Nitin Pradhan

Nitin Pradhan (Marathi: नितिन प्रधान;) was the Departmental Chief Information Officer (CIO) for the US Department of Transportation (DOT) as part of the Obama Administration from July 6, 2009 to August 31, 2012. After leaving US DOT, Pradhan established and led the nation's first Federal Technology Accelerator and Partner Consortium called Public Private Innovations[1] and later cofounded GOVonomy, an emerging products technology marketplace for the public sector as well as ScaleUP USA, a Digital Business Growth Accelerator.[2][3]

Nitin Pradhan
Departmental Chief Information Officer (CIO)
In office
July 6, 2009 – August 31, 2012
Preceded byDan Mintz
Prior position: IT executive, Fairfax County Public Schools (FCPS)
WebsiteUS DOT CIO

Prior to joining DOT, Pradhan was an IT Executive at Fairfax County Public Schools (FCPS), the 12th largest school district in the USA. Earlier, Pradhan was the Managing Director of Virginia’s Center for Innovative Technology (CIT).[4] He was also the co-founder and former CEO of a wireless startup.

Early life and education

Born and brought up in Pune, India, Pradhan attended Loyola High School (Pune). After high school, Pradhan attended the Faculty of Technology and Engineering, Maharaja Sayajirao University of Baroda (MSU), India where he completed his bachelor's degree in engineering. He followed this degree with master's in marketing management from Institute of Management Development and Research, Pune, India. Pradhan came to Washington, DC on a graduate fellowship from the Kogod School of Business at The American University (AU), to study for his second master's degree in accounting.

IT philosophy

Pradhan’s IT philosophy focuses on people first, innovation, agility and driving business value. He believes that technology is first about people. Technology based Innovation is his second theme. He believes that Chief Information Officers (CIOs) have a dual role to play as Chief Innovation Officers. This aspect focuses on creating an innovation life cycle within organizations consisting of ideation and crowd sourcing tools like DOT’s IdeaHub,[5] a process for selection of best ideas, a cloud based agility platform for quick deployment of “apps” that drive business value, an Amazon.com-like IT business catalogue, with a one-stop shop for basic, premium, and fee-for-service IT offerings,[6] and an IT Vital Signs dashboard that measures progress.[7]

Finally, he has promoted the concept of new IT—IT 2.0,[8] as he calls it, is based on immediately providing significant public value and business value, and Everything as a Service (EAAS).[9]

He is a strong proponent of using technology to deliver business results, for example; using emerging innovations like Intelligent Transportation Systems and DOT’s Connected Vehicles Program[10] designed to leverage vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V), driverless cars, and vehicle-to-infrastructure (V2I) wireless communication in order to make driving safer by making cars, trucks, buses and other vehicles aware of the vehicles around them, even if the drivers aren't.[11]

Career

Pre Obama Administration Career
DOT IT Portfolio Rationalization

Pradhan also supported initiatives launched in the DC metro region in the mid-nineties; including Potomac Knowledge Way[12] and Netpreneur,[13] established by the Morino Institute,[14] and the creation and expansion of the Northern Virginia Technology Council (NVTC)[15] a membership and trade association for the technology community in Northern Virginia, now the largest technology council in the nation, currently serving about 1,000 organizations. After CIT, Pradhan co-founded a wireless startup and was the CEO in early 2000.

Obama Administration Career
Digital Transportation Exchange (DTE)

In 2009, Pradhan joined DOT as its CIO. Pradhan was the chief advisor to the Secretary of Transportation, Ray LaHood relating to information technology. In his role as the Departmental CIO, Pradhan provided IT vision, strategy, planning and oversight for DOT's more than $3.0 billion IT portfolio,[16] the 6th largest in the Federal Government. Pradhan's focus at DOT was on using technology to drive mission and business value,[8] IT portfolio optimization,[17][18] streamlining technology services, creating an IT business catalogue and Online distribution(app store),[5] holistic cyber security[19][20][21][22] and public private partnerships like the Digital Transportation Ecosystem (DTE).[23][24][25] Some of the DOT technology initiatives included:

  • Modernization of the National Airspace System (NAS)-[26] Called NextGEN, which upgrades the system from older ground-based radars to satellite and GPS based systems.
  • Intelligent Transportation System (ITS)-[27] A Connected Vehicles Program that improves vehicle-to-vehicle and vehicle-to-infrastructure safety via wireless communications and threat alerts.
  • Modernizing Analog 911 Systems (E911)-[28] Next generation digital VOIP 911 systems capable of receiving and sending internet protocol based voice, video and text.

Post Obama Administration Career

In September 2012, Pradhan established the nation’s first Federal Technology Accelerator and Partner Consortium called Public Private Innovations (PPI).[29] The goal of PPI is to drive public value through private growth by researching and analyzing government problems and matching them with business technology solutions; nurturing, adapting, and deploying technology platforms, products, and services for the federal marketplace and starting, building and growing government practices for new or existing IT contractors and technology suppliers.[30]

In, March 2013, Pradhan cofounded GOVonomy.com, an emerging products technology marketplace focused on the public sector. GOVonomy’s goal is to drive increased public value by regularly introducing cost-effective, cutting-edge, targeted technologies that specifically address the challenges and opportunities facing the public sector. GOVonomy connects public organizations with new technology products/services from growth companies and helps arrange strategic discussions, demonstrations and pilots for increased understanding, education, purchasing integration of the emerging technology products for the public sector.[31]

Professional recognition

For his work at the Department of Transportation, Pradhan and the DOT were awarded:

References
  1. "Steve O'Keeffe's blog - MeriTalk".
  2. "5 Habits Of Highly Effective Government IT Leaders". InformationWeek.
  3. Pradhan, Nitin (2017-09-05). "The Reason Why Everyone Love ScaleUP USA Digital Business Growth Accelerator". Medium. Retrieved 2017-09-10.
  4. "Center for Innovative Technology Main Home Page - Center for Innovative Technology".
  5. "Making the Web Work for DOT: IdeaHub - CIO Council". CIO Council.
  6. "IT Reform: Task Force Will Drive Data Center Closures - CIO Council". CIO Council.
  7. "IT Vital Signs - CIO Council". CIO Council.
  8. "The Changing Role of the CIO - CIO Council". CIO Council.
  9. "GSA looks to cloud for pretty much everything -- FCW".
  10. "IT Solutions – Connected Vehicle Technology - CIO Council". CIO Council.
  11. "Dataquest CIO Handbook 2012, Dataquest Magazine Interview"
  12. "Potomac KnowledgeWay Project Home Page".
  13. "Netpreneur Exchange – Internet Entrepreneurship in Greater Washington DC (archived site)"
  14. "Morino Institute: Home".
  15. "Northern Virginia Technology Council".
  16. "Invalid Operation".
  17. "Portfolio Rationalization: Effective Optimization of IT Funds - CIO Council". CIO Council.
  18. "DOT CIO: Portfolio Rationalization Key". FedScoop.
  19. "The "Business" of Cybersecurity! - CIO Council". CIO Council.
  20. "DOT CIO Questions FISMA Audits' Value".
  21. "DOT Falls Short in Annual FISMA Audit".
  22. "DOT Continuous Monitoring Shortfalls Highlighted in OIG Audit Report » Regulatory Cyber Security: The FISMA Focus IPD".
  23. "Transportation Dept. Creates Online Technology Exchange". InformationWeek.
  24. "Digital Transportation Exchange: An Open Government And Web 2.0 Initiative". Breaking Government.
  25. "Technologists: Leverage Your Talent/Ideas/Experience To Contribute To The Digital Transportation Exchange".
  26. "Next Generation Air Transportation System (NextGen)".
  27. "The Office of the Secretary of Transportation (OST-R) - Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS)".
  28. "Intelligent Transportation Systems - Next Generation 9-1-1".
  29. "About Us - Public Private Innovations".
  30. "Public Private Innovations".
  31. "Government IT Contract Wins: An Insider's Perspective". InformationWeek.
  32. "InformationWeek 500: Government Innovators". InformationWeek. 7 September 2010. Archived from the original on 5 January 2016.
  33. "Class of 2011 Yearbook: The Honorees - Computerworld". Computerworld. Archived from the original on 28 June 2017.
  34. Ellen Fanning (18 February 2011). "How the 2011 Computerworld Premier 100 IT Leaders were chosen". Computerworld. Archived from the original on 18 May 2015.
  35. "50 Most Influential Government CIOs". InformationWeek. 31 May 2011. Archived from the original on 15 January 2016.
  36. "2012 Winner Profile: U.S. Department of Transportation". CIO Magazine. Archived from the original on 25 December 2014.
  37. "Innovations in Open Government that are Changing DOT". Obama White House. 13 April 2012.
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