ATARC Federal IT Newscast

This episode of the Space and Defense Innovation Launchpad Podcast features Chris Crumbly, Director of the Institute of Digital Enterprise Advancement and its professional education arm, DigitalWERX, as well as an instructor at Calhoun Community College, exploring model-based systems engineering (MBSE) and its role in digital engineering and Industry 4.0. He traces MBSE’s early use at NASA, explains why adoption is now being driven more aggressively by the Department of Defense, and describes how IDEA, DigitalWERX, and partner schools are building programs to grow MBSE talent across industry, government, and transitioning service members.

This episode features a conversation with Ben Garcia of Weber State University’s MARS (Miller Advanced Research and Solutions Center) about how academia can more effectively support the aerospace and defense industry, particularly in high‑temperature composites and hypersonic materials. The discussion explores technology and manufacturing readiness, industry–university collaboration models, and how intellectual property, factory-like training environments, and digital manufacturing can accelerate innovation from lab concepts to fielded capabilities.

This episode features Alex Morgan, a materials scientist and fire safety expert, discussing how material flammability and fire hardening are engineered across civilian and military aircraft and spacecraft, from aging aluminum airframes to modern composite structures and unmanned systems. The conversation dives into challenges like lithium-ion battery fires, high-oxygen spacecraft environments, reentry heat shields, and evolving regulations, highlighting how fire science adapts to new aerospace technologies to protect people, payloads, and missions.

In the inaugural episode of the Space Innovation and Defense Launchpad Podcast, Mark Giaconia of Vantor (formerly Maxar) shares his path from Army Special Forces into geospatial technology and software engineering, describing how GEOINT, coding, and data infrastructure have evolved over the past two decades. The conversation dives into tactical-edge geospatial intelligence, AI/ML for analytics, data fusion, UX and policy frictions in government and commercial environments, and how to turn massive volumes of sensor data into concise, actionable insights for users.

In this episode, host Tom Suder, Founder of the Advanced Technology Academic Research Center, sits down with Allen Hill, retired Chief Information Officer at the Federal Communications Commission, for a reflective conversation on four decades of service in federal IT.
They explore the FCC’s cloud transformation, the shift to secure FedRAMP environments, and the importance of building technical teams that can both architect and execute modernization at scale.
Beyond technology, Hill offers perspective on leadership, mentorship, and sustaining a mission driven career in public service. Whether you work in federal IT, lead modernization initiatives, or follow the evolution of government technology, this episode provides valuable insight from one of the community’s most respected CIOs.