals, website applicants and conferences.
Our employee resource group, which is focused on women and underrepresented minorities, teams with our human resources department to conduct a quarterly seminar series on a broad set of topics ranging from work-life balance to cross-cultural communications.
Seminar Series
We encourage our staff to participate in technical conferences, professional societies, and standards committees.
Conference Support
We support our technical staff as they share their scientific and engineering insights related to safety, health, and the environment through Exponent website and social media content, our webinar series, and external speaking opportunities.
Thought Leadership
Our mentoring program provides training and leadership opportunities to consultants early in their careers.
Mentoring Program
Our sponsorship program pairs rising mid-level consultants with senior leaders who serve as advocates and provide career opportunities. This pairing is a two-year commitment.
Sponsorship Program
We encourage training for all employees and provide training opportunities at all levels on a variety of technical and soft skills topics. Our leadership is exposed to best management practices that are vital to their development and the development of their staff.
Continuing Education
We encourage employee investment in the firm’s success by engaging with them through annual leadership meetings. We also encourage our line management to invest in employees' physical, cognitive, and emotional energy through their work.
Employee Engagement
We are continuously improving our organization through an annual employee survey to obtain input on how we can make Exponent an even better place to work.
Staff Surveys
Screening
We employ a behavioral and technical competency-based interviewing process to reduce bias in our candidate screening.
We employ a behavioral and competency based interviewing process to reduce bias in our candidate screening.
Community service
We support the initiatives of our employees as they seek local service opportunities, and we are developing strategies for deeper engagement in service through our participation in professional societies.
Community Service
Our Volunteer Connection intranet site enables employees to share stories and pictures of outreach to their local communities and to encourage others to participate.
Volunteer Connection
Volunteer connection
Matched contributions
This grant will fund 16 scholarships for African American students pursuing STEM majors at UNCF-member historically black colleges and universities.
In June of 2020, Exponent matched employee contributions to charities involved in diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives with a $50,000 grant to the United Negro College Fund (UNCF).
Matched Contributions
Pairing our newest staff with an experienced staff member, The Buddy Program provides an extra layer of support, connection, and communication for new employees.
The Buddy Program
the Buddy Program
Our Programs, Tools, and Processes Support the Development of:
Up Next: Safety and Environment
Go Back: Advancement of Science
We are working to source candidates from increasingly diverse backgrounds, and to reduce bias in our screening processes.
Our Commitment to Safety and the Environment
Exponent has worked with government agencies and a myriad of industries, contributing our engineering and scientific expertise to some of the world's most prominent and complex safety, health, and environmental issues. We leverage decades of experience in analyzing accidents and failures to advise clients as they innovate, improve the resiliency of their operations, and ensure the safety and health of their users, while also enhancing local ecosystems.
Case studies
Empowering Communities in the Chesapeake Bay
Protecting Our Health and Safety: Building Critical Asset Management Tools
Integrity of the Built and Natural Environment
Regulatory Compliance
Resilience
Exponent’s multi-disciplinary team developed an app that allows the Trust to facilitate and analyze large amounts of pollutant data and build a monitoring program that considers the configuration and uniqueness of the watershed.
The solution
“This scientific modeling creates evidence-based scenarios that can help align political, industrial, and ecological priorities around the watershed.”
– Lamis El Didi, Exponent Principal
The challenge
Working with the Chesapeake Bay Trust, Exponent was tasked with developing best management practices that meet various local stormwater-related standards designed to manage development and protect the local ecosystem. Our scientists sought to determine the cumulative effects of watershed restoration activities within a watershed and the degree of representative sampling that is required to determine levels of pollutant discharge at a county scale.
With support from surrounding counties and the State of Maryland, Exponent is helping establish and advance environmental and sustainability goals for the Chesapeake Bay area.
18 million Americans
250 species of birds, fish, insects, invertebrates, mammals, plants, reptiles, and amphibians
The project
Chesapeake Bay residents
Product Safety & Reliability
Contributions to the Peer-Reviewed Literature
“Stakeholders now have the ability to create forward-looking environmental models for different watersheds and under various stormwater management programs to better plan and use their potentially limited environmental analysis resources.”
– Dr. Robert I. Haddad, Exponent Principal Scientist & Group Vice President
Contributions to the Development of Technical and Safety Standards
Service to Professional Societies
Areas of Impact
How We Commit to Knowledge-Sharing
Go Back: Diversity and Investment in Our People
Supporting the Future of Transportation: Vehicle-to-Vehicle Communication
Building Consensus: Measuring Success for Autonomous Vehicles
“Our new process is based on what’s called fragility. Fragility is the strength of a given component assessed by the probability of failure. So, if I am forecasting a 60-mile-an-hour wind tomorrow, what is the probability that structures in a given line could fail in a way that would start a fire?”
– Dr. Brad A. James, Exponent Group Vice President & Principal Engineer
“Exponent offers the wide range of expertise necessary to analyze the risk an electric utility poses with respect to wildfires. Structural engineering, electrical engineering, big data, and data management all come into play.”
– Morgan Griffith, Exponent Senior Managing Engineer
A multi-disciplinary team of Exponent staff built bespoke tools to conduct a systems-wide review of power lines and towers, identifying which structures were most at risk of failure and allowing a major utility company to make decisions to protect their customers.
Infrastructure failures pose a direct threat to the health and safety of America's communities. Bridge collapses, wildfires from overhead power lines, and other infrastructure-related disasters destroy lives, induce stress, and damage the built and natural environment. Exponent was tasked with identifying assets at risk of failure across one of the nation's largest energy grids in the country's most populous state. The project called for expert knowledge of a variety of materials and the effects of environmental factors like wind, rain, and heat. In order to create a tool that could be applied throughout the utility's network, our engineers and data scientists modeled the health of the various assets within a degree of certainty to provide the utility with a mathematical and engineering framework to make operability decisions and repairs to protect the health and safety of the residents of California.
More than 640,000 miles of high-voltage transmission lines in the lower 48 states' power grids are at full capacity.
According to the American Society of Civil Engineers, most electric transmission and distribution lines were constructed in the 1950s and 1960s with a 50-year life expectancy.
Stats
America's infrastructure was recently rated a D+ by the American Society of Civil Engineers, but much of the world's infrastructure is in need of repair. The previous operate-until-failure model of asset management is being rapidly replaced by a more proactive asset management strategy designed to reduce risk and prevent failures. Exponent is helping public and private stewards of these assets make operability decisions and invest their resources to maximize impact and advance public safety and quality of life.
– Dr. Bill Goodfellow, Principal Scientist & Practice Director
– Dr. Bob Haddad, Principal Scientist & Group Vice President
Analyzing camera data simultaneously from two vehicles within proximity of each other with a deep learning algorithm, we found merging images from multiple perspectives improves accuracy, particularly in instances where an object is fully or partially obscured. The implications of this research go beyond vehicle-to-vehicle communication and extend into vehicle-to-infrastructure technology, such as traffic lights.
There is no standardized communication protocol or distinct channel by which AVs can communicate. Quantifying the potential analytical and safety benefits of vehicle-to-vehicle communication will create a glide path to developing that technology and protocol to build a safer transportation system.
Automation is poised to change the face of transportation. Advanced driver assistance systems (ADAS) and automated vehicles (AVs) have the potential to produce substantial safety benefits. As deployment ramps up, continued innovation will be key to saving lives by reducing crash frequency and severity. But what would happen if autonomous vehicles were able to “talk” to each other? That is what our scientists asked themselves and then tested.
Using real-world and simulated data, Exponent developed a computer-vision and artificial-intelligence (AI)-based algorithm to identify and track vehicles within the field of view of a monocular camera and then calculate the metrics. While this project is ongoing, the end goal will provide scientists and industry experts with viable, peer-reviewed safety metrics, allowing for the creation of effective scoring systems that will aid AV manufacturers as they make pre-market technological refinements, seek regulatory approval for their products, and maintain operational safety throughout the lifetime of the AV on public roads.
The current gaps between various actors in the ADS and AV industry stymie productivity and consensus-building around effectiveness and safety. A core set of industry standards will create a roadmap to building and deploying a successful product.
While automated driving system (ADS)-equipped autonomous vehicle (AV) technology develops at a rapid pace, there is not a consistent set of standards to measure the effectiveness of these technologies in navigating given scenarios. Exponent set out to change that. In collaboration with the Institute of Automated Mobility (IAM), Exponent began to address these gaps by undertaking and later publishing peer-reviewed research that includes a concise set of metrics to measure operational safety, such as measuring progress during the AV design and testing process.
