David Kissling
Sr Systems And Software Engineer, Sr Staff
Severn,MD
Summary
A professional career spanning 36 years including a mix of individual contributor and management roles. Developed subject matter expertise (SME) and filled lead roles in the areas of directing finding, software radio, telecommunications, reverse engineering, systems engineering, hardware design, embedded systems development, software development, and RF testing. Leadership roles at Lockheed Martin included Engineering Manager, Program Manager, Capture Manager and Recruiting Manager.
Overview
40
40
years of professional experience
4
4
years of post-secondary education
Work History
Sr Systems Engineer, Sr Staff
Lockheed Martin - EXTRAINNINGS Program
09.2021 - 03.2022
- Was responsible for maintaining and improving remote control, testing, and automation of several satellite ground stations located abroad.
- Used NETMAC Monitor and Control System software, hosted on QNX Operating System, to implement custom drivers and graphical user interface features.
- Used Atlassian Confluence as collaboration tool connecting teams worldwide.
Sr Systems Engineer, Sr Staff
Lockheed Martin - SUNSCAPE/FOXMILL Program
11.2007 - 09.2021
- Supported and designed systems fielded oversees in support of the Global War on Terrorism.
- With experience gained in Direction Finding (DF) systems, supported a related effort (a new GFE sensor which was under development and selected by the ISR Task Force for Army and Air Force airborne platforms) for 12 years.
- Conducted studies to test and improve its DF performance, led scores of calibrations and End-to-End testing efforts on MC-12 aircraft equipped with this sensor.
- Deployed to Afghanistan for 2.5 years where he supported the system E2E including ground (back-end and front-end) and air (embedded sensor and interconnecting components).
- Presented, demonstrated capabilities, and coordinated flight-line tours to several Army, Air Force, and other DoD VIPs.
- Frequently wrote LINUX Bash scripts to automate tasks, monitor activity within the system to provide leads on troubleshooting issues (often before operators became aware of a problem), and data filtering.
- Participated in several product evaluations of other software defined radio (SDR) and DF systems for possible future use.
- Oversaw aircraft integrator and corresponding airborne test efforts to improve the state-of-the-art of the GFE Sensor performance. This involved a tightly controlled configuration of system components and collaboration with the integrator to provide repeatable results.
- Participated in Unit testing on software suite developed by Sensor team.
- Performed System Administration tasks (requiring privileged access) including repairing, rebuilding, or updating servers in server warehouse, performing user and group management, maintaining server PKI certificates, and installing vulnerability mitigation patches.
- On this program he frequently used various test instrumentation to create and analyze signals including Network Analyzers, Spectrum Analyzers, Signal Generators, and Arbitrary Waveform Generators.
- Stood up collaboration with MS SharePoint connecting various vendor teams while leading a large competitive study to determine the best DF algorithms going forward.
- Software technologies included Web based UI, JavaScript, MySQL, MongoDB, Node.js, C, LDAP, and XML.
Capture Manager
Lockheed Martin
03.2006 - 11.2007
- Served the line of business and business development organization as capture manager to several government acquisitions.
- This role spanned many aspects of the proposal process including leadership, cost and schedule management, customer and team relations, proposal writing, risk mitigation, and interaction with leadership throughout the corporation.
Sr Embedded Developer and Engineering Manager
Lockheed Martin - PENGUIN, TIS, CACTUS Programs
08.1996 - 02.2006
- Performed as the Functional manager to the Lockheed staff on this program.
- Was the Program Manager from the Lockheed perspective of this sub-contract.
- Throughout the effort, received about a year of specialized training on a foreign line of central office switching equipment including operations, maintenance, Global System for Mobile communications (GSM), and system specialist training both locally and abroad.
- Mentored and provided technical direction in embedded developments to a team that focused on the interoperability between foreign central office and military communications equipment.
- Wrote many technically challenging programs in a vendor proprietary macro scripting language to explore and test this equipment. He frequently combined x86 assembly language and C for low-level and time sensitive code sections in the multiprocessor and real-time operating system environment.
- Throughout his development experience on this effort, I became the SME for the vendor specific architecture, message interactions between software processes, real-time operating system, and relational database structure in-spite of the lack of documentation available in these areas. With the best available understanding of the inner workings of the system he was the driving force behind the design goals and execution.
- As an SME using the proprietary macro language I developed and taught courses to the other team members.
- Much of the knowledge of this effort had to be derived from reverse engineering and at times used IDApro to analyze code sections.
- Designed a custom, self-powered, active current loop interface for the purpose of connecting to maintenance ports and served as liaison with a third party to have the interface miniaturized.
- Received several letters of appreciation from the customer and prime contractor for his outstanding performance on this program.
Sr Systems Engineer
Loral Aerospace - PREDATOR And TWD Programs
04.1994 - 08.1996
- Lead Engineer involved with the design and integration of complex SIGINT systems that were installed at several OCONUS government sites.
- Designed a CEPT L1 splitter and an RS-422 splitter, including the associated PCBs using OrCAD soffware, and supervised the production of dozens of units.
Sr R&D Design Engineer
Loral Aerospace - DTIP And MDD94 Programs
09.1991 - 07.1995
- Led a technically challenging telecommunications security and embedded development effort that involved microcontroller development (Motorola 68HC705) and mixed analog and digital circuit design. An end product came out of this effort was a “disconnect” device for use with a modern PBX telephone system.
- Wrote thousands of lines of 6805 assembly language code, designed the hardware, and created two PCBs each for a different function.
- Led a successful limited production run of over 50 units.
- Prepared and conducted numerous technical briefings and demonstrations for the government customer.
Sr Systems Engineer
Loral Aerospace - NIST
10.1993 - 09.1994
- Performed a vulnerability assessment of a modern PBX system from a feature and system prospective of which he was the principal engineer.
- The effort concluded with a presentation on the subject at a government symposium on telecommunications security.
Sr. R&D Design Engineer
Ford/Loral Aerospace - TECHNICAL SECURITY Program
11.1985 - 04.1993
- Designed and authored a data collection software package for the DoD entitled “ZONEMASTER” that contained over 12k lines of original Pascal code and introduced it to the community at the 1991 TEMPEST symposium through the presentation of a technical paper on the subject.
- ZONEMASTER was adopted as the National standard for use in the TEMPEST zoning of facilities and over 100 copies of it were distributed.
- Integrated zoning systems for several government and commercial customers.
- Educated others and provided ongoing technical support in the field of zoning.
- Designed an IEEE-488 (HPIB) interface controlled multi-port RF switch, which also included a programmable attenuator and low noise preamplifier suitable for use with zoning systems. 24 of these multi-port switches were produced in three production runs.
- Developed an automation system for collecting acoustic data according to Telephone Security Group (TSG) standards, including software (HP-BASIC) and hardware, to test a matrix of signal lines carrying very low-level audio signals. The automation reduced a manual test requiring hundreds of tedious man-hours to just a few hours work and also automated the reporting process by organizing hundreds of data plots formatted specifically for the report.
- Designed digital and analog circuits for various projects and produced circuit boards with the aid of OrCAD software.
- Wrote low-level software to control IBM-PC based hardware including IEEE-488 interfaces and DAC/ADC cards.
- Wrote software to exchange information between DOS formatted disks and HP-LIF formatted disks on an IBM-PC requiring interaction with the PC BIOS.
- Conducted research on a large telecommunications system to help determine whether a RED signal compromise exists. Made Graphical predictions by developing computerized models of the possible RF coupling and transmission scenarios. Subsequent RF testing verified these predictions.
- Performed TEMPEST, Zone, EMI, and acoustic testing both in a Laboratory and in the field.
- Became a Certified TEMPEST Engineer through a government professionalization program and maintained that certification for many years.
Education
BSEE - Computer
University of New Hampshire
Durham, NH 09.1981 - 05.1985
No Degree - Signal Processing
University of Maryland - Baltimore County
Baltimore, MD 05.2001 -
No Degree - Program Management
Lockheed Martin
Hanover, MD 05.2001 -
Skills
Embedded Development
undefinedHobbies
Automotive Repair DIY, Home Improvement DIY, Raspberry Pi projects, Web technology tinkering including CMS, HTML, PHP, and MySQL.
Timeline
Sr Systems Engineer, Sr Staff
Lockheed Martin - EXTRAINNINGS Program
09.2021 - 03.2022
Sr Systems Engineer, Sr Staff
Lockheed Martin - SUNSCAPE/FOXMILL Program
11.2007 - 09.2021
Capture Manager
Lockheed Martin
03.2006 - 11.2007
No Degree - Signal Processing
University of Maryland - Baltimore County
05.2001 -
No Degree - Program Management
Lockheed Martin
05.2001 -
Sr Embedded Developer and Engineering Manager
Lockheed Martin - PENGUIN, TIS, CACTUS Programs
08.1996 - 02.2006
Sr Systems Engineer
Loral Aerospace - PREDATOR And TWD Programs
04.1994 - 08.1996
Sr Systems Engineer
Loral Aerospace - NIST
10.1993 - 09.1994
Sr R&D Design Engineer
Loral Aerospace - DTIP And MDD94 Programs
09.1991 - 07.1995
Sr. R&D Design Engineer
Ford/Loral Aerospace - TECHNICAL SECURITY Program
11.1985 - 04.1993
BSEE - Computer
University of New Hampshire
09.1981 - 05.1985
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