Top cybersecurity administrators include key officials in government agencies and executives in leading private sector companies.

Paulo Costa has applied his significant experience as a fighter pilot to a career specializing in the field of electronic warfare and flight safety, which in conjunction with his research on probabilistic reasoning has led to applications in cyber and transportation security, heterogeneous data fusion, and decision support systems in healthcare, defense, and other areas. These topics are at the core of his classroom activities at both graduate and undergraduate levels, as well as his research path. Costa leads the research of graduate-level students in understanding security objectives and verification protocols, bringing in the science of probabilistic reasoning and challenging PhD-level candidates to consider theory and methods for building computationally efficient software agents that reason, act, and learn in environments characterized by noisy and chaotic traffic.

Costa is a key researcher in the field of probabilistic ontologies and has developed innovative applications and extensions that aid in the fight against cyber-warfare. In addition to his Mason assignments as Chair of the Cyber Security Engineering Department and Director of the C5I Center, Dr. Costa is Vice President for Securing Automation and Supply Chain Security (cymanii.org). He is a former President and current elected member of the Board of Directors of the International Society of Information Fusion (isif.org), as well as an IEEE Senior Member (SM13).

Degrees

• PhD, Information Technology, George Mason University
• MS, Systems Engineering, George Mason University
• BS, Engineering, Brazilian Air Force Academy

Source: CEC Page

Shawn Purvis serves as President and CEO of Sabel Systems, part of the Sagewind Capital Portfolio. As CEO of Sabel Systems, Ms. Purvis is responsible for all aspects of Sabel’s growth, M&A, product development and people strategy. Sabel is a leading provider of digital engineering, acquisition, manufacturing, supply chain and logistics solutions.  Shawn has recently been named as a member of the George Mason University Board of Visitors through June 30, 2029.

Over the course of Shawn’s 30 years of P&L responsibilities, she has led billion dollar organizations in the areas of defense, intelligence and cyber security technical solutions in support of the warfighter and intelligence customers both domestically and globally. Ms. Purvis has in-depth skills in driving strategy, policy, corporate strategic campaigns and financial/non-financial goals across the company. She actively participates in corporate governance in areas of risks, benefits, cyber and policies and engagements with the Board of Directors. She has a passion for customer service and delivery in support of our nation’s most critical missions.