Heidi Shyu
Under Secretary of Defense for Research and Engineering & Chief Technology Officer, Defense Department
President Joe Biden nominated Heidi Shyu as under secretary in April 2021, and she took on the role shortly after. As DOD CTO, Shyu has a big job. She’s in charge of making sure the U.S. military is technologically superior, while overseeing research, development and prototyping activities across the DOD enterprise.
Shyu also oversees the activities of the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, the Missile Defense Agency, the Defense Innovation Unit, the DOD Laboratory and Engineering Center enterprise and the Under Secretariat staff focused on developing advanced technology.
This year, Shyu and DOD have focused on bolstering the nation’s manufacturing base. In recent talks, she spoke about doing so by funding startups, upskilling the manufacturing workforce, strengthening U.S. supply chains, considering climate change, preventing intellectual property theft, rebuilding America’s semiconductor industry and more, according to MIT News. She also discusses the recently announced DOD Office of Strategic Capital, a cross-sector initiative to help drive prototypes to production.
Emerging tech is also top of mind, as Shyu’s team recently released the National Defense Science and Technology Strategy, focused on innovation and emerging tech to strengthen the military’s advantage.
Why Watch
Looking ahead, Shyu has her focus in many areas. She recently spoke at the Space Symposium in Colorado Springs, announcing a new DOD initiative to collaborate with private sector on commercial space capabilities for the U.S. military. C4ISRNET also hinted at the release of a “sweeping science and technology strategy,” citing recent comments from Shyu and a sneak peek at the document at a virtual National Defense Industrial Association event.
“Everything we’ve been doing is very much focused in on joint warfighting capabilities and what we need to do as a joint force,” C4ISRNET reported Shyu as saying. “The capability that we need to develop in that arena is what’s driving a lot of our focus, especially in prototyping [and]experimentation.”