Municipal Parking Services names Bob Samson president

By Atlas Watchline Staff · Corporate · August 20, 2026

Municipal Parking Services said Robert H. "Bob" Samson has joined the Austin company as president as it expands its AI-driven parking enforcement platform.

Municipal Parking Services said on Aug. 20, 2026, that Robert H. "Bob" Samson has joined the Austin, Texas, company as president.

The company said Samson will help lead its growth as it expands its AI-driven parking enforcement and compliance platform and works with municipalities, transportation agencies and public-sector technology partners.

MPS said Samson brings more than three decades of technology and government leadership experience. It said he spent 36 years at IBM, where he led the company’s global public-sector business, and later served as New York state chief information officer.

The release said Samson’s IBM public-sector organization included more than 10,000 employees serving customers around the world. It also said he helped modernize New York state’s information technology infrastructure after retiring from IBM in 2009.

According to the company, Samson served beginning in 2011 on New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s Spending and Government Efficiency Commission. The release said the commission helped develop recommendations that contributed to the creation of the New York State Office of Information Technology Services and consolidation of technology operations across state government.

MPS said Cuomo appointed Samson as state CIO in 2017. In that role, the company said, he oversaw about 3,400 state IT employees and an annual technology budget of about $855 million, with responsibilities that included statewide cybersecurity, cloud migration, IT consolidation and modernization initiatives supporting more than 40 state agencies.

CEO Joe Caldwell said Samson brings "a rare combination of enterprise technology leadership, government experience, and practical understanding of how public-sector organizations evaluate, procure, and deploy technology." Caldwell said Samson’s background aligns with MPS’s next stage of growth and will help the company bring AI-enabled solutions to city challenges.

Samson said government is undergoing "a fundamental transformation" in how it uses technology to deliver services, improve safety and manage complex communities. He said MPS has built a platform that can help cities make streets and parking environments safer, more accessible and more efficiently managed.

He said he is excited to help cities move beyond traditional parking enforcement toward intelligent infrastructure and technology-enabled public safety.

MPS said its SafetyStick® platform provides continuous, solar-powered monitoring and photo-verified evidence for city review. The company said the system is intended to improve compliance, accessibility and public safety.

The company said it plans to accelerate work with municipalities, state and local transportation agencies, public-sector technology organizations and enterprise technology partners. It also said Samson has received the Government VAR Lifetime Achievement Award, StateScoop’s State Executive of the Year award, the Former Governor Hugh L. Carey Public Service Award and a place on Government Technology’s Top 25 Doers, Dreamers and Drivers list.

MPS described itself as a company focused on AI-driven enforcement and compliance technologies and said it has operated since 2013. The company said its platform uses embedded AI for license plate recognition, dynamic pricing, zone monitoring and enforcement.

Sources

• PR Newswire release

Editorial note: This article was prepared with AI assistance and includes source attribution for reader review.

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