Richard Hieb

The Executive Summary

I'm a Distinguished Engineer at Verizon, and for over 35 years I've worked on turning emerging infrastructure into scalable enterprise assets. As a technical leader and mentor, I architect the high-capacity satellite broadband data paths that interface satellite platforms with terrestrial infrastructure for mission-critical backhaul. I hold five granted patents in satellite QoS, BGP route limiting, bandwidth management, and network path redundancy. I've made a habit of identifying industry-shifting technologies years before market adoption, and I led the teams that scaled a large corporation's GEO satellite platforms to tens of thousands of locations. My work in satellite-based disaster recovery has produced solutions supporting every major U.S. disaster response since 2020, with current LEO integrations scaling the platform from a few to thousands of circuits.

Professional Narrative & Leadership Philosophy

I joined IDB Communications as a satellite technician in 1990. That company was acquired by WorldCom, then MCI, then Verizon — and across all of it I've stayed on the same path, moving from technical systems integration to lead-architecting the company's strategic Broadband Satellite roadmaps. Over thirty-five years, one continuous body of work, one employer that kept changing its name around me. I see my role as an "enabler" — bridging the gap between executive vision and engineering execution — and I focus on cultivating technical talent and fostering a team-centric environment where complex, forward-looking satellite strategies are validated by rigorous operational discipline.

I try to stay ahead of where the technology is going. Before any of the major LEO constellations had launched a single satellite, I was already in conversations with every potential provider, positioning a large corporation's strategy to fit the direction the industry was headed. I look for what the market will need before the market knows it needs it, then build the organizational capability to deliver it.

Mission-Critical Resilience & Disaster Recovery

My work in satellite network hardening serves as the blueprint for a large corporation's regional resilience strategy. Following the 2018/2019 network challenges in Panama City after Hurricane Michael, I was tasked with re-engineering regional infrastructure to eliminate terrestrial single points of failure using satellite backhaul. Building on my prior evaluation of the Dialog satellite platform, I mentored a newly formed team through the transition from pilot phase to massive scaled rollout. Originally scoped as a small pilot, I guided the team in engineering an elastic satellite architecture that grew into a meaningful fleet of active circuits.

With the recent integration of LEO technology, I'm currently directing the rapid expansion of this "never-fail" satellite backhaul solution — scaling it from a few to thousands of circuits, with further growth planned beyond that. This satellite platform has been the standard for every major U.S. disaster response since 2020 — delivering connectivity when terrestrial networks cannot.

LEO Strategy & Commercial Stewardship

As the primary technical and strategic bridge to the global LEO ecosystem, I guide cross-functional teams in steering vendor relationships and complex commercial negotiations:

• Commercial Evolution (SpaceX/Starlink): I spearheaded the technical negotiations for a large corporation's foundational capacity deals with SpaceX, moving the partnership from an initial internal-use agreement to a significantly optimized deal that secured resale rights and improved terms for its internal satellite infrastructure.
• Satellite Capacity Group Plans: I negotiated flexible satellite capacity group plan terms for a large corporation, moving away from restrictive single-site deals with LEO providers. The broader industry has since shifted toward the same group-plan model.
• Mobile MEO (SES): I worked directly with SES to deploy MEO as a mobile solution — a large corporation was the first to build a fully mobile MEO solution.
• Vendor & Ecosystem Diversification: I direct the strategic technical dialogue evaluating the next generation of LEO and NGSO providers as they come to market, working closely with Corporate Strategy to ensure technical viability and commercial readiness.
• Strategic Oversight: I maintain management and capacity planning oversight for all of a large corporation's broadband satellite assets, both internal infrastructure and resale platforms.
• Industry Collaboration: I maintain relationships with Direct-to-Cell and 3GPP standards teams, ensuring a large corporation's satellite programs are integrated into the broader 5G and NTN (Non-Terrestrial Network) ecosystem.

Intellectual Property & Technical Innovation

I'm a named inventor on five granted U.S. patents that define the modern efficiency and reliability of satellite-to-terrestrial interfacing — the full list is on the Patents page.

Architectural Observability & AI

I direct the development of satellite telemetry pipelines and deployment modeling required for network autonomy. I engineered the foundational Splunk environments and reporting structures specifically for a large corporation's initial LEO broadband integrations, establishing the observability baseline for an entirely new class of network infrastructure.

I'm currently working with teams on the integration of AI-driven predictive maintenance and capacity optimization — shifting the satellite broadband stack from reactive incident management to proactive, automated response.

Technical Core & Leadership Impact

Strategic Leadership & Management

• Project Direction: Directed the GEO broadband node scaling from a handful to tens of thousands, and the active LEO disaster-recovery expansion from a few to thousands of circuits.
• Commercial Strategy: Guided the industry transition from single-site to satellite capacity group plans; secured Starlink Enterprise resale rights for a large corporation.
• Operational Excellence: Directs capacity management and network deployment modeling for a large corporation's Satellite Broadband program — both internal infrastructure and resale.
• Mentorship: Acts as a technical enabler for engineering teams across the organization, bridging satellite strategy and ground-level execution.

Systems & Data Engineering

• GEO/MEO/LEO Integration: Lead for Starlink Enterprise rollout, the first fully mobile MEO solution (SES), and multi-platform satellite ground systems (Dialog, iDirect Evolution).
• Satellite Observability: Design of high-fidelity Splunk telemetry environments and predictive data models for satellite network health and capacity forecasting.
• Interface Architecture: Design of the handoff between satellite platforms and terrestrial enterprise infrastructure — extending network capability across orbital boundaries with Private Network/Edge integration.
• Emerging Technology: Directing the implementation of AI for autonomous satellite network optimization and predictive capacity management.

Why This Site Exists

I'm still fully active at Verizon — this isn't a job search. LinkedIn is where I keep the record straight: the roles, the dates, the patents. This site is where I get to say what I actually think.

After over three and a half decades at the intersection of satellite technology, commercial strategy, and mission-critical infrastructure, I've found there are very few people working at that exact crossroads. Most of the public conversation about LEO constellations focuses on the launch counts and the coverage maps. The part I find interesting — and the part that rarely gets written about — is the unglamorous middle: how satellite capacity actually gets negotiated, how a hub talks to a terrestrial network without dropping a packet under load, how you build something that has to keep working when a hurricane has taken out everything around it.

If you're wrestling with satellite integration, NTN strategy, or resilient network design — or you want someone who'll talk candidly about where this field is actually going rather than where the press releases say it's going — reach out. I'm always glad to have that conversation.