Spotlight Q&A

 

Attributed to: Andy Lowery, Chief Product Officer, Epirus

Andy Lowery, Chief Product Officer at Epirus, is a proven entrepreneurial, corporate and military leader, having served 30 years in a wide spectrum of demanding US domestic and global roles. He is a recognized thought leader on the application of technology across industry. Prior to Epirus, Andy held various roles at high-tech startups: Co-Founder and CEO of RealWear, Inc., which made industrial head-up-display wearable systems, and Co-Founder of Daqri, where he pioneered mixed reality wearables for enterprise. From 2008 to 2014, Lowery worked in various roles at Raytheon, including Business Area Chief Engineer for Electronic Warfare Systems, and from 2004-2008, he led MACOM’s high-power amplifier products. Andy is a retired lieutenant commander in the US Navy and holds a bachelor’s degree in Electrical and Computer Engineering from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champagne.

JED: Epirus is a relatively new company funded through private capital and drawing on engineering talent with commercial and defense electronics backgrounds. How does this combination create agility for the company and help define its culture?

Lowery: Agility defines everything we do at Epirus, from the engineering bench all the way up to our executive leadership team. Our agile mindset has allowed us to rapidly create three form factors of our directed energy product in three years — Leonidas, Leonidas Pod and Leonidas Mobile.
By funding our own products through private capital, rather than waiting for government requirements to be shaped, we can rapidly meet the mission needs that we know are most pressing for our customers. With this proactive approach, Epirus is able to move at the speed of technology, not the speed of bureaucracy.
On the engineering side, we integrate the principles of the agile manifesto across the board. We are in constant contact with our customers to understand how to best meet their mission needs, and their input shapes what we do on a day-to-day basis. And with the threat landscape as dynamic as ever, we will change course on a dime to best serve the warfighter’s needs.
By drawing from talent with diverse backgrounds, Epirus strives to combine the speed of Silicon Valley with the mission-driven mindset of the aerospace and defense community. We have experts from top tier tech companies working daily with career professionals from the primes. That combination of tech chops and defense expertise is a big part of what makes the magic happen here at Epirus.

To read the rest of this interview at JEDonline, click here.