G. Nagesh Rao

Chief Information Officer

Bureau of Industry and Security, U.S. Department of Commerce

G. Nagesh Rao currently serves as Chief Information Officer for the Bureau of Industry and Security within the U.S. Department of Commerce. Most recently he was Director of Business Technology Solutions (BiTS) at the U.S. Small Business Administration’s (SBA) Office of the Chief Information Officer, and prior to was Chief Technologist & Entrepreneur in Residence within SBA’s Office of Investment & Innovation.

Over the last 20+ years, Nagesh has worked for numerous organizations in the public, private, and not for profit sectors. During his time in the public-sector, he has co-developed federal-wide policy initiatives around spurring small business and technological innovation, as well as programmatic endeavors, such as i6 Green, Patents for Humanity, USAID’s-SBAR Program, and SBA’s Growth Accelerator Fund Competition. Furthermore, he oversaw the revamp and modernization of SBA’s digital platforms, including SBIR.gov and SBA.gov, as well as led technology direction as part of SBA’s COVID-19 leadership response team with respect to the agency’s Virtual Command Center, PPP and EIDL endeavors via the CARES Act. In his initial year of service at BIS-Commerce, under Nagesh’s leadership, the Bureau has overcome 15+ years of technical debt and digitally transformed the way business is conducted via COTS, Cloud, and SaaS based solutions adopting a modern day technology stack standard.

Nagesh is a Mirzayan Fellow of The National Academies, an Eisenhower Fellow and a Marshall Memorial Fellow. Among many accolades that Nagesh has received over the years, recent prominent ones include the Mahatma Gandhi Pravasi Samman & Hind Rattan awards from the NRI Welfare Society, Fed 100, FedScoop 50, ACT-IAC Collaboration Award, DC Inno 50 on Fire, and the 2019 Gears of Government award.

G. Nagesh Rao
G. Nagesh Rao
Chief Information Officer
Bureau of Industry and Security, U.S. Department of Commerce