- BigBear.ai has welcomed retired U.S. Army Lt. Gen. Sean Gainey to its board of directors
- Gainey served the U.S. Army for 36 years
- Gainey is the ninth member of the BigBear.ai board, which includes CEO and Wash100 awardee Kevin McAleenan
BigBear.ai announced Monday that retired U.S. Army Lt. Gen. Sean Gainey has joined its board of directors effective August 13.
“General Gainey has spent his career at the leading edge of some of the most urgent threats facing warfighters, from counter-drone and integrated missile defense to joint force integration across combatant commands at the center of national security missions,” said Kevin McAleenan, chief executive officer of BigBear.ai and a three-time Wash100 Award winner. “As the threat from unmanned systems and advanced missile technology continues to accelerate, his firsthand operational understanding of what our men and women in uniform need from AI-enabled decision support is exactly the perspective our Board and our company need,” he remarked.
What Experience Does Sean Gainey Bring to the BigBear.ai Board?
Gainey closed out a 36-year Army career that included establishing the Department of War’s first Joint Counter-small Unmanned Aircraft Systems Office, where he served as founding director beginning in 2020. At the time, the military services were operating roughly 40 separate counter-drone systems with no shared architecture linking them. Under his leadership, the office produced the department’s inaugural counter-sUAS strategy and built out joint doctrine, training standards and a shared command-and-control framework that connected sensors and defensive systems across the services. His tenure also saw the launch of the Joint Counter-sUAS University at Fort Sill, which established a unified training pipeline for operators.
Gainey’s last military posting placed him in command of U.S. Army Space and Missile Defense Command and the Joint Functional Component Command for Integrated Missile Defense. He took on an additional role in January 2026 as commander of Joint Task Force-Gold, the U.S. Northern Command organization tasked with integrating and synchronizing homeland air and missile defense efforts and serving as the operational backbone for the planned Golden Dome missile shield. During his military service, he was decorated with the Defense Superior Service Medal, the Legion of Merit, the Bronze Star Medal and the Meritorious Service Medal.
Beyond his most recent posts, Gainey’s career spanned command roles from the battery through brigade level before his three-star command and senior assignments on the Joint Staff covering force protection and global force management.
Who Are the Members of BigBear.ai’s Board?
Gainey joins eight other members of BigBear.ai’s board of directors, which consists of leaders from defense, aerospace, accounting and government service.
The chairman of the board is Peter Cannito, a former Marine Corps officer who now heads Redwire and has led defense technology firms including Polaris Alpha and EOIR Technologies.
CEO and Wash100 award winner Kevin McAleenan is a former acting secretary of Homeland Security and commissioner of Customs and Border Protection who co-founded Pangiam before it was acquired by BigBear.ai.
Other members are Sean Battle, a 30-year intelligence and defense veteran who previously served as BigBear.ai’s vice chairman and chief strategy officer and earlier co-founded PCI; Pamela Braden, founder and CEO of defense engineering firm Gryphon Technologies; and Anthony Evangelista, a PricewaterhouseCoopers veteran who spent 23 years advising public companies on Securities and Exchange Commission compliance and financial reporting.
The board also includes Paul Fulchino, an AE Industrial Partners operating partner with deep aviation-industry and mergers and acquisitions experience from roles at Boeing, Aviall and B/E Aerospace; Dorothy Hayes, a veteran corporate controller and chief accounting officer with previous leadership roles at Intuit, Agilent Technologies, Hewlett Packard Enterprise and Apollo Computer; and Kirk Konert, a partner at AE Industrial Partners and the chairman of Firefly Aerospace.
