Tom Suder
Government Collaborator & Thought Leader for government academia and industry resolving emerging technology challenges
A respected thought leader in the Federal IT community, Tom Suder is the Founder and President of the Advanced Technology Academic Research Center (ATARC), a non-profit organization that introduces innovative technology from academic research labs to the Federal government and private industry with the goal of commercialization. Through a partnership with the MITRE Corporation, ATARC holds collaboration sessions featuring industry thought leaders and subject matter experts in the areas of mobility, cloud computing and big data and the group has published research documents featuring best practices, lessons learned and recommendations to the government. Tom is a Strategic Advisor for the University of Central Florida’s Institute for Simulation & Training (IS&T), an internationally-renowned center of excellence that focuses on advancing modeling and simulation technology, including the integration of mobile, games and virtual worlds for learning. Tom is also the Founder and President of Mobilegov, a mobile integrator he spun out of UCF’s Mixed Emerging Technology Integration Lab (METIL). Tom is a past winner of the Federal 100 Awards, a prestigious honor that recognizes government and industry leaders who played pivotal roles in Federal IT and made a made a difference in the way technology transformed the government. He serves on several technology advisory boards, including the Professional Science Master’s Advisory Board, which is a part of the Telecommunications Management graduate program at the University of Maryland University College (UMUC). Tom is an active member of the American Council for Technology-Industry Advisory Council (ACT-IAC), a prominent professional organization dedicated to the improvement of Federal IT through government and industry collaboration. From 2011 to 2013, he served as Co-Chair of ACT-IAC’s Advanced Mobility Working Group (AMWG), an influential committee that helped shape the mobility component of the Digital Government Strategy. ACT-IAC honored Tom’s substantial impact in mobility by naming him the 2012 Industry Contributor of the Year. Tom has held leadership positions on numerous ACT-IAC committees including: Advanced Mobility Working Group (Co-Chair, 2011-13); IAC Executive Board Nomination Committee (Committee Member, 2010); Management of Change Conference (Industry Vice Chair, 2008); and Program Committee (Vice Chair, 2007). In 2008, Tom won the IAC Chair’s Award for outstanding service and dedication to the organization. In addition to his ACT-IAC committee work, Tom has been a lead contributor on several high-profile government collaboration initiatives within the organization. In 2011, he served as ACT-IAC Working Group Leader on the Myth Busters campaign, which was Point No. 25 in Federal CIO Vivek Kundra’s 25-point IT Management Reform Program. In 2010, he served as the ACT-IAC Working Group Leader for the Better Buy Project – an idea he proposed – which had a goal of helping make government acquisition more open and transparent by using social media tools and collaboration. While the project started out as an experiment by the General Services Administration, it has now become a new way of doing procurements by GSA.
