This week I spoke with Mike Smayda, 2008 UVA grad who’s now the Founder & CEO at Fortastra, a defense and space manufacturing company based out of California. Mike also was former Senior Aerodynamics Engineer at SpaceX.

The Rundown:

• COLD OPEN: High speed flight, SpaceX, starting a company

• TURNING POINT: Academic frameworks compared to industry

• STEAL THIS: What do you love most about where you live?

• INDUSTRY INSIDER: How do you defend? More importantly, how do you talk about defense?

• BRAGGING RIGHTS: The engineering of building a company

• IF I WERE YOU: No one has lived your life before – you're the first

COLD OPEN

How Did You Get Your Start?

I was graduating undergrad in 2008; not the hottest of job markets to go into. I got really interested in high-speed flight late in my undergrad. UVA has a fantastic program around hypersonics (a field that studies vehicles that go 3,800 mph or faster).

I got along with Chris Goyne, who would become my future advisor. It was a super exciting time to be in that. There were some really interesting things going on in the community, and I was excited to go to pursue my PhD at UVA.
My intent was to work in the industry. I guess staying in academia was always an option, but I wanted to go build things. Not that you can't do that in academia, but I wanted to expand. In a PhD program, usually you go very deep in a precise area. I kind of wanted to explore a bit outside of just one niche.

After UVA, I went to SpaceX in the aerodynamics group. I worked primarily on rocket landing, both from an aerodynamics and aerothermal perspective, some systems engineering things, and some interesting Elon side projects, like the Hyperloop design squad.

Currently, I’m the Founder and CEO of Fortastra, a defense and space manufacturing company based out of California. 

TURNING POINT

What’s A Challenge You Faced Early On?

It was definitely an adjustment going from academia to the SpaceX environment.

When you're out in the world, it's a different framework – you have to do the thing and it must work, whereas an academic environment, I think, is a bit more forgiving.

Figuring out how to do things at a massive scale with much larger teams, can be a challenge to learn. At SpaceX, for example, figuring out what the right thing to do was just as important as doing the thing correctly and well.

I really enjoyed it though – lots of fun and a lot of growth.

STEAL THIS

What’s A Question You Love To Be Asked (Or Asking)?

I love to ask people what they love most about where they live. 

It fosters all sorts of interesting answers and it's a unique view into what people value and how they think about various aspects of life. There’s a lot that your life depends on based on where you are, why you choose to be there, why you are forced to be there, or whatever it is. It leads to a lot of interesting discussion.

I’ve definitely gotten “nothing” as an answer, to which I’ll follow up and then usually they’ll find some things they forgot about that they actually do love. I like trying to find the joy in something that's generally regarded as negative.

INDUSTRY INSIDER

What Do People Misunderstand About The Defense Industry?

There's an interesting, and I think misunderstood conversation about ethics and the defense industry.

The first big question is “Why is defense necessary?” Part of the reason is you want your citizens to be able to do more than standing with rifles defending their valuables all day – you want them to have the freedom to explore other opportunities and the safety to do so.

Defense allows societies to live in an ethical, rules-based order. Obviously, it would be nice if everyone got along, but that's not how history has played out for us, unfortunately.

Another big question is “If you believe you’re on the ethical side, how do you reckon with the ways in which you fight?” This is especially relevant today with the advent of autonomous defense systems. If your adversary is fighting with weapons out of human control, are you supposed to defend with your own?

It’s important to have thoughtful discussions about this, and be open to different perspectives.

BRAGGING RIGHTS

What’s The Coolest Project You’ve Owned?

I've had the pleasure and honor of working on a lot of cool things. It's like choosing one of your children.

I’d say building a company. It comes with a host of underappreciated engineering problems. In my case, at least, you have to design an organization that could align engineers, investors, customers, and the U.S. government. The challenge of creating a culture where people are having the right discussions at the right time when you’re working on the highest value pieces of the technical puzzle is tremendously fun and enjoyable.

IF I WERE YOU

Do You Have Any Advice For Students?

Nobody's been in your situation before. You're the first person to live your life. Yes, everyone has experience, some of which may be applicable, some which may not be. My advice is take all advice with a grain of salt.

Also, do things. Whatever it is, even those that may not interest you. In general, I like to prioritize the future over avoiding the unpleasantries in the present. Everyone's kind of got their own knob for where they like to keep that.

Lastly, engage with humanity, do things to create value, and interact with the world. I would recommend biasing towards that.