David Smith
Raj Shah
, head of the Defense Department’s Defense Innovation Unit Experimental, resigned from his post Thursday after a nearly two-year stint with the organization, Federal News Radio reported Monday.
Navy Capt. Sean Heritage will step into the acting leadership role at DIUx.
Shah, a 2018 Wash100 recipient, took the helm in May 2016 after then-Defense Secretary Ashton Carter decided to restructure the organization.
“Raj will still remain attached to DIUx as a part-time Air National Guardsman,” Lt. Col. Michelle Baldanza, a spokeswoman for DoD, told Inside Defense in an email.
Michael Griffin, newly confirmed defense undersecretary for research and engineering and a 2018 Wash100 recipient, is likely to have a role in the selection process for the next DIUx chief.
The report noted that DIUx awarded 59 pilot contracts worth approximately $184 million from May 2016 to September 2017 and has helped move prototyping initiatives into the production phase including a potential $950 million cloud services contract with REAN Cloud.
