Parry Labs hires Claussen as chief executive

Parry Labs has hired a new chief executive in Don Claussen, a nearly two-decade defense technology veteran who joins after three years as CEO of ST Engineering iDirect.

Claussen succeeds co-founder John “JD” Parkes, who has moved to executive chairman of the board of directors. Parry Labs said Wednesday that Parkes continues to focus on the company’s long-term strategy, while Claussen will assume responsibility for leading the business day-to-day.

This transition takes almost two years after Parry Labs completed its first institutional investment round that collected $80 million in capital from investors. Parry Labs planned to put a majority of that capital toward efforts in command-and-control, interoperability and artificial intelligence.

Parkes and his colleague Robert Miller started Parry Labs in 2016 to bring together open architecture software and smaller-form hardware into a digital framework for military operators.

As its new CEO, Claussen will lead the next phase of Parry Labs’ efforts to scale the company’s market presence and operating model.

“Now more than ever, it is paramount to build mission outcomes at speed and scale,” Parkes said in a release. “As we, Parry, have continued to grow, I am happy to bring a new CEO and leader that will help us do that.”

"As the (Defense Department) shifts its priorities, I am excited to help position Parry within this evolving opportunity space,” added Claussen. “The defense industry needs exactly these capabilities right now: open architecture, edge compute, C2, and integrated systems with the warfighter at the center."

More recently, Claussen led the U.S. government-focused subsidiary of Singapore Technologies Engineering in its push to expand across federal satellite communications programs.

Claussen’s career in industry also includes leadership roles at Intelsat General, that satellite network operator’s U.S. government subsidiary, plus L3Harris Technologies and Intelsat.