Federal Leadership

As the Department of Defense’s undersecretary for research and engineering, Heidi Shyu essentially serves as the chief technology officer of the DOD. In this role, she has a long list of priorities for the department’s adoption of advanced and emerging technologies, including artificial intelligence, cybersecurity, hypersonics, next-generation telecommunications networks like 5G, microelectronics, network-of-network systems, quantum computing, and others. “Successful competition requires imagining our military capability as an ever-evolving collective, not a static inventory of weapons in development or sustainment,” Shyu said in early 2022.