Jennifer Zbozny, Director, Technical Management Division
Program Executive Office for Command, Control and Communications-Tactical
(PEO C3T)
Throughout her career, Ms. Jennifer Zbozny has networked our
Soldiers to the edge of the battlefield. She has inspired
innovation across the teams who develop and deliver the
networked mission command capabilities our Soldiers require to
defeat their adversaries.
As the chief engineer for the US Army Program Executive Office for Command,
Control and Communications-Tactical (PEO C3T) since 2009, Ms. Zbozny led the
delivery of Capability Set (CS) 13, the Army’s first integrated tactical network
package providing mobile voice and data communications across the Brigade
Combat Team (BCT) down to the dismounted Soldier, in support of deploying
BCTs. Ms. Zbozny is the chief architect of the Simplified Tactical Army Reliable
Network (STARNet), PEO C3T’s framework for the next-generation network
supporting Force 2025 operational priorities. She has been instrumental in
delivering the network designs utilized during the Army’s semi-annual Network
Integration Evaluations (NIEs), which have allowed the Army to rapidly progress
and integrate the tactical communications network. Ms. Zbozny led the creation
of the PEO C3T Tactical Systems Integration Facility (TSIF) at Aberdeen Proving
Ground, MD, which ensures that the hardware and software for PEO C3T
programs of record – which form the backbone of the Army’s tactical
communications infrastructure – are integrated and interoperable.
In 2009, Ms. Zbozny was instrumental in filling the requirement of an urgent
needs statement for U.S. forces in Operation Enduring Freedom (OEF) in
Afghanistan to communicate with their coalition partners. The result was the
Combined Enterprise Regional Information Exchange System (CENTRIXS) International Security Assistance Force (ISAF), or CX-I, the U.S. component of the
coalition network in OEF. She established a team that led the development of the
CX-I architecture and worked with the Project Managers (PMs) to develop
solutions to support the CX-I network. As a result of these efforts, PEOs C3T and
Intelligence, Electronic Warfare and Sensors were awarded the prestigious David
Packard award, the Department of Defense acquisition community’s highest
award.
In 2004, as Technical Management Division Chief of PEO C3T’s former Project
Manager, Tactical Radio Communications Systems (PM TRCS), Ms. Zbozny
synchronized hundreds of C4ISR engineers who ensured network interoperability
and functionality. At the time, PM TRCS’ key effort was responding to an
Operational Needs Statement (ONS) from the 3rd Infantry Division (3rd ID), to
replace the Mobile Subscriber Equipment network, which proved insufficient
during the division’s overrun of Baghdad, Iraq. Only 10 months after the ONS was
released, the Army team equipped 3rd ID with the initial components of the
satellite-based communications system Joint Network Node-Network, known
today as Warfighter Information Network-Tactical (WIN-T) Increment 1. Her team
also worked with PEO Enterprise Information Systems to enable integration of the
first regional hub within the tactical network.
Ms. Zbozny began her engineering career in a government intern program in 1991
at the School of Engineering and Logistics, in Texarkana, TX, after obtaining her
Bachelor of Science degree in industrial and systems engineering from the
University of Florida in 1991. She finished her Master’s of Science degree in
software engineering at Monmouth University, NJ, in 1993 and moved on to the
Army Materiel Systems Analysis Activity (AMSAA) in Aberdeen, MD.
While at AMSAA, she worked on the Joint Surveillance Target Attack Radar
System and returned to Fort Monmouth, NJ, in 1995. She spent much of her
career at the Software Engineering Center (SEC), working on software
development, and later supporting PM WIN-T. As Product Director of PM WIN-T’s
Tactical Network Architectures and Configurations-Current, Ms. Zbozny worked
with product managers to ensure their new capabilities could co-exist with other
network components.
Ms. Zbozny has been honored with the Superior Civilian Service Award and three
times with the Achievement Medal for Civilian Service.