A dozen corporate leadership moves to note as fall arrives

AE Industrial Partners

Leonard “Butch” Dollaga, a retired Navy rear admiral and formerly chief of legislative affairs, has joined this government market-focused private equity firm as a managing director.

In his legislation-focused assignment, Dollaga was the principal adviser on that topic to the Navy secretary and chief of naval operations.

Dollaga played a key role in securing domestic support for the trilateral AUKUS partnership between Australia, the U.K. and U.S. His three-decade Navy career also includes service as commander of Submarine Group 7 and commander of the Undersea Warfighting Development Center.

AITC

Aaron Betz has joined the IT and cyber services company also known as Advanced IT Concepts as chief growth officer to help lead its expansion push.

The three-decade market veteran’s responsibilities will cover both the business development and client relationship functions.

Betz most recently worked as a BD managing director at Empower AI. His career also includes leadership roles at Magellan Federal, GovCIO, Deloitte and Calibre Systems.

Avint

The cybersecurity services provider has added two people to its C-level executive team, one being a promotion and the second an external hire.

Brian Edwards, who joined Avint in 2022 after a decade at VariQ, has moved up to chief growth officer and will oversee business development initiatives. Edwards Avint’s work to secure a place on three small business tracks for the governmentwide OASIS+ professional services vehicle.

Kevin Thomas has joined Avint as chief solutions officer to lead its technical strategy and solutions delivery functions. The two-decade market veteran most recently worked as chief information security officer at LMI. His career before that included roles at companies such as Electrosoft, OnPoint and Hewlett-Packard.

Harmonia Holdings

Rod Fontecilla is the newest former Dovel Technologies executive to join the Harmonia leadership team as chief innovation and artificial intelligence officer.

Harmonia was acquired by Madison Dearborn Partners during the summer’s latter months. CEO Damon Griggs and Jon Brooks, Dovel’s former chief legal officer and now Harmonia’s chief business and legal officer, worked with MDP as an executive partner to find a company to acquire.

Fontecilla worked as chief innovation officer and chief data scientist at Dovel before its sale to Guidehouse in 2021. His career also includes senior tech roles at Altamira Technologies, Unisys and Booz Allen Hamilton.

Herdt Consulting

Jerry Short has joined the enterprise resource planning system support specialist as president following three decades in financial roles as a civilian supporting the Navy.

He spent 13 years as a Senior Executive Service member and more recently served as deputy assistant navy secretary for financial management, where he led a consolidation of four legacy systems into a single ERP.

Short is also a former comptroller for the Naval Air Systems Command. He will report to CEO Jim Herdt.

IronArch Technology

Seth Finkel has joined the cloud engineering and network modernization specialist as chief operating officer following 25 years at companies of different sizes.

Finkel’s most recent position was vice president of public sector at Matterport (more on that company further down). Prior to that, he worked as a VP at AECOM and later Amentum following the latter’s carveout from the former in 2020.

IronArch is a service-disabled, veteran-owned small business that also includes data center consolidation as a core work area.

Nightwing

Tricia Fitzmaurice has joined the cybersecurity and intelligence solutions to government agencies as its chief growth officer to lead efforts at expanding across existing and new business models.

Nightwing was once a business unit of RTX before the former's sale in the first quarter to an at-the-time unnamed private equity firm, which Reuters has previously reported is Blackstone. RTX first announced the $1.3 billion transaction in October.

Fitzmaurice most recently worked as vice president of sales and strategy for federal clients at Rancher Government Solutions. Her 25-year market career also includes roles at UiPath, Red Hat and IBM.

Outpost Space

Jamie Landers has joined the spacecraft manufacturing startup as president to help chart its push for growth across both the government and commercial markets.

CEO Jason Dunn started Outpost in the fall of 2021 to make reusable vehicles that take customer payloads into space and back to Earth. In August, Outpost booked a $33.2 million Air Force contract to develop a scalable earth return vehicle for hypersonic testing and re-entry missions.

Landers most recently worked as a vice president of business development at Maxar Technologies. Her two-decade career also includes roles at Lockheed Martin and Analytical Graphics Inc.

Reli Group

Saeed Elnaj has joined the government IT and professional services provider as chief information officer to lead how the company aligns digital offerings with business strategies.

Elnaj will also oversee Reli’s work to extract business value from how it uses generative artificial intelligence.

The three-decade tech veteran most recently worked as a senior customer success manager at Amazon Web Services. His career also includes leadership roles at HealthKey Technologies, the National Council on Aging and Project Concern International.

Riva Solutions

This IT services and consulting provider has made a pair of promotions as part of its push for more of a presence in full-and-open programs.

Neelu Modali has moved up to president following five years as chief operating officer. He joined Riva in 2019 via its acquisition of SMRC, which he led for 17 years as CEO.

Jennifer Bonner will take over as COO following two years as a senior vice president and one as a VP. She joined Riva in 2021 following 18 years at MetroStar, Solutions By Design and Salient CRGT.

Unissant

Hitesh “Tesh” Vashistha has joined as chief growth officer to oversee its functions in corporate development, business development, capture and proposals, marketing and communications, and sales.

Vashistha also becomes the newest member of a reconstituted leadership team that brought in CEO Sumeet Shrivastava and Chief Financial Officer Robert Deegan during the summer.

Prior to Unissant, Vashistha worked as chief growth officer at TSPi. The three-decade market veteran is also a former CGO for Cadmus and Dovel Technologies.

X-Bow Systems

Mike Bender has joined the solid rocket motor production startup as chief operating officer to oversee its factories and other facilities, among other internal functions.

X-Bow Systems is looking to gain a foothold in that corner of the market currently dominated by L3Harris Technologies and Northrop Grumman. X-Bow completed a $70 million Series B raise over the summer and touts an investor base as including Crosslink Capital, Razor's Edge Ventures and Lockheed Martin Ventures.

Bender’s three-decade defense industry career includes senior leadership roles at L3Harris, Aerojet Rocketdyne, SpaceX, ATK and Orbital Sciences.