Indian-American turns into US Army’s first CIO

Image Source : AP Indian-American turns into US Army’s first CIO
Indian-American Dr Raj Iyer has taken over as the primary Chief Information Officer of the US Army, after the Pentagon created the place in July 2020. One of the highest-ranking Indian-American civilians within the US Department of Defense, Iyer, who holds a Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering, serves because the principal advisor to the Secretary of the Army and directs illustration of the secretary in issues referring to info administration/info expertise (IT), the Pentagon stated in an announcement.
Equivalent in rank to a three-star General, Iyer will supervise an annual funds of USD 16 billion for the US Army’s IT operations. Over 15,000 civilians and army personnel posted throughout 100 international locations work underneath him.
Iyer will direct the execution of insurance policies and programmes to modernise the US Army to attain digital overmatch in opposition to close to peer adversaries akin to China and Russia.
The Army has dedicated to leveraging superior applied sciences akin to cloud computing, robotics and synthetic intelligence as important enablers for future battle preventing via an idea referred to as multi-domain operations.
Previously, Iyer was companion and managing director at Deloitte Consulting LLP, the place he led a number of expertise packages supporting authorities purchasers.
Over the course of his 26-year profession, Iyer has supported a spread of defence and industrial purchasers on numerous advanced enterprise transformation challenges, together with technique, innovation and modernisation.

He has established new organisations, together with the primary workplace of the Chief Technology Officer within the Army, co-founded a profitable expertise start-up, and led restoration programmes akin to Obamacare. He additionally holds a patent and has printed dozens of peer reviewed papers.
Iyer holds a Ph.D. from the University of Texas at Arlington together with a number of masters levels, together with a Master of Business Administration from the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor and a Master of Science in Electrical Engineering from The University of Texas at Arlington.
Iyer, initially a local of Tiruchirappalli in Tamil Nadu, grew up in Bengaluru and accomplished his undergraduate research at National Institute of Technology Tirchi earlier than shifting to the US to pursue increased research.
In the US, he had barely sufficient cash to pay for tuition and lease for one semester via his father’s life financial savings, however was quickly capable of safe a full fellowship to finish all of his graduate training.
His father Manakkal Okay Ganesan, an engineer working as General Manager at Metallurgical and Engineering Consultants (MECON), was instrumental in exhibiting him a ardour for public service and the worth of training and arduous work, in line with a testimonial on-line.
Iyer is married to Brindha, a healthcare IT programme supervisor within the US authorities. They have two sons, Ashwin Iyer, a freshman majoring in Data Science on the University of California at Berkeley, and Abishek Iyer, a ninth grader at Centennial High School in Maryland. 
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