President and CEO of The Aerospace Corporation
Earns NDIA’s Teets Award
EL SEGUNDO, Calif. (2/8/07) — Dr. William F. Ballhaus Jr., president and CEO of The Aerospace Corporation, has received the Peter B. Teets Award from the National Defense Industrial Association’s Space Division.
Ballhaus received the award Feb. 1 in Washington, D.C., during the NDIA’s annual Space Policy and Architecture Symposium. He was recognized for “championing the cause of national security space” over a 37-year career in aerospace.
Ballhaus, the award citation stated, “…has made significant contributions that have led to strengthening of our national security by direct application of space capabilities and to the enhancement of our industrial technology base with application to space technology.”
Ballhaus’ career spans service in academia, the government, and industry.
As a research scientist, after completing his PhD at UC Berkeley, he published more than 40 papers on computational aerodynamics, which helped him become one of the earliest members inducted into NASA Ames Research Center’s Hall of Fame. Later he became Director of Ames and also served as acting associate administrator for Aeronautics and Space Technology at NASA Headquarters.
In industry, he was president of two Martin Marietta businesses and was vice president and program director of Martin Marietta’s Titan IV Centaur Operations. He later became a corporate officer and vice president of Engineering and Technology at Lockheed Martin Corporation. He joined The Aerospace Corporation as president in 2000 and assumed the additional title of CEO in 2001.
The Peter B. Teets award is named after the retired undersecretary of the Air Force and Lockheed Martin Corporation executive who advocated rigorous adherence to sound engineering principles and risk management practices in aerospace operations. He served as director of the National Reconnaissance Office at the same time he was undersecretary of the Air Force.
The Aerospace Corporation, based in El Segundo, Calif., is an independent, nonprofit company that provides objective technical analyses and assessments for national security space programs and selected civil and commercial space programs in the national interest.
Contact Dave Jonta, 310-336-5041, david.l.jonta@aero.org
