The Board of Baillie Gifford Shin Nippon PLC announced the appointment of Professor Sethu Vijayakumar as a non-executive Director of the company with effect from 1 September 2018. Professor Vijayakumar is the Professor of Robotics at the University of Edinburgh and the Director of the Edinburgh Centre for Robotics. He is a world renowned roboticist, known for his scientific contribution to the data driven control of several iconic robotic platforms with his latest project involving a collaboration with the NASA Johnson Space Centre on the Valkyrie humanoid robot being prepared for unmanned robotic pre-deployment missions to Mars.