ISL Corporate Leadership

Dr. Joseph Guerci

President/CEO

ISL President and CEO Dr. Joseph R. Guerci has more than 30 years of experience in advanced technology research and development in government, industrial, and academic settings.

Dr. Guerci’s prior government service includes a 7-year term with the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), where as Director of the Special Projects Office (SPO), he oversaw a $500M annual technology portfolio. At DARPA, he was responsible for the inception, research, development, execution, and ultimately transition of next-generation multidisciplinary technologies. The advanced radar and electronic warfare (EW) solutions he developed at DARPA are currently deployed in the F-22, F-35 and other advanced radars. He also created the KASSPER project, the forerunner of cognitive radar and EW.

Additionally, Dr. Guerci has held senior engineering and scientific positions in private industry and was Chief Technology Officer for SAIC’s $2B+/year Research, Development, Test & Evaluation Group.

Dr. Guerci is an internationally recognized leader in the R&D and transition of next generation sensor and cognitive systems. He authored Space-Time Adaptive Processing for Radar and Cognitive Radar: The Knowledge-Aided Fully Adaptive Approach, co-authored several books and has written more than 130 peer-reviewed articles.

Dr. Guerci, a Fellow of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE), in 2020 was awarded the IEEE’s Dennis J. Picard Medal for his “contributions to advanced, fully adaptive radar systems and real-time knowledge-aided, and cognitive radar processing architectures.” He was previously awarded the IEEE’s Warren D. White Award for “Excellence in Radar Adaptive Processing and Waveform Diversity.”

A graduate of NYU Polytechnic University (now Tanden School of Engineering) with a Ph.D.E.E, Dr. Guerci has held adjunct professorships in engineering and applied mathematics at The City University of New York, NYU Polytechnic University, The Cooper Union for Advancement of Art and Science, and
Virginia Tech.

C. Russell Shearer

Chief Operating Officer

Russell H. Shearer is the Chief Operating Officer of ISL, Inc. He oversees ISL’s three business units that develop and manufacture products in advanced, high-fidelity digital engineering for RF and nuclear modelling, mission planning, and design and testing; AI and neuromorphic computing for airborne and other sensors; the world’s only state-of-the-art exportable passive sonar intercept; and real-world, efficient, and deployable solutions for nuclear energy production, carbon sequestration, and water desalinization, among other uses. Shearer is also responsible for strategically positioning ISL to respond to growth, intellectual property development, and evolving business lines.

Shearer joined ISL in 2009, serving first as Vice President for Nuclear Reactor Services with P&L responsibility for nuclear licensing and construction-management, and then as Senior Vice President & General Counsel managing ISL’s global legal activities.

Shearer has held senior leadership positions in the U.S. government, including as Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary and Assistant Secretary (acting) for Environment, Safety, Health & Quality (ESH&Q) at the U.S. Department of Energy—the chief ESH&Q officer in the Nation’s nuclear weapons and national laboratory complex—and as Deputy Assistant Secretary for Chemical Demilitarization (acting) and Special Assistant to the Assistant Secretary of the Army—the senior-most line manager of the $1.3B (annual) program that destroyed the Nation’s stockpile of chemical weapons. He practiced environmental law with Cadwalader and Squire Patton Boggs; was environmental counsel to the Savannah River Site, a nuclear-weapons-production facility; and served as a judicial law clerk to the Delaware Supreme Court and the U.S. Court of Veterans Appeals.

Shearer earned a bachelor’s degree from Washington & Lee University, a juris doctor degree from Widener University School of Law, and a legum magister (master of laws) from Tulane University School of Law. He has a certificate in nuclear-weapons design from Sandia National Laboratory and was a National Security Decision-Making Fellow in asymmetrical warfare at Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies. Shearer serves on the board of Grace at the Greenlight, which provides meals, water, and clothing to and reunites the homeless with their loved ones.

Robin Felice

Chief Financial Officer

Robin Felice is Senior Vice President, Chief Financial Officer, and Treasurer for ISL She has a BBA degree in Accounting and a minor in Computer Science from the University of San Diego and is a Certified Public Accountant Ms Felice has been with ISL for 16 years and is responsible for the administrative and financial management operations of the company, which include the financial reporting, budgeting, cash management, development of financial and operational strategies, metrics tied to that strategy, and the ongoing development and monitoring of control systems designed to preserve the company assets Prior to working for ISL, Ms Felice has 17 years of accounting and financial management experience
with companies dealing with advanced technologies and manufacturing that are involved with both government and commercial contracts.

Her expertise lies in government accounting and she has extensive experience with applicable government rules and regulations, including but not limited to DFARS FAR, CAS, NRC, etc Her career started with the Defense Contract Audit Agency ( where she audited various defense contractors in San Diego County She earned an Award of Merit issued by the Department of Navy for an outstanding effort in assisting the Navy in the negotiations of an equitable adjustment and also received a Superior Accomplishment Award for assisting the Department of Justice Trial Attorney in the development of litigation strategies, for which her audit was relied upon significantly in the issuance of the Final Decision Ms Felice
then moved into private industry and worked for General Atomics in accounting, then moved into one of their divisions as a financial analyst, and then returned back to Corporate and started their Internal Compliance department Ms Felice next worked for Remec Aerospace, where she gained extensive experience in the Defense manufacturing industry and was involved in a several hundred multimillion dollar proposal win, and was responsible for the company’s financial anagement and audits Her background with technology, research and development, engineering services, and manufacturing led her to ISL, of which her knowledge serves as a valuable asset.

Jason Williams

Senior VP, Manager of Energy and Space Division

Mr. Jason Williams is Vice President and General Manager of ISL’s Energy and Space Division. Mr. Williams possess a Bachelor and Master of Science degree in Nuclear Engineering from The Pennsylvania State University. His career is dedicated to advancing new nuclear technologies to solve the world’s most challenging problems. Mr. Williams is an expert in advanced reactor designs, nuclear safety analysis, radiation dose analysis, and regulatory practices. He leads a team of world-renowned experts and engineers in nuclear software development, nuclear analysis, modeling and simulation, risk management, regulatory practices, and artificial intelligence.

Jamie Bergin

Senior VP, Manager of Research, Development and Engineering Solutions Division

Jamie Bergin is the Senior Vice President and Manager of the Research, Development and Engineering Systems Division Mr Bergin has been with ISL for 23 years He is currently the general manager of ISL’s Research, Development, and Engineering Solutions division He has over 20 years’ experience in RF systems engineering, signal processing, and project management Mr Bergin is an active researcher in advanced radar and sensor signal processing and has made contributions in the areas of knowledge aided signal processing, site specific RF modeling and simulation, and MIMO radar He was one of the first researchers to demonstrate useful MIMO radar performance on a fielded production X band radar Mr Bergin has been principal investigator on a number of past and on going DARPA, NAVAIR and AFRL sponsored R&D programs including the DARPA KASSPER and FOPEN GXP programs His research has led to numerous open literature and conference publications and he is the co author of the recent book titled “MIMO Radar Theory and Application” published by Artech House, March 2018.

George Michalakeas

Senior VP, Manager of Products and Manufacturing Division

George Michalakeas has held various positions in Engineering and Information Technologies at various capacities ranging from Division head, Primary Designer to Proposal/Account Manager and Program/Project Manager.

He has Managed large IT divisions in The City University of New York and Large Corporations.

He maintains a solid record of designing, managing, and delivering large scale projects well before the planned delivery dates in various countries ranging from USA, Greece, Bulgaria, Moldova, Austria, Hungary, Finland, Qatar & Jordan. He managed the implementation of one of the largest Data Centers worldwide and the migration of the existing one at half the planned time servicing 27 countries with full disaster recovery capabilities, utilizing a team of more than 200 engineers and subcontractors such as Accenture, IBM, Lenovo, Del, HP, Cisco, EMC. and achieved zero down time during migration.

The projects he managed from proposal to delivery, span the areas of Air Defense, Airport Security, Port Security, TAXIS-systems, National Health and Social Security, Interoperability, National Optical Networks, Border Control, Transportation and Sonar systems.

He has received several awards and recognitions through the years from his employers and independent entities.

Holds a bachelor’s degree in Engineering from CUNY and a Master’s degree in Information Technology from CUNY & Columbia University of New York. Has taught for more than 15 years in engineering, Physics and Numerical Analysis at the Applied Sciences and Mathematics departments at The City University of New York(CUNY).