Tommer Ender, Ph.D., is the Deputy Director for Research at the Georgia Tech Research Institute (GTRI), where he leads the Electronics, Systems, and Optics Directorate. In that role, he has oversight for half of GTRI’s research execution conducted across four laboratories. He also serves on the GTRI Executive Council, contributing to enterprise-level strategy, investment decisions, and organizational alignment. His organization’s work spans critical mission areas including autonomy, cybersecurity, electronic warfare, sensors, systems engineering, modeling and simulation, and test and evaluation. With over 25 years of experience focused on national security and systems engineering research, he leads efforts to partner with government, industry, and academia to move technology from concept to operational impact.

Most recently, he served as interim Director of GTRI and Senior Vice President of the Georgia Institute of Technology, leading one of the nation’s largest applied research organizations focused on national security and advanced technology. He was responsible for the strategic direction, execution, and growth of a nearly $1B annual research enterprise with more than 3,000 employees. As Senior Vice President of Georgia Tech, he served on the President’s Cabinet, helping set institutional priorities and guide the university’s long-term strategy. He also previously served as Director of the Electronic Systems Laboratory at GTRI, with a focus on delivering end-to-end systems and transitioning capabilities into real-world use.

Ender’s personal area of research includes development of collaborative, executable Model Based Systems Engineering (MBSE) tools utilizing multidisciplinary design optimization and trade space analytics applied to complex problems. He has also served as an instructor and course developer for Georgia Tech’s Professional Master’s in Applied Systems Engineering, and has served on doctoral and master’s thesis committees at Georgia Tech and other universities. 

Ender has been invited to participate in a number of national committees, including at the National Academies of Science, Engineering and Medicine, offering up his expertise in the areas of systems, mission, and digital engineering. He is a certified Project Management Professional (PMP) and Certified Systems Engineering Professional (CSEP). He is a Senior Member of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE), and an active member of the International Council on Systems Engineers (INCOSE), National Defense Industrial Association (NDIA), and Military Operations Research Society (MORS), regularly publishing with those organizations. 

Ender earned his bachelor’s, master’s and doctorate degrees in Aerospace Engineering from the Georgia Institute of Technology.

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