Rob A. Rutenbar (born November 19, 1957) is an American academic noted for contributions to software tools that automate analog integrated circuit design, and custom hardware platforms for high-performance automatic speech recognition.

At CMU, his research group developed a wide range of novel CAD tools to optimize, synthesize, and perform geometric layout on analog and mixed-signal integrated circuits.

Also while at CMU, his In Silico Vox project developed novel hardware platforms for very fast, energy efficient speech recognition.

[13] At CMU, and continuing at Illinois, he led some of the first work to apply data mining and machine learning techniques for electronic design automation.

[19][20] Rutenbar serves on boards for several entrepreneurial and cultural organizations in Pittsburgh, including LifeX, Innovation Works, and the Carnegie Science Center.

[21][22][23] As several massive open online course (MOOC) providers emerged in 2012, Rutenbar led the University of Illinois Urbana–Champaign to establish a relationship with Coursera.

degrees at Illinois called “CS+X” (a term originally coined by Alfred Spector,[28] a former colleague of Rutenbar's at CMU) that integrate computing and “X” disciplinary topics, ranging from anthropology to astronomy, music, and agriculture.

[44] He is a two-time winner of the IEEE Transactions on Computer-Aided Design Donald O. Pedersen Best Paper Award, in 2011 and again in 2013, for work on statistical analysis for nanoscale silicon.