Leaders & Achievers 2022
DANIEL DIMASE
CEO and president, Aerocyonics Inc.
CEO AND PRESIDENT Daniel DiMase founded Aerocyonics Inc. four years ago, after seeing “some gaps in the processes and technology associated with supply chain risk management, logistics, hardware assurance, counterfeit parts avoidance and detection, cyber physical systems security and STEM [science, technology, engineering and math] learning,” he said.
With consulting as its baseline, the East Greenwich-based company does extensive research and development, some of which is funded by the U.S. Department of Defense. Aerocyonics’ subject matter experts work with government agencies and microelectronic fabricators such as GlobalFoundries Inc. and academia to develop solutions for advancing state-of-the-art technology.
Each week, the privately held company aggregates data summarizing current events around supply chain risk management and cyber physical systems security that includes hardware and software issues.
“We send these articles for free to thousands of individuals [at] … the 25 or so national information sharing and analysis centers, government agencies, academia and companies,” DiMase said. “We work only with open-source information so that the material doesn’t become classified.”
‘We [at Aerocyonics Inc. are] working on some extremely complex problems.’
Aerocyonics is working with both Rhode Island College and the University of Rhode Island on proposals for the National Science Foundation to develop teacher training, mentoring and project-based learning that focuses on the engineering design process for students from kindergarten through college. Advancing this workforce and making STEM education more accessible, especially for underserved and underrepresented populations, is DiMase’s “passion project.”
“We are working on some extremely complex problems,” DiMase said, such as cybersecurity of physical systems and advancing innovation and technology in ultrafast laser machining, imaging and artificial intelligence.
“For example, we’re worried about someone hacking a city’s water supply system. These systems are out in the field, not in controlled server rooms with frequent updates,” DiMase said. “In our imaging business, our instruments provide 3D images of electronic parts that can be the width of four human hairs to provide meaningful data.”
