Space and Defense Innovation Launchpad Podcast - Episode 6

Speaker A: Foreign.

Speaker B: Welcome to the Space and Defense Innovation Launchpad podcast. I'm Brian Fox and in this series you'll be hearing from different technologists and technology leaders in government, industry and academia about their efforts to implement innovative technologies to impact civilian and defense missions. Together, we will explore multiple aspects of this technical realm, including vehicle propulsion, material science, digital geospatial and sensor technologies. Hello and thank you all for joining us in today's Space and Defense Innovation Launchpad. I'm Brian Fox with the University of Tennessee Space Institute utsi. And many thanks as always to ATARC for hosting today's podcast and event. I am so glad to have a good friend and colleague, Brian Manheiser on today. He's coming in with Geo261. He's a big connector in the St. Louis and geospatial realm. So there's a geography to it, but there's also just everything happening with Geo, uh, in the space mission and uh, space based sensor mission. Um, so Brian, thanks so much for coming. Uh, on today. I know we're going to lean in on workforce development in the, in the, in the St. Louis area, but thank you sir for joining us.

Speaker A: Yeah, for sure. And thanks for having me. And I'd be, I'd be remiss if I didn't mention one of my other hats that I wear, uh, which is the chief, um, growth Officer for T. Carter USA who also calls St. Louis home for their US based headquarters. So, um, one of many hats that I wear. But I appreciate that.

Speaker B: Absolutely. Uh, yeah, in a recent, uh, I'm bringing you on because on a recent virtual coffee just I keep hearing from you and others because folks, uh, listening to the podcast, I, I was a, at NGA for, for nine years. Lived uh, and worked there in St. Louis for nine years. And what I hear from you and others is just this interesting and amazing pivot in the St. Louis area. I, I know when I moved there in 1999 it, it was essentially just a, a Rust belt town. NEMA was there, DMA and nima, that's um, who I went to support which became nga. But here over the last decade, maybe a little longer, there's been just a tremendous, maybe understanding and now energy and pivot towards the geospatial, the technology, the entities that are there and the support for it. So it's just exciting. Um, and so yeah, today what I'd like to do, Brian, is just lean in on that from a workforce development because yeah, not only is NGA in the St. Louis market, but you've got these academic institutions. University of Missouri, St. Louis, you've got Washington University, SLU, you've got a number of K through 12 organizations. So what's going on in the space? Like, uh, yeah. What would you like to share first?

Speaker A: So I think, I think the cool thing for me too, and it was interesting how you talked about it kind of being, you know, I think that the term you just used was a bit of a rust belt. I always assumed St. Louis was just kind of a blue collar, um, uh, you know, it's, it's been that gateway to the west since the beginning of time. And you know, the more that I've dug into this and, and I, I did it more as this geospatial thing started to evolve. But you cannot deny the growth that St. Louis has had around the ag tech space, which is, oh, absolutely pretty extraordinary. Um, with organizations like 39 north and the Danforth Plant Science center. And, and these have been, you know, I, I might be talking a little out of pocket, but you're talking kind of 20 year, uh, economic development focus areas for the St. Louis region on all things ag and ag tech, um, biotech as well. Um, if you look down where Forest park is at and Barnes Jewish Hospital, that whole area has exploded in terms of what it's grown and how it's changed. There was a whole initiative that was arched to park. And if you look at that, us geospatial nerds, if you look at that corridor from the arch all the way downtown all the way to Forest park, the amount of work that's gone into, uh, development and building and changing. And so all of those things have been pretty remarkable. And I didn't really realize those until this geospatial thing started to evolve. And you dig in and go, oh, well, there's been some really cool success stories around agtech and biotech. If you wanted to kind of model geospatial tech growth, um, in the region too, like look at what they've done in those spaces. And so, um, to your point, yeah, I'd say it's probably been more so, you know, you say a decade. I'd say probably seven to eight years. Uh, folks started paying attention to geospatial whenever NGA announced that they were going to build a new facility. So they just built a new 2 billion-ish dollar facility facility on the, on the north side of town. Um, when that got announced, people started going, oh, what's geospatial? And I've talked about this in, in blogs and other podcasts and stuff. But, you know, Robert Cardillo, who was then the director at the time when, when that decision was being made, um, he was very purposeful about celebrating Geospatial and what is it. And you know, we didn't, we didn't outwardly talk about it. I've always joked that the Geospatial was the secret society of the skulls. It was that way in my time in the Marine Corps. Right. There's only about a percent of us in the entire Marine Corps that do the geospatial stuff. And we do it for, you know, every element of the Marine Corps that's also kind of held true just in general, even though this, this industry is growing so fast. Um, and so Robert did a really good job of kind of celebrating the industry that you and I have grown up in that we love and kind of talking about it and exposing it. And then I think, you know, he did a, he did a clip on a, on a CBS Evening News thing where he kind of highlighted Planet Labs at the time. And it was like these small sats and how are we getting so much information? So, and revisiting the earth multiple times a day. Um, and then you kind of evolve that to, you know, the bin Laden raid, which talked about model building and that highlighted again another expertise of NGAs. And then at that time, uh, you know, director Bob Sharp, uh, who was part of that story that got, I think it was CBS as well. Um, and so folks started to go, oh, is that that mapping place across from the brewery downtown? That's all people ever knew it as, right? People didn't know what it did. Um, and then, uh, so you fast forward and that started to create this real buzz around this. And again, you know, to give some credit to Robert, he made it a point to get with, um, key decision makers, whether that's on the political side or whether, um, that's on the high net worth side. People who invest heavily. You can't accomplish anything in this town or you can't sell. I don't want to say you can't accomplish. Um, but you can't celebrate anything in this town or a lot of the evolution without giving credit to the Taylor family. So, Mr. Andy Taylor, Enterprise Holdings, Enterprise Rent a Car. I mean, his generosity in the city and what he's done to give back to the city. Everything from the Veterans Memorial downtown to bringing St. Louis City Soccer to the region to investing, uh, in geospatial tech growth, a lot of that his was kicked off by this introduction of nga, um, building a new facility. And I think folks started to go, oh, well, what's this geospatial thing? And then if you even fast track a little bit more, as we start talking about kind of workforce development, I think everybody, for as long as you and I have been in this, and I'm creeping up on 30 years in the space, and you're right there with me, we're roughly the same age folks started going, so what is it and how does it work and is it just at this NGA place or do we do it other places? And so there started to be this evolution of, well, how do you get a job and what are those jobs and where do you go to school to do that? And so I think that's been kind of the, um, that was the impetus for this groundswell. And then folks looked at the market and looked at the growing market. I think you can go look at any document online and you'll see that it's projected to be in the trillions by 2030. It was in the hundreds of billions. You know. Now, um, and so all of that growth has really started to get people to focus on this other vertical and go, okay, well let's lean in as a region, as a city and as a region and say let's do for geospatial tech and geospatial innovation what we did for bio and ag tech or plant sciences. And none of that's gone away. Those things keep growing and kicking tail. So this is just another one of those. And I think before we even jumped on the call, you know, there is a, uh, there's a rich history here, you know, in advanced manufacturing. And that's another focus area for St. Louis too, in terms of growth with the, um, kickoff of amic, which is Advanced Manufacturing and Innovation Center. Uh, and so that's another big kind of focus area for the region and kind of job growth, economic development, uh, and even careers and workforce development around those.

Speaker B: Yeah, it's interesting, when I moved there, you know, I mentioned back in 99, you know, I, I use the term rust belt, but I think with uh, the remanufacturing movement in America, that there's clearly opportunities there, uh, within the St. Louis area as that, that changes. But in that geospatial industry, that coming to the forefront, that it was in the background, as you said, kind of behind the curtain, no one really saw the power or the, the, the potential there, but they do now. What, um, but Brian, what, what universities. And thanks for that detailed history. And the folks that are Involved.

Speaker A: Yep.

Speaker B: But what, what have been some of the local universities there, whether it's WashU, Umzel, others, um, that have and are playing a role in, in bringing that, uh, getting geospatial, uh, on stage, in the forefront, uh, and driving forward, especially with workforce development.

Speaker A: Yeah, you'd. If you are talking about universities in the region that have really leaned um, heavily into geospatial, there's two that never pop up on the map that people always skip over that have probably been more involved than anybody. Um, you know, SLU for sure, always has been recognized and they've had, uh, our relationship with NGA and the national kind of defense sector for a long time, have done a lot of the more sciencey and more kind of, um, image science based stuff. Right. One of the things that I think when we think about or classifying this as stem, people go, ooh, science and math. I'm not good at that. SLU's done a lot of that and SLU's probably as advanced as anybody.

Speaker B: Hey Brian, we lost your voice.

Speaker A: Do you get me now?

Speaker B: Yep, got you now.

Speaker A: Okay, good. Sorry about that.

Speaker B: Let's just pick up there.

Speaker A: Yeah, so, so, so just for the

Speaker B: audience, this might be a, uh, a good segue. Let me just start with this. So for the audience listening in, SLU is Saint Louis University. You're not from Saint Louis, but Brian, back to you. So Saint Louis University, SLU leading out. Keep, uh, going.

Speaker A: Yeah. One of the heavier hitters in this and in terms of just kind of time that they've been focused on the geospatial industry, like I said, they have a lot in the way of undergrad, graduate and then certificates, a number of certificates that you can get that are workforce development related. Um, you cannot talk about the region without mentioning Southern Illinois University, Edwardsville, and Dr. Randy Pearson, who's been working really hard there for a long time and, and has probably created or produced, um, more talent in the region than most. Lindenwood University. Uh, and Tara Vancel, um, she's been very involved at a state level. She's been very involved in educating educators, um, and trying to get this in. You gotta pause for a half second on that too. We don't teach geography in this country anymore. Not like we should. Right. I think the last stat I looked at it, 17 states required up through eighth grade. I think. I think that number drops to 10 when you start talking high school level. And so for folks to get exposed to anything geography related, which for you and I, in talking about this geospatial Industry. There's a science and a trade craft and a technology and a talent level to this that I think a lot of people are still kind of mystified by because we're not teaching, we're not creating kind of introductory pathways into careers in this. And so you have to give kind of those three institutions an awful lot of love for the work that they've done before. It was cool, um, in the region, um, Harris Stowe State University, which is our hbcu, it's literally um, it shares a, ah street with Saint Louis University. Right. So it's downtown too. And the work that they've done and starting to build out, um, their HBCU summer immersion in Geoint program. Dr. Freddy Wills has been very instrumental in doing that. Um, they also have a GIS certificate, undergraduate GIS certificate. You can get there. They're also about to be accredited through USGIF and their program as is Tara Vancel's working that way too, uh, at Lindenwood. Um, and SLU's already an accredited university in the USGIF system for their uh, certificate in geo. Um, so that's awesome. And then, uh, Harris Stowe also has an epa, which is an educational partnership agreement with nga, as does umsl, which has been uh, you know, kind of ripping into the space as well. And they acted, they added Dr. Retta Amir, um, to run their geospatial collaborative. They got some state money for this. They have an educational partnership agreement also uh, with nga. Um, and they've been really kind of, kind of growing the space and focusing on a lot of the interdisciplinary use cases. Dr. Amir has been instrumental about not being narrowly focused. I love national defense. That's where I grew up. It's where I've spent most of my time. But this thing cross cuts every vertical. Right. And so he's been very purposeful about highlighting those. And he's received a lot of support from the Chancellor at umpsl, Kristen Sobolic, uh, which is also part of the University M of Missouri system, which we'd all be cheating the system if we didn't talk about Dr. Curt Davis and the work that he's done dating back 20 years, um, at the University of Missouri M Columbia and the work that they've been doing and some of the opportunities that were awarded to the university back then, uh, to then James Clapper, um, because he saw the value in that. There's a lot of educational institutions in and about the St. Louis region that are getting after it. Um, and I'm, I'm Trying to make sure that I certainly didn't leave anybody out in that and I don't think that I did.

Speaker B: And if you did and they're listening in and they're like, hey man, you didn't mention me. Uh, you're heard and seen. There's a lot happening in the region. Yep. Brian, lean in though. What about K through 12 and let me tee up. Is there anything that some non profit entities might be doing? Because you've been talking with me about uh, some entities within or orbiting umzel.

Speaker A: Yep.

Speaker B: Um, and, and Bob Sharp getting involved as I understand. So. But K through 12 and some of the non profit entities. What's happening that way.

Speaker A: Yeah, so one of the real major ones is you have to highlight, you know, Gateway Global, um, and their founder and CEOs Git Armstrong. Probably not the best language for, for a public podcast, but she's just a badass and they're badasses too. And she saw this, she saw this opportunity in Geospatial which I've, you know, I've been very vocal about folks going well, I want to do Geospatial and I go, do you know what that means? And are uh, you investing the time to learn and educate yourself and kind of get grimy and dirty and roll up your sleeves? And um, nobody has rolled up their sleeves the way that Zakita has done uh, at Gateway Global and she's got a pretty incredible team and um, she's been building out ah, curriculum and opportunities for kids. Um, she's the first USGIF certified certificate in geo int for high school. So she's got one of those and is creating an opportunity and pathways um, for kids. And she's got some other things that she's working on that I can't remember if I'd be getting in trouble to mention those. But a lot of other things are coming out of there. And we've seen um, unleashing potential in the Littlebits Foundation. These are some other non for profits that are working in the area. We've had Frank Romo in the area doing a lot of work too. And he's not a non for profit but he's got a servant's heart. And so for the fact that he focuses a lot on being uh, a GIS in geospatial SME and kind of integration type company, the amount of time that he spends that he spent developing programs for you know, K through 12, very real. Specifically you know, kind of 6 through 12 creating opportunities in places like Detroit and the Bronx And L A and down in Tennessee, he's done some really cool stuff. So he's another one that's kind of orbiting, uh, this space and has been a key contributor to what we're doing here. But those are, those are some of the major ones. And you can't also talk about the stuff that's going on if you also don't include T Rex. And so T Rex has been a staple in this area around workforce development. When I first got involved with T Rex, it was incubation and acceleration and access to VCs and folks that could help you even with legal services and being able to work on a patent or get kind of your legal stuff put together. As you were a startup growing up, um, they could, they provide some, some affordable workspace. Uh, you know, even if you're just one person with a vision, you can get a membership there for next to nothing. And now you've got access to conference rooms and shared spaces and it gives you some access and placement. Um, NGA opened up Moonshot Labs in that very same building. A number of the companies that you and I are familiar with in the defense space, folks like Omni and Reinventing Geospatial, uh, they have offices in that building as well. A lot of folks do. Um, and so they've kind of been a hub and they really leaned heavily into this geospatial growth, uh, um, opportunity as well. And so they're a non for profit that's here that falls in the economic development space. And I also don't think you can call it. Well, um, I don't know if it's not for profit, but also our economic development arm, and that being Greater St. Louis Inc. Has leaned pretty heavily into this with, with funding and support from the Taylor family. And so there's all of these people that.

Speaker B: Brian, I have to ask though, because there's so much happening in the, in the market. There's a lot of people digging. How are people coming together to synchronize that they're digging in the right direction or dragging. Digging in the directions that industry and government need from a workforce development standpoint, who's helping weave all that together? Because you can have a lot of goodness and a lot of people with the right heart and it, uh, sure, yeah.

Speaker A: I, you know, you can't ever talk about this growth and not give us GIF and some of the working groups that they put together. Okay. You know, Tara Mot, Are they playing

Speaker B: a coordinating role in that at least bringing people together?

Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, uh, definitely, definitely. A, a convener and an informer. And um, you get a lot of the usual suspects with USJF because of its focus on kind of the national defense sector. And so bringing in all of you know, these other, these other verticals with Geospatial is relevant but they're certainly, they've been a key player in that um, the, the establishment of the Taylor Geospatial, um. Ah, I can't believe I just blanked on tgi, The Taylor Geospatial Institute, um, and the Taylor Geospatial Engine. Um, Jen Marcus has been a key contributor to that growth since the beginning of time. Robert Cardillo was certainly putting his weight into that. Um, generous contributions from Mr. Andy Taylor and the Taylor family made uh, all of that possible. And that was to start building up um, spaces for researching some of the world's hardest geospatial problems and bringing people together on those things. Um, the Taylor family was also very um, key in the establishment of Geofutures. And so Geofutures was that kind of convening body that was brought together to help inform and connect the dots. Andy Dearing, um, stood that up uh, five years ago and that initial report was done five years ago, uh, along with Tracy Whelpley who's now taken her talents to the Kansas City area and kind of their economic growth, growth space. But uh, you know, those were the people that were convening people and informing them. I, everyone's.

Speaker B: Oh, Brian, we lost you again. Nope.

Speaker A: How about now? Yep, gotcha. There we go. Sorry. Internet's not always the best here on the southern Illinois side of the river. Um, and so, and so obviously that, that formation of, of geo futures was a, was a big deal. The doing um, the research and the building of a geofutures roadmap. What should you do to grow a region was a very important kind of evolution in this piece and bringing folks together. And now uh, with the leadership of Mark Munsell, they've, they just rebranded geofutures to Geo stl. And so if you, if you look up that and you see Mark, Monsieur newly uh, retired NG senior, uh, career geospatial nerd like the rest of us, um, you know, got his start at Noah has done some really cool stuff um, in the, on the non government side of things, but has also probably contributed more of his life to, to, to government service. Mark's now heading that up. Um, and so if you look up gstl, you'll see this kind of rebrand and launch that they did. Um, they even kind of revamped the roadmap a little bit. And so they become, you know, one of the convening bodies for this. It's. It's interesting, right? As a career geo nerd, I go, look, we were already, we were already doing this stuff and convening a long time ago. We can get 100 people in a bar together real quick that know this stuff cold at a geoint symposium or a Geography 2050 conference in New York City. Um, but getting some of the right folks together who have past performance and bonafides in this is really key. And growing that ecosystem is going to be really important too.

Speaker B: What are some of the. I'm thinking about, like the outcomes and the challenges. So what are some of the challenges that were there that have been knocked over? You've talked about the institute, some of the leaders in the space, some of the institutions local or national, like usgif. What are some of the outcomes you've seen that have moved things forward, knocked over a barrier or moved, moved through a challenge?

Speaker A: It's really funny because I am the worst person to ask this question to and only because, um, I have some really kind of high standards or expectations of what should be accomplished. And it was really funny. Quick side note, so we won't take more than a couple minutes on this one. I called Bob Sharp one day, who has become an incredible friend and mentor to me. Um, one of the most approachable flag officers that I've ever seen in my life. Right. I mean, as an enlisted Marine, you see the stars on someone's collar and it's almost like, oh, I just saw a version of Jesus. Right? And it's, um. And so you always kind of feel yourself being separated from them on a personal and intellectual level. And Bob is the most approachable senior leader I've ever met in my life. And he's one of the, uh, you know, he cares about people so much and it gets involved in with people so much and helps people come together. But I called Bob one day and I was just, these people don't do this and these people don't do that, and that's not really a win. And Bob, let me kind of go on this wild tangent for a minute and the very end of I get done, and he goes, okay, are you finished? And I was like, yes, sir. And he goes, all right, I'm going to talk to you and I don't want you to say a word, but I'm going to make some points and maybe give you a different perspective. And what Bob said To me was he goes, I appreciate you. I appreciate kind of your Marine Corps drive and demand from others. And he goes, but you just told me all of the things that haven't happened or they're not great, or they're. And he goes, and I want to pause for a second. He goes, how many universities had an educational partnership agreement seven years ago? And I was like, zero. And he's like, how many are there now? And I was like two. And I think there's actually three that are tied to nga. Um, and he goes okay, so net sum positive gain. I was like, yes sir. And he goes, all right, Zakita and Gateway Global. He's like, that didn't exist seven years ago and it exists now. And it's got USGIF accreditation and she's running kids through her program. She's opened a new building. And he's like, despite how many people you think should have been run through there so net some positive gain. And I'm like, yes sir. And he goes okay. And then he talks about the establishment of um, the Geospatial Collaborative over at umpsl. Um, and he talks about the fact that we had then, I guess at the time of this conversation we're probably talking about this past summer we had hosted five geoint symposiums in St. Louis. And he was like, how many had you hosted up until all of this? And I said that that's a lie. It's one. I think the very first one ever was in St. Louis. And so he's like, look, you're talking about having had four over the last seven years. He's like, net sum positive gain and exposure. And I was like, yep. And then he mentions TGI and he mentions TGE and he mentions the establishment of GEO futures. And he's like, maybe not what Brian Manheiser wanted it to be or thinks it should all have accomplished to the level so far. And he goes, but net sum positive gain? And I'm like yes sir. And then he hit me with a, ah, career defining moment and a humbling moment. And he said, you know, you have these expectations for where people should be in the movie and how much they should have done. And he's like, um, did have you ever communicated this expectation with all these people that you're now flustered with? And I go no sir. And he goes, so would the crazy person, or maybe the person who's a little out of line be the person that's demanding an expectation from people that he's never communed the expectation to and that they didn't agree to. I was like, oh man. The most humbling part of my career because I was taking my 30 years or 26 years of experience and saying, but you should do this and do this and do this. He was like, yeah, maybe if everybody across the board had that same knowledge and if everybody had had the whole rising tide lifts all ships moments. He's like, but look across all of these things. And don't forget that NGA invested in a new building. Don't forget that NGA is invested in being outside of the building with Moonshot Labs and T Rex. And don't forget that we've started doing partnerships with Saint Louis University and hosting um, uh, the um. Why am I blanking on the name of it now that they're going to do in September? Um, the Geo Resolution conference that we now had a couple of Bob's like net sum positive gain in a seven year period when people didn't even know what geospatial was before is extraordinary. He's like, maybe not extraordinary in the eyes of Brian Monheiser because he's got these demands on people and has all this experience. He goes unspoken demands. Yeah. Right, right, right. Unagreed upon demands. Right. But that was kind of a humbling and inspiring moment for me because it gave me a bit of a different perspective on how much that's good to celebrate your wins.

Speaker B: And perfection is the enemy of good enough.

Speaker A: Sure.

Speaker B: Needle is moving.

Speaker A: Sure. Why do you learn from these economic development groups which. I don't know nothing. I didn't know anything about what they did either. They're like, look man, when you go on these economic development focused journeys, these are 20 and 25 and 30 year endeavors because you're not gonna just flip the shit the switch overnight. It takes time and you gotta have some, some, some, some wins, some losses. Right. And you learn and grow from those mistakes. And so uh, when you think about it that way, it's pretty remarkable the amount of things that have happened here in a very short period of time around an industry, uh, and, and a, and a science that not a lot of people are talking about.

Speaker B: And so with that, what, what are some challenges that remain ahead? What are some, some things that, and Admiral Sharp's you know, guidance there that maybe you want to enunciate to others that you want to build alignment around because it remains a challenge, something yet to get done in that area.

Speaker A: Yeah, I think at the end of the day, um, this isn't a new industry. And so for people to Treat it like it's new and try to go, start off, you know, at ah, in the batter's box and go, oh, let's. No, no, no. I think it's important to bring in the folks who've been there, done that and gotten the T shirt. It's not to say that we don't have, um, opportunities ahead of us, uh, especially when you start to look at, uh, other, other industries that aren't national defense. Um, we can take a lot of the lessons learned from that. So I think bringing together the right group of people that have all that, all have those experiences, at the end of the day, everybody's still got a mortgage to pay. So how do you convene all of these people and leverage their time, um, and make it beneficial to them financially? So I think one of the biggest challenges. Where do you find the money? How do you get the money? Um, everybody's got their own idea. I gave you the Bob Sharp story, uh, kind of put me in my place. Everyone's got their expectations of what right or perfect or the next thing should be. So everybody having a different opinion on what that is. I think getting some alignment on that. And if you look at this most future or this most current update to the geofutures roadmap that Mark's team, uh, has published, we highlight some of those topics. So it's not hard to say, well, what are the right things to focus on? So we shouldn't be so divided on that. So I don't know that that's as much of a challenge if we can truly agree on those. Um, but again, I think the biggest one in my own mind, and I keep saying this to people, we need to go on a 6 to 60 campaign about the importance of geography, geospatial sciences, geospatial tech, geospatial, uh, tradecraft and talent that comes with that. Because I can go talk to senior executives and I won't mention organizations by name, but you can go in the financial space and there's folks who go geospatial. And I'm like, golly, it's so prevalent in risk and finance and insurance. If you're not using it, um, you're probably failing transportation and logistics and oil and gas and telco and precision agriculture. There's all these. And so I talk about the fact that we don't teach it in schools or it's kind of not demanded in schools. And so I think our greatest challenge is improved spatial literacy from age 6 to 60, because then you at least have an Idea. When you hear people talk about these, oh, I got an idea what they're talking about. And I think it's more so the examples of the why and not the how. Right. The tech exists, the tradecraft exists, but, you know, why, why does this industry solve problems? Why is this industry important, you know, on a global level? And I think that's probably our greatest challenge is just kind of getting everybody up to the speed, up to speed on the why and why it's important.

Speaker B: Excellent. It's been so impressive watching you, talking to you, keeping up with you and what's going on in that St. Louis market. And, and as I've joined the University of Tennessee and working on a number of things that are defense oriented and relate to workforce development. In some cases it's hypersonic vehicles or weapons. In other cases it's advanced manufacturing. We were just talking about that in St. Louis. Um, and the US is going to have to pick up and develop some things again or in some cases for the first time ever, like with chip manufacturing. Brian, what would you have to share with others that are going to build regional consortiums around workforce development for remanufacturing, rebuilding that. These capacities or building the capacities for the first time? What, what do you have to share with them? Uh, as far as some lessons learned, a thing to, to definitely copy or a thing. To avoid any. Anything you'd like to share?

Speaker A: Uh, you know, and I, I don't, I don't want to pat myself on the back, but it's one of the approaches that I've used my entire career. I have zero interest in being the smartest guy in the room, but I have a lot of interest in being surrounded by a lot of the smartest people in the room. Right. Um, I learned so much from them. I also realized that it's easy to, to step out of the way and get places faster when you let the right people kind of in and do it. I think the secret is bring in all of the right partners with shared experiences. I think bringing in diverse groups of partners, um, to work on that. And I'm not, you know, I'm not just talking about the things that we talk about around race or color or, or gender or those things matter as well because there's some amazing different perspectives, but there's people in so many different adjacent areas where you don't naturally, you don't necessarily think, oh, well, they, they fit in here. Well, they do. Right? You want to talk about the University of Tennessee and a, uh, close relationship they have at Oak Ridge and our friend Carter Christopher. The things that they're doing around quantum computing and folks are going, quantum computing and geospatial. Yeah. AI and quantum computer or in geospatial. Yeah. So there's all of these kind of intersections. And so I think my advice would be get as many smart friends in the room as you can. Right. Who've done these things and lean on their experience, lean on their shared failures. And there's. Right. There's no such thing as failures. Those are, those are opportunities to improve. Right. Or opportunities to learn. So I think that's the key is get the right people at the table so that you're not starting off from the get go.

Speaker B: Excellent. Really appreciate all of that. Brian?

Speaker A: Yeah.

Speaker B: Um, is there anything I didn't ask that you'd like to, to share with the audience

Speaker A: now? You know, I don't know. I think it's the thing that I appreciate is that it's. You tend to think of these like, places where, where we both live. Well, yeah, you too, right. There's a whole lot more going on in places um, around the country that I don't think people pay attention to. But I think we tend to think a lot of these as flyover states. Somebody would call a, ah, a Tennessee or an Alabama a flyover state. Right. And they've got extraordinary things happening. Folks would think of, you know, Missouri, uh, as a flyover state. But when you look at the things that are happening here, or go to Omaha or look at some of the evolution that's even happening in Detroit, I think the thing that's really awesome is there's a lot of really incredible things going on in places that we don't traditionally think of as the, the top US Destinations because they're not sitting on the coast or they're not a, uh, Miami or a New York or Chicago or a Boston or an LA or San Francisco or even now, I mean even look at the, the, the evolution in, in Austin and the things that happen in south by Southwest and how the military's taking it. You know, one of the things I love too, I don't know if you've paid attention to what's going on in New Mexico and around Q Station and the Space Valley Foundation. But like you, the uh, the secret is there's some, there's some, some nuggets of amazingness that are kind of hidden where you don't traditionally think of. And maybe it's a marketing problem that all of those people have. You know, Geospatial has a marketing problem by itself. But I think that's the secret is there's, there's some really special things happening and what I think people don't consider on the whole to be exceptional, uh, geographic destinations and there's just lots of greatness happening and a lot of places you, if you ever go to, to, to northwest Arkansas and what, Walmart's changed that into a little mini Silicon Valley too. And I don't think people wrap their brains around the amazingness that's happening across our, across our country.

Speaker B: Absolutely. Well thanks for your role in it there in St. Louis and even just nationally. Right. Because I think as local areas figure out the potential and lean into it, it helps the nation, it helps the region, helps that city and helps kind uh, of everyone with it. So Brian, thanks so much again for coming on today. Really appreciate your leadership there and, and everything in the St. Louis market with uh, within the geospatial uh, realm with NGA and others. So it's been so wonderful having you on, sharing what you're doing and uh, I hope everyone found it educational and maybe they'll reach out if they're like oh yeah, we need to be doing that maybe in a different uh, industry but doing that uh, in, in their city, in their region.

Speaker A: You know what, you know what's really cool before we jump off and people might appreciate this too. So you know, there's a lot happening in Charlottesville, Virginia and it was really interesting. Bob Sharp's tied into that as well and he brought a whole contingent from Charlotteville, everyone from you know, local and state leaders to, to politicians, to you know, economic development folks and basically you know, took them on a tour of the things that are happening here in St. Louis and said hey, maybe not a one to one match for the things that you're doing, but like, here's some ways to think about that. Um, you know, there's a, there's an ARISE foundation or an ARISE Coalition that's here, uh, in town this week. Um, that's tied into the whole ag space and kind of emerging geospatial folks from south and Central America and the UK and they're here kind of seeing what everybody else is doing. And so I think, you know, when you make the comment of, of reaching out, there's probably some ways where we could highlight uh, the work that we're doing and share those opportunities for folks to bring a small contingent. We should get on planes too and go other places and see what other people are doing. But you know, a lot of those cities that I mentioned and the work that they're doing, I think it would. It would be in the best interest of a lot of us to check out what other people are doing.

Speaker B: Absolutely. So, uh, I would invite folks to reach out. But Brian, thanks again so much for being on. And for everyone listening in today, thank you so much for, for being with us and joining us today. I hope you all enjoyed the podcast. We're always interested in hearing from technologists and technology leaders in government, academia and industry. So, Brian, it was amazing having you on. So if someone in the audience would like to share what you're doing to drive innovation and modernizing outcomes, improving a region or a city, uh, whether it's with the US Space Mission Defense, please reach out to me at bfox24tsi.edu. Again, that's bfox24tsi.edu. Uh, thank you all again for joining. And Brian, thanks again for being on today. Really appreciate it. It was wonderful for sure having you share what you all are up to there.

Speaker A: Yeah, I appreciate you and I appreciate our years of friendship. Means a lot.

Speaker B: Amen, brother. Thank you all for listening to today's episode of the Space and Defense Innovation Launchpad podcast. Don't hesitate to reach out if you'd like to be a part of a future podcast. We'd love to hear from you. We hope you enjoyed today's discussion, so please don't forget to like, follow and subscribe so you don't miss out on future episodes. We'll see you next time on the Space and Defense Innovation Launchpad podcast.