About Us

Overview

Emergent Space Technologies, Inc. provides consulting and engineering services to the civil, commercial, and military space industry around our core competencies of spacecraft guidance, navigation and control, satellite ground systems, and space mission automation. Our domain expertise and experience, combined with our knowledge of current and emerging technology, make Emergent the small business team of choice in the aerospace industry.

History

Emergent Space Technologies, Inc. was founded in 2001 with the goal of bringing modern information technology to the aerospace industry. Our objective was to combine knowledge of emerging technologies from the web, Internet, e-commerce industries with our broad and deep space mission engineering experience to enable autonomous spacecraft operations. The initial market for our services was to be created by NASA's satellite formation and constellation missions.

As their launch dates moved further out, however, we trained our sights on rendezvous, proximity operations, and cislunar navigation for NASA's exploration and science missions. As we grew, we broadened our customer base to include other civil, commercial, and military customers, e.g., NOAA, Intelsat, and DARPA. Along the way, Emergent has experienced rapid growth, almost doubling in staff and revenue each year. While doing so, Emergent has achieved a high level of customer success and employee satisfaction.

IMPROVING YOUR WORLD ONE SYSTEM AT A TIME

At Emergent Space Technologies, Inc. our engineers are committed to developing innovative systems and solutions to improve the world in which we live. Through our breadth and depth of aerospace and information system engineering experience we thrive on developing synergistic solutions to challenging problems that benefit humans here on Earth and as they explore vast frontiers beyond.

Vision

Our vision is to build a consulting and engineering services firm that is widely regarded for its technical acuity, its breadth of knowledge and its innovation in providing solutions for our customers. We embrace technology and seek its application to challenging problems in the aerospace industry, focusing on advanced space missions such as human exploration of the Moon and Mars, satellite formations and constellations, and autonomous spacecraft. In doing so, we leverage our deep understanding of spacecraft guidance, navigation and control; satellite ground systems; and mission automation and autonomy with practical life-cycle experience.

Mission

Our mission is to deliver high impact, high value solutions to our customers through our intellectual prowess and our understanding of space and information technology. With over 60% of our employees having an advanced degree, we focus on tough problems, where theory meets mission application.

Values

Emergent truly values its customers, and is dedicated to getting the job done. When we say we will do something, we do it. Customer satisfaction is always our top priority. Emergent also values its employees. We are committed to providing a challenging and stimulating work environment that promotes and facilitates teamwork, yet also advances individual learning and growth. We provide a work environment that is conducive to a high level of customer success and corporate achievement, but within a fun and low-key atmosphere that leads to employee satisfaction and minimizes turnover. These commitments to our customers and our employees result from our core values of integrity, respect, and accountability.

LEADERSHIP

MEET OUR TEAM

PRESIDENT & FOUNDER

Dr. George Davis is the President and founder of Emergent Space Technologies, Inc. He received a Ph.D. in Aerospace Engineering from the University of Texas at Austin for his research into the precise orbit determination of low altitude satellites using the Global Positioning System. His M.S. in Aerospace Engineering, also from the University of Texas, was on on-orbit assembly operations for lunar and Mars spacecraft. His interests include GPS applications, autonomous spacecraft navigation, and orbit determination.

Prior to starting Emergent, he worked for the Technical Services Division of the Orbital Sciences Corporation as a support contractor at the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center. He worked in GSFC's spaceborne GPS technology group, providing systems engineering, algorithm development, receiver testing and data analysis support to a variety of missions, including the International Space Station, EO-1, and VCL. At the peak of the Internet bubble, he joined Appnet Systems, which became Commerce One e-Government Solutions, to break into the Information Technology industry. He supported the development of web portals and e-commerce exchanges for the federal government. It was there that he saw the opportunity to apply modern information technologies to the aerospace industry, and subsequently started Emergent.

When not working, he enjoys coaching his kids in youth sports and playing softball in the NASA Goddard Softball League. With what little time he has left, he enjoys fishing and playing golf, and probably watching too much college football and basketball.

VICE PRESIDENT OF BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT

Mr. Morgan Mitchell’s passion for computer technology began sometime prior to the age of 12, when he used the proceeds of a summer construction job to purchase a PC. Later, Mr. Mitchell took a brief sabbatical of almost nine years from his undergraduate studies to serve in the U.S. Navy SEAL Teams, specializing as a scout sniper. He completed his undergraduate studies while on shore duty as an instructor at Basic Underwater Demolition/SEAL (BUD/S) training, being awarded a B.S. in Computer Science (Summa) from National University in San Diego, CA.

Mr. Mitchell went on to be inducted into the U.S. Air Force as a Software Engineering Officer, later completing an M.S. in Information Assurance from Norwich University. During his next 12 years of service and prior to retiring from the U.S. Air Force in 2010, with over 21 years of military service and multiple deployments, Mr. Mitchell had served as a Software Test Engineer, AWACS Mission Computing Lead, Chief of Advanced (Cyber) Technology, Chief of Information Operations, etc. Mr. Mitchell managed or supported many key cyber-warfare programs of the highest priority to the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) and the Intelligence Community (IC).

After retiring in 2010, but prior to joining Emergent, Mr. Mitchell went on to assist in the founding of the cyber division of Applied Signal Technology (AST) a major supplier of signals intelligence equipment and expertise to the IC. AST was later acquired by the Raytheon corporation and Mr. Mitchell moved on to serve as the San Antonio Site Lead and Mission Manager for Raytheon, Centers of Innovation, providing cyber-security products and services, specializing in software security, to the DoD and IC. In his off time, Mr. Mitchell can be found encouraging and supporting young people pursing their interests in technology with his son, who has been a developer with a prominent cyber-security company since he was 15.

VICE PRESIDENT OF OPERATIONS

Mr. Everett Cary is the Vice President of Operations and has previously served as the Vice President of Technical Services. He joined Emergent in 2002 and has seen the company through all its growth phases over the years. As the VP of Operations, he is responsible for the day-to-day tactical execution of the company's strategies. He holds a B.S. in Computer Science from the University of Maryland.

While at Emergent, he has been the Principal Investigator for a government-funded program and has been active in applying modern information technologies towards automation of satellite ground systems. He has numerous years of experience in developing, deploying, and managing software solutions across a variety of domains. His organization skills and his ability to decompose solutions into work packages applied itself naturally to project management responsibilities and ultimately to overseeing the corporate operations. Prior to joining Emergent, he designed, and supported software applications, including web and e-commerce portals, point-of sale solutions, enterprise busienss and auction applications. He has a strong interest in Engineering processes, having worked as a certified Rational Unified Process trainer and he is involved heavily with Emergent's Engineering Process Group.

Outside of the office, he is a family man, scouter, and ham radio operator.

CHIEF TECHNOLOGY OFFICER

Mr. Brendan M. O’Connor is the Chief Technology Officer, having joined the company in 2008. He earned a B.A. in Chemistry from New College of Florida and both an M.A. in Chemistry and an M.S.E. in Aerospace Engineering from The University of Texas at Austin. His areas of interest include spacecraft mission design, complex systems development, and autonomous flight software for spacecraft.

He has extensive experience developing high availability software systems in distributed environments. He specializes in leading software teams that successfully deliver working software under extreme circumstances using agile, customer-centric methods. Mr. O’Connor has led many successful mission critical software development projects. Prior to joining Emergent, he was a software architect and Senior Principal Engineer at McDonnell Douglas and The Boeing Company and the Chief Technology Officer for Multimedia Games (now Everi Holdings NYSE:EVRI), a publicly traded producer of high-availability, high-volume transaction processing software for the casino industry. He is a co-inventor on eleven US patents and in his spare time he is an avid runner, bicyclist, and pilot.