Katherine Ryan

Katherine Ryan serves as a key procurement lead within the Air Force Research Laboratory’s Propulsion Directorate (FA8650), managing complex research and development contracts critical to advancing U.S. air and space propulsion systems. She oversees the acquisition of high-risk, high-reward technologies in hypersonics, adaptive flight control, and advanced materials, ensuring alignment with national defense priorities. Her portfolio emphasizes fundamental and applied R&D efforts that bridge laboratory innovation with operational capability, requiring deep technical understanding and agile contracting practices to support rapid prototyping and transition of next-generation propulsion technologies. Ryan maintains long-standing 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 sustained, mission-critical collaboration on proprietary research initiatives, often involving proprietary materials, computational modeling, and high-temperature system integration. Her contracting approach prioritizes technical excellence and performance-based outcomes, fostering trust-based vendor relationships that enable iterative development and rapid fielding of experimental systems. Ryan’s procurement strategy reflects a singular focus on open competition, with 100% of awards issued under no set-aside provisions. This reflects the agency’s emphasis on accessing the broadest possible pool of technical expertise, particularly for highly specialized R&D efforts requiring advanced engineering capabilities not typically available within small business ecosystems. While socioeconomic preferences are not utilized, her contracting decisions are driven by technical merit and mission necessity. Her primary procurement activity centers on NAICS 541715—Research and Development in the Physical, Engineering, and Life Sciences—focusing on propulsion system design, functional materials development, and high-fidelity simulation tools. She procures services spanning computational fluid dynamics, thermal protection systems, and additive manufacturing of metallic and ceramic composites, underscoring her deep domain expertise in aerospace propulsion engineering.