As vice president within ECS’ Federal Health practice, Asad Akhtar is responsible for programs across the Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health (ARPA-H), the National Institutes of Health (NIH), and the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA). Mr. Akhtar drives agency-wide modernization initiatives at the intersection of customer experience (CX) and AI/ML solutions, overseeing teams in data science and automation, research support and analytics, human-centered design, and business improvement.

With nearly 20 years’ experience supporting federal transformation initiatives, Mr. Akhtar led the establishment of the Veterans Experience Office (VEO) and its implementation of AI to support veteran suicide prevention efforts. Prior to this, Mr. Akhtar helped lay the groundwork for a multi-hundred-million-dollar DoD program that has reshaped warfighter readiness, planning, and deployment.

He holds a bachelor’s degree in business information systems from the Robert H. Smith School of Business at the University of Maryland.