After an early career in product management and telecommunications at Eicon, Primary Access, and 3Com, Alistair built web performance pioneer Coradiant and sold it to BMC for $135M. He launched the Year One Labs incubator, chaired O'Reilly's Strata and UBM's Cloud Connect, founded FWD50, and has taught at Stanford and Harvard Business School. He has co-written three books including Lean Analytics, widely considered required reading for startups. His latest book, Just Evil Enough, looks at subversiveness in business and will be available in early 2025.

Andrés Vega is the founder and CEO of M42, focusing on critical infrastructure security and secure data exchange for defense environments. With extensive experience in regulated software delivery, his work spans security architecture, state-of-the-art networking and compute, and compliance automation. He specializes in helping organizations maintain system sovereignty while meeting stringent security requirements and operational needs.

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Barry O’Reilly is a globally recognized business advisor, entrepreneur, and author driving innovation at the intersection of business models, product development, and organizational transformation. He co-founded Nobody Studios, a high-velocity venture studio aiming to launch 100 companies in five years, and founded ExecCamp, an entrepreneurial experience for executives.

Barry’s books, Unlearn and Lean Enterprise (part of Eric Ries’ series), are international bestsellers and essential reads for leaders driving high-performance innovation. A faculty member at Singularity University, he advises global executive and accelerator programs while serving on the boards of several high-growth startups, including AgileCraft, acquired by Atlassian. Barry’s mission is clear: to empower technology-driven businesses to innovate and scale with purpose.

Bryon Kroger is Founder and CEO of Rise8. Before that, he spent seven years as a targeteer using terrible software, which led him to cross-train to acquisitions and spend his first year building a transformation at AFLCMC, ultimately becoming one of three co-founders of Kessel Run. Bryon served as Kessel Run COO for two years, leading acquisitions, development, and operations for the enterprise-scale software lab that defined DoD DevSecOps. Frustrated by the path the DoD was taking to scale the team’s success across the rest of the enterprise, he separated and decided to tackle the problem as a digital services provider. Bryon launched Rise8 in 2019 to help change agents overcome bureaucracy and transform the way they build and deploy software to create national security outcomes in prod.

Chris brings nearly 20 years of IT and cybersecurity experience to his role as CEO at Aquia. As a United States Air Force veteran and former civil servant in the U.S. Navy and the General Services Administration’s FedRAMP program, Chris is passionate about making a lasting impact on his country and our global community at large. He participates in industry working groups, such as the Cloud Security Alliance’s Incident Response and SaaS Security Working Group, and serves as the Membership Chair for Cloud Security Alliance D.C. Chris is also the co-author of the book, “Software Transparency: Supply Chain Security in an Era of a Software-Driven Society.” He regularly contributes pieces on software supply chain security and presents on the topic at a variety of industry conferences.

Clinton Herget is Field CTO at Snyk, the leader in Developer Security, where he focuses on crafting and evangelizing our strategic vision for the evolution of DevSecOps. A seasoned technologist, Clinton spent his 20-year career prior to Snyk as a web software developer, DevOps consultant, cloud solutions architect, and engineering director. Clinton is passionate about empowering software engineers to do their best work in the chaotic cloud-native world, and is a frequent conference speaker, developer advocate, and technical thought leader.

Bio coming soon. We're excited to have D.J. as part of the most unique agenda in GovTech.

Doug developed a decision analysis method called Applied Information Economics (AIE) that has been his specialty for the last 25 years of his over 35-year management consulting career specializing in the application of quantitative methods in management. He is the author of How to Measure Anything: Finding the Value of Intangibles in Business (Wiley 2007, 2010, 2014). Doug also wrote The Failure of Risk Management: Why It’s Broken and How to Fix It (Wiley 2009, 2020), Pulse: The New Science of Harnessing Internet Buzz to Track Threats and Opportunities (Wiley 2011) and, with co-author Richard Seiersen, How to Measure Anything in Cybersecurity Risk (Wiley 2016).

He has used AIE to solve difficult forecasting, measurement and decision analysis problems in business and government and has completed over 150 risk/return analyses of large, critical projects, investments and other management decisions. He's done enterprise implementations of the AIE method in several organizations. Doug's experience spans insurance, banking, utilities, federal and state government, entertainment media, military logistics, pharma and manufacturing. In addition to his books, he has published articles in Nature, The American Statistician, and many other journals and magazines.

Edward Hieatt serves as Chief Customer Officer at Mechanical Orchard, where he spearheads the company's customer excellence strategy to scale its success with large enterprise clients. A seasoned software engineer, Edward began his career at Pivotal Labs in 2003, playing a pivotal role in its growth from a nascent organization to a global leader acquired in 2012. As SVP of Customer Success at Pivotal, he led the rapid expansion of the technical field organization, managing thousands of employees and hundreds of global customers. After Pivotal’s IPO and subsequent acquisition by VMware, Edward oversaw Customer Experience and Success at VMware Tanzu, further refining his expertise in enterprise transformation.

Joining Mechanical Orchard at a critical growth juncture, Edward is dedicated to helping enterprises overcome legacy modernization challenges. His leadership aligns with the company’s mission of enabling faster innovation and risk-free transitions to cloud-first capabilities through advanced, AI-driven methodologies.

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A seasoned Product Manager with extensive experience in human-centered design, Holly has spent over a decade aligning innovative strategies with impactful outcomes. Her portfolio spans a wide range of initiatives including leading product teams through major cloud-based transformations. Holly’s work has supported organizations such as the Department of Defense, Centers for Medicare and Medicaid, and National Institutes of Health, driving meaningful results through collaboration and strategic focus.

Jamie Whitehouse is a Product Director at Sonatype where he works with customers to solve big problems.  Over his 10+ year tenure at Sonatype, Jamie has co-created industry-defining products like Sonatype Lifecycle, and the next-gen Repository Firewall.  Despite being from Ontario, Canada, he doesn’t follow hockey but does enjoy building with Lego.

Jason is an impact strategy consultant with years of experience leading software product and design teams in the public sector space. Jason applies his product strategy approach to help teams drive successful mission outcomes. His work spans a wide range of mission-driven clients, from the US Dept of Defense, to small nonprofits, and even the White House Presidential Personnel Office.

Jason’s work focuses on identifying and aligning on key challenges and developing and implementing cross-functional solutions to drive mission outcomes.

He is also the co-author of Farther, Faster, and Far Less Drama, an actionable guide to equip a new generation of humble, humane, and collaborative leaders.

A former Product Manager with a Master’s Degree in Educational Technology, Jeff has been developing learning solutions and bringing learning products to market over the last 15 years. His portfolio includes a variety of emergent learning technology including NLP just-in-time support for clinicians (on Amazon Alexa), immersive game-based simulations, and a blockchain-based learning credential network for clinical professionals.

More on Joe soon, we're excited to have him as part of the most unique speaker lineup in GovTech!

Jonathan Mostowski is the President of Agile Acquisitions, LLC, and a published author with deep expertise in federal acquisitions for both government and industry. He has held pivotal roles, including Chief of Staff at Rebellion Defense and Senior Director of Contracting and Business Operations, where he blended strategy with execution. His career also includes significant contributions as an Acquisitions Strategist for the US Digital Service and Defense Digital Service, advising the OMB and Pentagon on rapid procurement methods for advanced technologies.

Jonathan's 13-year tenure as a Senior Contracting Officer at the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency highlighted his adaptability and impact on IT modernization strategies. Recognized for his role in driving organizational transformation, he has also been honored in Marquis Who’s Who in America 2023. Jonathan continues to influence the federal acquisition landscape through public speaking, writing, and advisory roles. For more details, visit his LinkedIn profile at https://www.linkedin.com/in/jonmost/.

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Mr. Justin Fanelli is the Acting CTO for the Department of Navy and Technical Director of PEO Digital, driving mission-critical IT transformations and cost-efficient innovations. He has held key roles including Chief Data Architect for Defense Health and Technical Director for Navy MPTE, earning accolades like the Etter Award for impactful service delivery and multi-billion-dollar cost savings. A DARPA Service Chiefs Fellow, he has led groundbreaking advancements in healthcare data systems and Navy enterprise solutions. Outside work, Mr. Fanelli teaches at Georgetown, advises startups, and contributes to nonprofits like TechImpact. Holding degrees from Penn State and UPenn, he is a Senior Executive Fellow at Harvard Kennedy School with numerous certifications. Recognized by awards such as the Secretary of the Navy’s Innovation Award and FedHealth 100 honors, he resides in Arlington, VA, and enjoys sharing book recommendations.

Karen Martin, President of the global consulting firm TKMG, Inc. and President and Founder of TKMG Academy, Inc., is a leading authority on business performance improvement, problem solving, and Lean management systems.

Known for her keen diagnostic skills and rapid-results approach, Karen and her team have worked with clients such as Adventist Health, AT&T, Chevron, Epson, GlaxoSmithKline, International Monetary Fund, Lenovo, Mayo Clinic, Prudential Insurance, Qualcomm, and the United States Department of Defense to develop more efficient work systems, grow market share, solve business problems, and accelerate performance.

An in-demand speaker, she’s the three-time Award-winning author of Clarity First, The Outstanding Organization, and Value Stream Mapping.

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Lt Col Williams is an Air Froce operations research analyst currently serving as a Materiel Leader in the Space C2 program of record at SSC.  He leads the Space Defense branch, whose mission is to deliver Battle Management Command and Control (BMC2) software systems that enable space combat power forces to defeat threats and integrate with the joint force to achieve our nation's military objectives.  His previous assignments include AFRL, SMC, Air Staff, Air Force Red Team, and the Air Force Rapid Capabilities Office.  He has a passion for transforming & challenging DoD acquisition to enable agile, continuous delivery of software capabilities, as well as approaching military challenges with the mindset of a scientist and empathetic leader.

Colonel Homan is responsible for promoting innovative processes within SpOC to deliver rapid, impactful, and sustainable solutions for space operations with a focus on digital proponency for future operations.  Previously, Colonel Homan has served within several military organizations with mission areas in major systems acquisitions, education and research, security cooperation, operational test & evaluation, combat operations and planning, and more.  Colonel Homan is an INCOSE Certified Systems Engineering Professional with a Master’s degree in both Systems Engineering and Business Administration with a keen interest in delivering rapid and sustainable capability.

As Chief, Mr. Contoveros leads all support to Deltas’ Combat Development Teams and Supra Coders. He also leads a team of professional software developers charged with delivering digital tools to the force. Mr. Contoveros is the lead for Digital Proponency for the Command.

Upon retiring from the USAF with 26 years of military service, Mr. Contoveros worked as a contractor supporting the HQ AFSPC S5/9 Advanced Capabilities Team, which morphed into the Directorate of Innovation upon the standup of HQ SpOC. In this role he created the monthly Delta Innovation Collaboration Exchange (DICE), authored the Accelerated Delta Innovation Process (ADIP) and co-authored the command’s first ever, nearly completed, Innovation Operations Instruction. Mr. Contoveros joined the government team in July of 2023 as Director of Innovation, re-branded as the Combat Enhancement Division as part of the SpOC re-organization in 2024.

Paul Gaffney is a change agent who has led profound transformations in technology, operations, and overall business results for several iconic American brands. He has served as Chief Technology Officer, Chief Operating Officer, Chief Supply Chain Officer, and Chief Executive Officer, but his focus is always on a human-centered approach to identifying and solving problems, motivating team members to contribute to success in ways they previously thought impossible. Paul was inducted in the Chief Information Officer Hall of Fame by CIO magazine and is a 2009 Henry Crown Fellow of the Aspen Institute as well as a member of and moderator for the Aspen Global Leadership Network seminars program.

Siobhán Mc Feeney, chief technology and digital officer, is responsible for all technology, information and digital platforms supporting Kohl’s omnichannel business.

Mc Feeney joined Kohl’s in 2020 as Senior Vice President, Technology and was promoted to Executive Vice President, Technology in 2022. Prior to Kohl's, she led innovation and strategy at Pivotal Software, Inc., as well as held technology and finance leadership roles at AAA Northern California. Mc Feeney also worked as an accountant at Deloitte and KPMG Ireland. Mc Feeney has more than 30 years of information technology and finance experience.

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With 20 years in tech, Steve has held roles ranging from CEO and CTO to Head of Product in startups and publicly traded industry leaders. He's developed three market-leading products and led significant agile transformations, including a large-scale shift for a global public software company with 50+ teams. He recently spearheaded AgileCraft's successful acquisition by Atlassian. As the CEO of an Austin software firm, we are innovating a new AI-driven platform that refines strategic decision-making by aligning context, metrics, goals, and progress from strategy to execution.