Executive Vice President of Missile Defense & C5ISR Market Leader, PARSONS CORP
Parsons' Hector Cuevas Talks Defense Market Outlook and Future of the Military
WashingtonExec's Amanda Ziadeh is joined by Hector Cuevas, executive vice president and general manager of the missile ...
About Hector Cuevas
Hector Cuevas, executive vice president and general manager of the missile defense and C5ISR market at Parsons, discussed the company's role in the defense market and the future of the military in a September 2021 interview. Cuevas stated that Parsons is positioned to "straddle both sides of the equation" as the Department of Defense shifts from a focus on counterterrorism to near-peer conflicts. He said the company's workforce includes "non-traditional employees such as gamers and recent college graduates" to drive innovation. Cuevas also said Parsons is involved in all three service efforts related to Joint All-Domain Command and Control (JADC2), including the Army's Project Convergence, the Air Force's ABMS, and the Navy's Project Overwatch, and aims to be "the broker of capabilities" for the customer. In a 2016 interview, Cuevas described his background as a first-generation American, noting his mother is from Nicaragua and his father from Puerto Rico. He said he was the first person in his family to graduate high school and the first to graduate college with honors. Cuevas spoke about his experience joining a fraternity, stating that he felt a connection with the brothers and that the organization provided a network and philanthropic opportunities. He said his mother initially questioned the value of joining a fraternity but later expressed pride in his decision.
Transcript (10 segments)
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Amanda Izzy0:05
Hello everyone and welcome to Washington Execs video series. I'm Amanda Izzy with Washington Exec, and I'm joined by Hector Cuevas. He's Executive Vice President and General Manager of the Missile Defense and C5ISR market at Parsons. So we're here to talk through the defense market outlook and the future of the military. Thank you so much for being here today with me, Hector.
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Hector Cuevas0:24
Thank you, Amanda. Glad to be here.
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Amanda Izzy0:27
All right, so Hector, I understand that Parsons has emerged as a new player in the federal contracting world, especially with your active acquisition approach. So could you talk about the future vision for Parsons' defense market?
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Hector Cuevas0:39
Yeah, perfect. You know, I'm a byproduct of that, one of those acquisitions. I came over with the OG Systems acquisition back in 2018, and have lived through the last couple years of being part of a really great company as we move into this new world order of going from a full focus on counterterrorism operations over the last 20 years, where Parsons has made its name in the industry base, and now with this pivot to our near-peer fight and conflicts, and our ability to really straddle both. So two things that pop out for me when I explain who Parsons is and what we do in this space is really our agility, and we really do know how to fail and fail quickly and own that outcome. So operational relevance means everything to Parsons. So as long as we maintain that and as we move forward into 2021 and beyond, we will be in a good position to do that. You know, we straddle the whole spectrum of multi-domain operations from space to cyber operations, to ISR sensors on airborne platforms, into even exquisite engineering services that we provide all the services within the Department of Defense. So we're really excited to look into this new near-peer threat for us, because we believe that all of our experiences for the last 20 years have really built the company to be able to handle both sides of the equation there for the Department of Defense.
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Amanda Izzy2:17
All right. And you know, as a veteran yourself, where do you see the future of the military going, especially with the shifting political environment in Washington, D.C.?
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Hector Cuevas2:27
Yeah, so you know, I'm very proud of my service. 20 years in the Army, retired as a Chief Warrant Officer 4. I was in the Pentagon on 9/11, and I knew what the military was prior to 9/11 and what it has become over the last 20 years. So a lot of our workforce at Parsons grew up in this post-9/11 world, and grew up in a world where we had to deliver technology and capabilities at speed, and again fail quickly, recover from that, but really build that relationship with our mission partners, not just treat the department as a customer, but as partners in everything that we did in that post-9/11 world. And we will obviously continue to maintain that moving forward. Our workforce is an absolute huge part of that. We brought in non-traditional employees that normally you wouldn't find in a defense company, but we needed them. We needed the gamers, we needed the technology experience that comes with people right out of college that really don't have any military experience, but we needed that innovation to come in. And our workforce is an example of that today.
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Amanda Izzy3:50
All right, yeah, that makes sense. So you know, we've also been hearing a lot from the Air Force about their Joint All-Domain Command and Control vision, also known as JADC2, which is moving towards reality. So how is Parsons involved, and how do you see JADC2 taking shape?
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Hector Cuevas4:07
Right. So JADC2 as a concept, you've heard the Air Force is leading the way with the ABMS program that they have in place today. We're on that program, we're ramped onto six of the seven categories that exist today, along with about a hundred other companies that are waiting to start providing capabilities there. We're doing joint all-domain operations today with our mission partners, but it is obviously in a very kind of manual way, both from the Army, the Air Force, and the Navy perspective. And what JADC2 intends to do, if you listen to Mr. Preston Dunlap, the chief architect of the Air Force, this internet of military things is really what we've all strived to be able to implement in this post-9/11 world. And I think the leadership that both he and Dr. Roper are showing the community from an Air Force perspective is really going to have an impact both on the Army with their JADC2 efforts, which is called Project Convergence, and then in the Navy domain they have a similar effort called Project Overwatch. So we're involved in all three, we're going to be involved in all three, and we want to be the broker of capabilities to really bring the operational relevance of each of these capabilities to the customer. And so we're super excited about JADC2, and we're going to work with the Air Force and all the different services to really implement that and continue to be that true mission partner that they've always expected from us.
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Amanda Izzy5:51
All right, awesome. Yeah, we certainly look forward to seeing that come to fruition, and I appreciate your insights today on the defense market outlook. Thanks so much for joining me.
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Hector Cuevas5:58
Thank you, Amanda.