Planes, Trains, and Tanks

Trains may look like large analog devices, but they are teeming with computers. Communications, monitoring, positive train control, fuel management systems, data recorders, power, and engine control systems all heavily involve digital components. It’s not just locomotives that have become heavily digitized: passenger and freight cars also benefit from many digital sensors and con

Venture capital is America’s innovation engine. Where venture investors deploy capital has a huge impact on which transformational ideas turn into disruptive products. Ultimately some of these disruptive products turn out to have profound impacts on our lives. It’s no secret that digital technology has been at the root of many such profound impacts over the past century. But th

Even though they may not look like it at first glance, aircraft are crammed full of computers. Communications, navigation, monitoring, flight control, fuel, collision avoidance, flight recorders, weather systems, and management systems are all rooted in digital components. Military aircraft have even more. Because aircraft run complicated software and contain many digital interface

The United States established the Space Force in 2019 as the world’s first and only independent space force. Its mission is to protect US and allied interests in space. Space is an important domain for a wide range of applications, including communications, observation, scientific exploration, and recently tourism. In this episode, special guest Ryan Welch joins us to discuss the

Field Engineering is the culmination of the delivery of our ideas to the marketplace in a way that realizes as close to immediate value to the customer as possible and provides a feedback loop to our product, engineering, marketing and sales organizations for improvement. It is the customer facing team of technologists who are "closest to the problems" faced by the customer which e

Cyberattacks against critical infrastructure can have detrimental impacts on everyday life. The past few months, we’ve seen example after example of cyberattacks causing gas and food shortages as well as transportation service disruptions. CISA, the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, is a standalone US federal agency established to advance the Department of Homelan

On this podcast, we’ve talked about the need to secure legacy systems from attackers that use today’s technology. But what about securing today’s systems in preparation for attackers using technologies of the future? In this episode, special guests Ellie Daw and Ben McCarty discuss one of those emerging technologies: quantum computers, and specifically their utility for secur

Maintenance departments are not often known as the first place to implement new technologies, but as more companies emerge to aid in their processes, companies have to learn to meet these teams where they are and guide them through a digital transformation. How can companies put themselves in the shoes of those they try to serve with their technology? In this episode, we invite Reb

Autonomous fleets are quickly becoming the new topic of conversation among the trucking, rail, and aviation industries. However, with optimistic promises of safety and efficiency improvements comes caution regarding cybersecurity and legal risks. How will autonomous trucking impact the freight rail industry, or vice versa? Will unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV’s) become the future o

A few weeks’ ago, we discussed the utility of the hacker’s mindset in all manner of situations. But what if I told you that the hacker’s mentality is far older than the term itself? On this week’s episode, I am delighted to welcome Ben McCarty, author of Cyberjutsu: Cybersecurity for the Modern Ninja, to discuss the parallels between the practices of world class, cutting-ed