Vania La Rocca

• Senior Director Product Management, 2024-11 - Present
• Director Product Operations, 2023-02 - 2024-10

Reporting directly to the Chief Product Officer (CPO), lead the strategic direction, roadmap, and cross-functional execution of Cerence’s AI and Generative AI product portfolio.

• Orchestrated Cerence AI’s transition to Generative AI, launching next‑gen voice and conversational experiences for global automotive OEMs
• Launched Cerence xUI™, an agentic hybrid edge‑cloud LLM platform enabling contextual, multi‑user in‑car AI interactions even offline
• Introduced Small Language Models (SLMs) with Microsoft, delivering industry‑first embedded GenAI capabilities optimized for low latency
• Defined and optimized company‑level product operations and innovation pipelines, leading the phase‑gate innocation and productization funnel
• Led C‑level portfolio investment and divestment reviews, guiding the CEO, CPO, CFO, and CTO in invest/harvest/stop decisions to drive organic growth
• Managed product pricing strategy (royalty and SaaS), maximizing value creation and aligning business models with market opportunities
• Directed global, multi‑disciplinary teams (PMs, engineers, UX, researchers)

Key Product Achievements:

• xUI https://tinyurl.com/cerencexui 
• CaLLM Edge https://tinyurl.com/cerencecallmedge 
• Chat Pro https://tinyurl.com/cerencechatpro 

Previously:

• Senior Principal Product Manager, 2022-06 - 2023-01
• Principal Product Manager, 2021-01 - 2022-05
• Senior Product Manager, 2017-02 - 2020-12

Owned vision, strategy, and execution for the Text-to-Speech product line, including roadmap definition, market research, and cross-functional delivery with 100+ global team members.

• Drove 25% of Cerence revenue by managing the full lifecycle of ML-powered Text-to-Speech products, deployed in 400M+ cars (1 in 2 globally)
• Led the transition to Neural TTS across cloud and edge, delivering the industry’s first embedded Neural TTS for automotive platforms
• Expanded market presence into automotive, consumer electronics, and smart mobility through strategic product positioning and global sales support
• Partnered with AI research, engineering, and design teams to accelerate innovation and release cycles, enabling cutting-edge voice experiences

Key Product Achievements:

• Reader: https://tinyurl.com/cerencereadertts 

Key Performance Achievements:

• Promoted 4 times in 8 years due to superior performance
• 2 times recipient of Cerence AI "Formula One Club Award", recognizing top performers 
• 5 times recipient of Cerence AI internal "CEO Spot Award" for sales performance

• Led a 15+ person software team delivering end‑to‑end Telematics/IoT solutions for a major off‑road OEM in agriculture and construction
• Managed full project lifecycle, from firmware to web app development, enabling advanced fleet management capabilities
• Defined project strategy, planning, and execution, ensuring on‑time, high‑quality feature delivery
• Oversaw customer relationships and delivery

• Supported sales of AUTOSAR 4.x embedded software in the Italian automotive market
• Led technical evaluations and prepared proposals to secure customer deals

Led a joint customer-supplier team combining members from Cerence and BMW, driving next-generation embedded software development for BMW infotainment head units, ensuring production readiness and system stability.

• Directed a 6-person Tiger Team to guarantee zero unrecovered system hangs at production start
• Managed an 11-person Tiger Team delivering critical low-level system functions (Lifecycle, Power Management) into the software baseline
• Owned end-to-end deployment of System Watchdog functionality, from design through integration and testing
• Defined R&D feature planning and execution strategy, ensuring timely, high-quality delivery and defect reduction
• Spent one year working on-site at BMW premises in Germany, leveraging Agile project management to meet tough deadlines and deliver expected results
• Fostered close collaboration between customer and supplier teams to navigate complex technical and organizational challenges

• Reviewed software requirements and architectural models to identify and resolve specification errors
• Drafted Statements of Work (SoWs) for multiple software suppliers, aligning deliverables with project goals
• Planned and tracked software supplier development activities to ensure timely delivery of milestones

Master of Science final project: "Anomalies detection in backbone networks"