From Jim Garrettson, Executive Mosaic President & Founder

A renown GovCon leader who helped shape the industry and some of its leading firms over more than 25 years in executive roles is looking to re-enter the public arena.

Walt Havenstein, who served as CEO atSAIC and BAE Systems Inc. among his many leadership positions, announced his intention to become the next governor of the state of New Hampshire.
This is the first run at elected office for the former U.S. Marine, who noted his state to be at a “critical juncture” and said he is positioning his candidacy around his “experience, ideas and leadership.”
In other industry news, the Department of Homeland Security is looking to adopt a “kill chain” method developed by Lockheed Martin as part of a plan to improve DHS’s internal network security.

Lockheed’s method works to apply predictive tools to analyze cyber attacks and halt any incident regardless of its location within the chain.

Wayne Lewandowski, vice president ofVormetric‘s federal operations, told ExecutiveBiz that it is critical for organizations to focus on protecting their data – rather than their network perimeters – to successfully combat and prevent cyber attacks.
“The paradigm in security today is that, if we defend the perimeter, we will be assured of success,” Lewandowski noted. “Almost every week you’ll see another breach where that has been proven to be a fallacy.”
John Thomas, Leidos‘ chief strategic officer, added that cybersecurity is one the spaces that holds the most potential for gains from collaboration between industry and government – and that more needs to be done.
“(Cybersecurity)’s certainly an area where there is a lot of experience on both sides that can support collaboration,” Thomas said. “The exchange of cyber information needs to improve and it needs to be a two way street.”

Against this critical backdrop, the Potomac Officers Club hosted its “2014 GovCon Cyber Summit”Wednesday for government and industry leaders to discuss how they can best collaborate to bolster the U.S.’ cyber postures.

Speakers at the interactive summit came from the legislative and executive branches of the federal government, as well as the private sector.

House Intelligence Committee ChairmanMike Rogers and Ranking Member Dutch Ruppersberger led off the event with perspectives on the role of Congress in the cybersecurity landscape and how legislation can help protect Americans from being exploited online.

 

Robert Jensen Appointed VP and Director of MITRE CMS FFRDC

Robert Jensen has been named VP and director of MITRE’s Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services federally-funded research and development center.

Jensen previously served as executive director of the nonprofit’s center for transforming health and started that position in 2009.

“Rob brings more than two decades of healthcare knowledge and experience to this role,” said Alfred Grasso, MITRE president and CEO.

Jensen has previously worked on MITRE’s electronic health record, medical error reduction and acquisition practices initiatives.

 

Karl Williams Named COO, Charles Peiffer CFO at PAE

Karl Williams has been appointed to serve as COO at PAE starting April 21 and joins the company from a VP role at Engility.

Williams is also a former VP at Harris Corp. and held C-level roles at Multimax and Vodium.

In conjunction, Charles Peiffer will become PAE’s CFO on April 14.

Peiffer most recently served as SVP and CFO at IAP and has also held leadership roles at ITT Corp., Avaya, Lucent Technologies and Martin Marietta.

 

Anthony Brown Joins Northrop in HR VP Role

Anthony Brown has become VP of HR for Northrop Grumman’s corporate office and the company’s enterprise shared service organization.

Brown previously served as VP of human resources at Clark Construction and is a former VP of HR at the PulteGroup.

He will be responsible for Northrop’s talent capture and redeployment center in his new role.

Brown will also serve on Northrop’s HR policy council.

 

Ed Abner Tapped as IntelliDyne COO and EVP

Ed Abner has taken on the EVP and COO roles at IntelliDyne.

Abner will be responsible for BD functions, operations, bid and proposal, IT units and the Hygeia joint venture in his new role.

The former CEO of management consultancy firm Achievance has also previously worked at Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman and SAIC and

 

LexisNexis Patents Tech That Helps Agencies Fight ID Theft

LexisNexis’ risk solutions business unit has acquired a patent for its tax refund detection technology.

The technology is meant to inspect personal information against identity records in order to uncover phony tax refund requests.

“The ability to file electronically has made it easier for taxpayers to submit their returns — and they are doing so in growing numbers,” said Haywood Talcove, government sector CEO at LexisNexis Risk Solutions.

Federal and state agencies have used the investigative tools to block more that 1.5 percent of refunds filed over the past two years.