Brandon Kaploe

Brandon Kaploe is an aerospace engineer with over 20 years of experience in government space, commercial space, and self-driving vehicles. He currently leads the Guidance, Navigation, and Controls (GNC) organization at an early-stage aerospace startup, where he heads a team developing the precision pointing system for a demonstration space telescope while staying hands-on in engineering.

He began his career with 13 years at Lockheed Martin as a dynamics and controls engineer and systems engineer. There, he served as both an individual contributor and technical lead for multiple spacecraft programs from inception through launch.

Brandon spent three years in Pittsburgh's self-driving vehicle industry as a systems lead and engineer. He led fault management and safety-critical system design, and guided his team through critical business transitions such as mergers and shutdowns. Before his current role, he headed GNC at a commercial satellite startup, taking the system from program start through launch and on-orbit commissioning.

Across these roles, Brandon has seen engineering outcomes depend on the decisions people make under pressure: how teams communicate, plan, and execute, and how organizations respond when things go wrong. The engineering leadership course draws on that experience, using case studies built from real decisions in his own career to help students practice the judgment professional engineering demands. Students debate choices with no clean answer, the way engineering teams have to.

Brandon holds a B.S.E. in Aerospace Engineering and an M.Eng. in Space Engineering from the University of Michigan.