Making Leaders: Ensuring Excellence for the American Warfighter from the Army to Artel - A Conversation with 2024 Hall of Fame Inductee Ed Spitler

SSPI

In this Making Leaders podcast, we hear from Ed Spitler, Head of SATCOM at Artel and one of three inductees to the Space & Satellite Hall of Fame in 2024. For more than three decades, Ed Spitler has pursued a passionate commitment to support the American warfighter by supplying best-in-class satellite communications systems to power the success of the US Armed Forces. Upon completing his military service as a Cryptographic Telecommunications and Systems Specialist, Ed went to work for the US Department of Defense Contractor, rising from Senior Technical Engineer to Regional Program Manager, OPMAS-EUR, 5th Command, where he played a pivotal role in transitioning seven Defense Communications Sites (DCS) throughout Germany from analog to digital technology.

In 2001, he joined Artel as Vice President of Managed Network Services, in which role he served as program director for more than eight critical DOD and Department of State programs and supported missions including Operation Enduring Freedom, Operation Iraqi Freedom and Afghanistan. Leaving Artel in 2012, Ed went on to hold a series of leadership positions, including COO of Vizada, CEO of Astrium Services Government and President of Satcom Services Government Division at Airbus Defense and Space. By 2017, he was back at Artel as Head of Satcom, where he led the company into a multi-orbit future that delivered resilient GEO to LEO connectivity to the government. He led development and delivery of the SPACE FORCE Pathfinder 2 program, which embedded the Pathfinder 2 payload aboard Hispasat’s Amazonas Nexus HTS. The goal was to provide dependable access to connectivity while saving money for Federal agencies compared with short-term satellite capacity leasing. The program produced savings of more than 60 percent over equivalent service.