New Navy CIO Is Coming From HHS: Rob Foster

WASHINGTON: A year after the Navy’s last Chief Information Officer left to become CIO of the entire Defense Department, the Navy Department is bringing in new blood to fill its CIO position: Rob Foster. A retired Navy officer with extensive acquisition and IT experience, Foster has served as deputy CIO of both HHS and ICE (Immigration & Customs Enforcement) but never previously at such high levels in the Pentagon.

The Navy won’t confirm the name, only that there’ll be an announcement on a new CIO this Monday. But we understand from a knowledgeable source that Navy Secretary Ray Mabus approved Foster’s selection last Friday. When we called Foster’s office at Health & Human Services, where he’s currently deputy CIO, they said he was out on terminal leave and his last day with the department would be the 12th. So expect Foster to start in about two weeks.

To be clear: we don’t have official confirmation but our source is very, well, reliable.

Foster’s kept a low profile: He has no recent mentions in news stories, no official biography online, just a LinkedIn profile and an old speaker bio from an AFCEA event.

Foster joined the Navy in 1984 as a supply corps officer, serving on since-retired frigates before becoming an acquisition professional and moving into the IT world. He worked on the Defense Logistics Agency’s “transformational” Product Data Management Initiative and worked extensively on the Navy-Marine Corps Intranet (NMCI). After retiring from the military in 2007, he worked as ICE’s deputy CIO for six years before moving over to HHS in 2013.

At the Navy Department, Foster will replace acting Navy CIO John Zangardi. Zangardi is currently dual-hatted as deputy assistant secretary of the Navy (DASN) for “Command, Control, Communications, Computers, Intelligence, Information Operations, and Space,” and he’ll presumably stay on in that position. The last official Navy CIO was Terry Halvorsen, who’s now DOD CIO.

Colin contributed to this article.