Leadership Team:
Jeffrey Hamel – Chief Executive Officer and President
Mr. Hamel started his career at Raytheon Company where he worked in manufacturing, development and program management where he gained progressive authority over systems design, R&D, manufacturing and project management functions eventually leading the Patriot Program Office in charge of managing $500M+ development and production programs.
Mr. Hamel left Raytheon in 2000, joining RSA Security to lead the startup of a new engineering organization focused on innovation in the security authentication market. Mr. Hamel built, led and supervised the engineering design team consisting of firmware, software, quality assurance, PCB and mechanical design engineers tasked with researching, designing and developing new security authentication solutions.
Mr. Hamel joined Digimarc/L-1 Identity Solutions’ Secure Credentialing Division/Morpho Trust responsible for the 320 person Professional Services Organization consisting of program and operations managers; system architects, manufacturing, field service, call center and engineering staff. He managed program lifecycle implementing complete systems to provide citizen enrollment, biometric capture, fraud analysis, backend storage, processing and ID production services on time and within budget. He also had was responsible for P&L authority over 50+ domestic and international secure credential programs representing $650M+ in long-term customer contracts and 85% of the division’s yearly revenue.
Mr. Hamel joined IDSS in October 2012 as the President. Mr. Hamel is responsible for the Security business of IDSS Holdings overseeing the development and manufacturing of the DETECT™ 1000 Cabin Baggage Scanner as well as other solutions IDSS is bringing to market in the future.
Paul Medwar – Chief Financial and administrative officer
Paul Medwar joined IDSS in January of 2018 and serves as the Company’s Chief Financial & Administrative Officer overseeing Accounting, Finance, Human Resources and Administration. Prior to joining IDSS, Mr. Medwar held executive financial and operational positions at Idemia, MorphoTrust USA and Digimarc Corporation over the last 15 years. Mr. Medwar received his Bachelor’s Degree in Finance from Northeastern University.
James Connelly – CTO
Dr. Connelly left the Federal Aviation Administration’s Aviation Security Laboratory to join L-3 Communications Security and Detection Systems Division in 1998. His experience in developing explosives detection equipment while at the security laboratory helped the team prepare for and pass the FAA certification test. Over the next several years, Dr. Connelly’s team achieved certification at reduced threat mass, produced a reduced false alarm algorithm that actually increased detection at the same time, and became the first team to pass TSA’s expanded detection standard that covered homemade explosives.
In his role as Sr. Director at L-3, Dr. Connelly oversaw all engineering activities at the St. Petersburg facility of L-3 S&DS. His team of 24 engineers was responsible for the development and maintenance of the detection algorithms, the system software and the user interfaces for the eXaminer product line, as well as several new system development efforts. In addition to his management duties, Dr. Connelly played an active role in the development of several major new systems. Dr. Connelly contributed to the development of system requirements, review of designs by all disciplines (Mechanical, Electrical, Physics, Algorithm and Software), and review of project progress.
In addition to his system development and management duties, Dr. Connelly served as Co-Chair on the ANSI N42.45 working group which developed the American National Standard for Evaluating the Image Quality of X-ray Computed Tomography (CT) Security-Screening Systems, initially published by IEEE in 2011.
Dr. Connelly joined IDSS in May 2014 as the Chief Technology Officer and leads all our Research & Development efforts.
Daniel Poder, Vice President Engineering
Mr. Poder was the Director of Applied Research and Advanced Technologies at Morpho Trust USA. His team was comprised of several Ph.D. computer engineering researchers as well as 7 software developers. The focus of the team was to enable Morpho Trust's industry leading Biometric solutions to run on commercially available mobile devices. The team delivered the first fully integrated mobile Facial Recognition System for law enforcement on Apple devices. The team also developed the nation's first field piloted mobile Driver's License with complete end-to-end encryption and authentication. Mr. Poder is personally named on over 20 patent disclosures related to mobile Biometrics, Document Authentication and Mobile Credentialing.
Mr. Poder joined IDSS in September 2015 as Director of Software Engineering.
Patricia Krall – Executive Vice President
Ms. Patricia Krall has more than 30 years of experience in aviation security, research science, chemistry and program management and has held several accomplished positions with high technology companies. As a member of the senior executive team at Integrated Defense & Security Solutions (IDSS), Ms. Krall plays a key role in strategic business development with a focus on marketing and government relations worldwide, analyzing and evaluating proposed business opportunities and expanding the company’s product offerings through both research and development and external strategic partnerships.
Ms. Krall has extensive work experience in the technical, scientific, and management aspects of new product and business development. She was a member of the L-3 management team in 1997 which originally formed the Security and Detection Systems division. She was also the principal investigator responsible for the development of the highly successful eXaminer® TSA certified explosives detection system (EDS) that has been widely deployed throughout the U.S. and in many of the world’s largest and most security conscious airports.
Prior to her current role with IDSS, Ms. Krall held executive positions for L-3 Security and Detection Systems and previously held managerial and technical positions with General Electric, Lockheed Martin and American Hospital Supply Corporation. Ms. Krall earned a Master of Science from the University of Florida and a Bachelor of Science from the University of South Florida.
Ms. Krall joined IDSS in November 2016 as the Executive Vice President and supports our Business Development and Strategic Partnership efforts.