David Ray’s biggest achievements of 2020 were integrating three acquisitions in his previous position, bringing together work related to unmanned air and ground systems, and integrating artificial intelligence and analytics into digital battle space solutions. Another achievement was working on a robotic combat vehicle that applied AI and analytics innovations to all mission types — land, sea, air and space.
Space is all about tomorrow and bringing the future to the present, Ray said.
“We can achieve this by rolling out a digital engineering ecosystem across multiple space programs and enterprises; leveraging digital transformation technologies to deliver space-as-a-service to meet the demands of contested and congested space as well as developing the foundational ecosystems required for human and robotic space exploration; and integrating capabilities in ways the traditional (original equipment manufacturers) cannot,” he added.
Why Watch
In 2021, Ray’s team is heavily focused on investing in areas such as digital engineering, cloud and AI and applying them to all aspects of the space domain. They will apply talent, teaming partners and ingenuity to invest research and development dollars in those areas that directly impact critical customer missions and user needs, whether it’s missile warning and hypersonics, positioning, navigation, timing, communications, space superiority, remote sensing, climate research, interplanetary travel and exploration, or shaving some parsecs off the Kessel Run.