SAN FRANCISCO, March 21, 2023 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Orbital Sidekick (OSK), the global leader in space-based hyperspectral intelligence, today announced the expansion of its advisory board to include five distinguished leaders across the space, defense, and geospatial intelligence industries. New appointees include Thomas Cooley, Jorge Delgado, David Gauthier, Jeffrey Harris, and Douglas Loverro. The group joins existing board members Nick Stavropoulos, the former President and COO of Pacific Gas & Electric, and Jesus Soto, the EVP of Quanta Services.
The expanded advisory board will play a key strategic role in OSK’s operations as the company prepares to launch its GHOSt Constellation, a fleet of satellites equipped with best-in-class hyperspectral sensors, and commercializes its asset monitoring solution. In particular, each new member offers a dynamic mix of technical expertise, relevant industry roles, and past advisory experience, all of which will be invaluable to advancing OSK’s mission of supporting sustainable operations for the energy and defense sectors.
Dr. Thomas Cooley has 35 years of experience developing space technologies beginning at NASA/JPL and the last 25 years at the Air Force Research Laboratory, most recently as its Chief Scientist for the Space Vehicles Directorate where he was responsible for assisting with the planning and execution of an annual $165M Space Force science and technology program and an additional $100M in externally funded research and development. He held several senior positions while at AFRL including Senior Scientist for Space Situational Awareness, Chief Scientist SpaceWERX, Chair of OoD(R&E) Space Community of Interest, and Program Manager and Principal Investigator for the TacSat-3/ARTEMIS mission.
Jorge Delgado brings a range of experience across the space and engineering industries, including a decade at Space Systems Loral as its Electric Propulsion Architect, where he informed the design, integration, validation, and flight of 30+ large geostationary communication spacecraft. He also served as Principal Engineer for OneWeb’s Advanced Development division and Vice President of Engineering at Apollo Fusion, responsible for the company’s technical direction and product validation.
Jeffrey Harris is a former corporate officer for Lockheed Martin, where he was the President of Missiles and Space and President of Special Programs. Prior to this role, he was the President of Space Imaging, the first company to commercially provide high-resolution satellite imagery and information products. Before entering the private sector, Mr. Harris served with distinction in several senior national leadership positions. He has been Assistant Secretary of the Air Force for Space, the Director of the National Reconnaissance Office, and the Associate Executive Director of the Intelligence Community. He also serves as chair of the Rochester Institute of Technology’s board of trustees.
David Gauthier is currently the Chief Strategy Officer for GXO, Inc. after serving over 26 years in the Intelligence Community (IC). He spent the last 16 years at the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA), most recently as its Director of Commercial Operations, and served as the inaugural chair of the IC Commercial Space Council. In his numerous leadership roles at NGA he led the discovery, assessment, contracting and acquisition of commercial GEOINT data, products and services; developed agency strategy; and implemented data-centric analytic operations. He also led remote sensing operations for the USAF, NSA, DIA, and ODNI.
Douglas Loverro brings over 45 years of service across a number of very senior government positions, including as the Associate Administrator for NASA’s Human Exploration program and Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Space Policy. He was the deputy for the Air Force’s Space and Missile Systems Center and held multiple senior program leadership positions both there and at the NRO. He served in uniform as an Air Force officer for 30 years where he focused on space and technology systems for the service. He is credited as one of the leading voices in the creation of the US Space Force and is the recipient of multiple prestigious awards including the Secretary of Defense’s Medal for Outstanding Public Service.
“OSK has a bold vision for leveraging space-based hyperspectral intelligence to advance sustainability initiatives across the energy sector while also supporting global defense efforts. I can’t think of a better group of industry leaders to join Nick and Jesus on our board to help us achieve this mission,” said Dan Katz, CEO and cofounder of OSK. “The expansion of our advisory board presents a massive opportunity to accelerate our commercialization strategy in collaboration with some of the brightest minds in space science and engineering. We’re excited to start our work together.”
The expansion of the advisory board comes on the heels of OSK securing a $10 million strategic investment. Altogether, these milestones reflect the significant momentum the company has built in recent months to support a sizable operational expansion; OSK expects to monitor over 124,000 miles of energy infrastructure in 2023. By bringing on leaders from across the space and defense industries to help guide this effort, OSK is positioning itself for sustained growth in the rapidly-emerging market of hyperspectral intelligence.
About Orbital Sidekick
Orbital Sidekick’s proprietary analytics platform and hyperspectral payload architecture provide persistent space-based monitoring solutions powered by Spectral IntelligenceTM. This unique radiometric speciation and change detection capability enables unparalleled target monitoring services for both commercial and defense users on a global scale. For more information on Orbital Sidekick’s global persistent monitoring services, please visit www.orbitalsidekick.com
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