Quality Assurance Lead Engineer

Leaders shaping the future of nuclear and engineering. * Published August 04, 2026 By: Staff Writer The National Society of Professional Engineers will celebrate PE Day on August 5. This day recognizes professional engineers nationwide for their commitment to safety, ethics, and reliability. The U.S. Women in Nuclear Conference began Monday in Seattle, WA, and is the largest U.S. WIN National Conference to date, with over 1,000 registrants. This year's theme is Powering Progress: Turning Energy into Action. Sessions will address topics including personal strengths, human resilience, workforce development, and space applications of nuclear technology. Zap Energy announced that on August 4, Senior Vice President of Fusion Technology Marvi Matos will serve as a panelist at the U.S. Women in Nuclear Conference in Seattle. The panel, Building a Nuclear Career on Your Own Terms, will highlight her experience leading verification for New Shepard's first human flight at Blue Origin and managing a 600-person systems engineering team at Boeing. Matos is a WOC award recipient for outstanding technical contributions. Kendra Hullum-Lawson received Special Recognition at the WOC Conference and was selected for the U.S. Women in Nuclear Leadership program. Her achievements include leading Nuclear Regulatory Commission inspections, plant modifications, and Component Design Basis Inspections. In 2016, she earned a Management Senior Reactor Operator Certification. She started her career at DTE's Fermi 2 Nuclear Power Plant in 2000, and gained years of experience in nuclear power plant design and licensing. Hullum-Lawson led a team of 35 engineers responsible for technical modifications and resolving issues affecting plant performance. She was also recognized as a Technology All-Star, Rising Star, and DTE Trailblazer for her leadership in nuclear generation. Jasmine Gilliam received the Professional Achievement Award at the WOC Conference. As a physical security inspector for Region III at the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, she joined the NRC in 2007 after earning a Bachelor of Science in electrical engineering from Tuskegee University. Her expertise and dedication led to two temporary promotions to senior reactor engineer, a rare opportunity in the industry. On International Women's Day 2024, women from International Atomic Energy Agency programs shared their vision for a more inclusive future in nuclear science and technology, emphasizing the need to make the field more accessible.

Tech Moves: Agility Robotics gets CFO; Microsoft security departure; Zap's legal officer; new KEXP CPTO. by Lisa Stiffler on Jul 23, 2026 at 10:34 am - Agility Robotics named Michael Beer as its chief financial officer. Current CFO and chief operating officer Jennifer Hunter will transition to serving exclusively as COO. "Michael brings outstanding public company finance and capital markets experience, while Jennifer, with her prior experience as a publicly traded COO, will focus exclusively on scaling our operational excellence and manufacturing capabilities," said CEO Peggy Johnson, in a statement. The Salem, Ore.-based startup, whose two-legged Digit robots have been tested inside Amazon warehouses, is set to become the first publicly traded U.S. company dedicated solely to humanoid robots, the company announced last month. Beer joins Agility Robotics from the California energy storage company Energy Vault, where he was CFO for two years. Past roles include venture partner at Vest Coast Capital and CFO at FreeWire Technologies. - Seattle-area tech veteran Matt Fisher has taken the role of CTO for London-based Efekta Education. The company is developing an agentic teaching and learning platform. "I've spent my career building technologies that help people learn, connect and achieve more. What attracted me to Efekta is its clear vision for using AI to enhance learning, support teachers and make high-quality education accessible to more people around the world," Fisher said. Last August, Fisher joined immersive media startup Adventr as a late-stage co-founder. Prior to that, he was co-founder and CTO at Daydream, a startup that raised a $50 million seed round last year to shake up the way people find and buy clothing online. Other past roles include leadership at Amazon, Microsoft, Nordstrom and Auth0. - There is another name to add to the raft of departures from Microsoft's security leadership. Rahul Prakash, head of product for Microsoft Security Copilot, shared that he's leaving his role after nearly a decade with the company. "As any Identity professional will tell you, the world of [Identity Access Management] is far more intricate than people realize, and it's being rewritten for the world of AI agents. At Microsoft, I've had the privilege of going deep into this space..." Prakash said on LinkedIn. On Monday, GeekWire reported that Rudra "Rudy" Mitra, who spent more than 27 years at Microsoft, was joining Amazon Web Services as vice president of security services. Other recent departures include Krishna Kumar Parthasarathy, who resigned at after nearly three decades. - Nancy Lipson has joined Zap Energy as chief legal officer. The Everett, Wash.-based company is in pursuit of fusion energy, and recently expanded its scope to include next generation nuclear fission. Lipson was previously executive vice president and CLO for the gold mining giant Newmont Corporation, departing after 18 years in 2023. "Nancy's deep expertise in areas of corporate strategy, governance, compliance, and sustainability will be key assets as Zap pursues its integrated approach to advanced nuclear," Zap posted on LinkedIn. - Jyoti Shukla was named chief product and technology officer at KEXP, a nonprofit radio station serving Seattle and the Bay Area. The station includes community and performance spaces, and features wide-ranging music genres. "There is a lot of meaningful work ahead, and I'm excited to keep learning, building, and partnering with an amazing team as we shape what's next," Shukla said on LinkedIn. Prior to taking the role, Shukla served on KEXP's board of directors and was senior vice president of product design at SiriusXM. She has also worked in tech leadership roles at Nordstrom and Starbucks, and started her career at Microsoft. - ZEV Co-op, a Washington-based nonprofit EV carshare cooperative, announced Ry Armstrong as its new executive director. Armstrong was previously at Sustainable Seattle, where they served as co-director. - Tirzah VanDamme has joined Gagen MacDonald as senior director of AI and digital transformation. She brings more than 20 years of experience and was most recently at Microsoft. - The Washington State Academy of Sciences (WSAS) announced the election four new board members. They are: * Amanda Boyd, executive director of Native American Programs and Professor in the Elson S. Floyd College of Medicine at Washington State Universit * Mary Czerwinski, former research manager at Microsoft Research * John Stein, former science and research director of NOAA Fisheries' Northwest Fisheries Science Center * Judith Wasserheit, professor emerita of Global Health, Medicine, and Epidemiology at the University of Washington WSAS also elected 30 new members, who will assist the organization in providing scientific and technical information to state policymakers. They include 26 scientists and engineers elected by their WSAS peers and four members recently elected to the National Academies of Science, Engineering, or Medicine or awarded the Nobel Prize and who reside or work in Washington state. The members include 11 UW professors and eight from WSU, five researchers from Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, three from Fred Hutch Cancer Center, and three at private companies, with some participants holding roles at multiple institutions.