Riverside Research has appointed Ralph D. Semmel to its board of trustees, citing his background in national security, space exploration and research and development as aligned with the company’s mission to advance technology for government customers.
“Dr. Semmel’s experience ensures Riverside Research remains focused on developing hardware, software, and other technology to meet the emerging needs of the government customer,” the company said.
Semmel is director emeritus and served as director of the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory from 2010 to 2025. As director, he was CEO of a $2.7 billion-per-year organization overseeing innovative R&D for the Defense Department, NASA, the Intelligence Community and other federal agencies.
He also was the founding head of APL’s Applied Information Sciences Department and held senior roles including business area executive for Infocentric Operations, assistant head of the Power Projection Systems Department, deputy director of the Research and Technology Development Center, business area executive for Science and Technology, and supervisor of the System and Information Sciences Group.
In academia, Semmel chaired multiple professional engineering graduate programs and was a professor at Johns Hopkins University. He also held leadership and technical positions with Wang Laboratories, MITRE Corp. and the U.S. Army, and served on the Defense Science Board and U.S. Strategic Command Strategic Advisory Group.
Today, Semmel is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations.