Draper Welcomes a New Vice President and General Manager of Space Systems
CAMBRIDGE, MA—Draper today welcomed Julia MacDonough as Vice President and General Manager of Space Systems. In this critical role, Julia will develop, implement and oversee the execution of a strategy that accelerates mission impact and growth of Draper’s Space Systems business, which currently spans low earth orbit to deep space.
Reporting to Draper’s President and Chief Executive Officer, Dr. Jerry M. Wohletz, and serving on the executive leadership team, Julia will lead all facets of Space Systems, a key business area for Draper.
Julia has over 25 years of experience in military and civil space, aerospace and defense, remote sensing, electronic warfare and satellite communications serving government, commercial sector and international business customers, including NASA, the Department of Defense andthe Intelligence community. As an Air Force officer, Julia provided technical and programmatic leadership for Department of Defense ground system and remote sensing acquisitions.
Prior to Draper, Julia held positions across BAE Systems and was most recently Product Line Director in Electronic Systems’ FAST LabsTM business. In that role, She led a geographically distributed, matrixed team of scientists, engineers, program managers and functional partners to drive sustained growth following an organizational, cultural and strategic re-set.
Julia earned a Master of Science degree in remote sensing and imaging science from the Rochester Institute of Technology and a Bachelor of Science degree in physics and history from Duke University. She is currently completing the Harvard University Equity, Diversity, Belonging and Inclusion Leadership Graduate Certificate.Julia will support Draper from its Cambridge campus.