Cathie Stropki

Cathie Stropki serves as an Agreements Negotiator within the Air Force Research Laboratory’s Propulsion Directorate (FA8650), where she plays a pivotal role in structuring and executing complex research and development agreements to advance next-generation aerospace propulsion, hypersonics, and high-performance materials. Her responsibilities include negotiating technical, financial, and intellectual property terms for federally funded R&D contracts that bridge government objectives with industry innovation. She primarily handles prime contracts under the Basic Research, Applied Research, and Advanced Technology Development categories, ensuring alignment with AFRL’s mission to sustain U.S. air and space dominance through cutting-edge propulsion technologies. Stropki maintains long-standing, high-trust relationships with leading aerospace and defense contractors including UES Inc., General Electric Company, DCS Corporation, Spirit Aerosystems Inc., and Advanced Thermoplastic Composites LLC. These partnerships are characterized by deep technical collaboration, often involving proprietary materials development, computational fluid dynamics modeling, and adaptive flight control system integration. Her negotiation approach emphasizes performance-based outcomes, milestone-driven deliverables, and robust technical oversight to ensure mission-critical capabilities are delivered on schedule and within scope. Stropki’s contracting portfolio reflects a strict focus on open competition, with 100% of her agreements awarded under no set-aside provisions. This underscores a deliberate strategy to prioritize technical excellence and industrial capacity over socioeconomic preferences, ensuring the most capable entities—regardless of size or certification—are selected to meet the demanding requirements of national defense R&D. Her procurement activity is exclusively concentrated under NAICS 541712, encompassing research and development in physical, engineering, and life sciences. She specializes in procuring advanced propulsion systems, hypersonic test hardware, functional composite materials, and flight-critical avionics, requiring deep domain expertise in aerospace engineering, thermodynamics, and materials science. Her work directly supports the transition of laboratory innovations into operational air and space systems.