Former US Defence Advanced Research Projects Agency Information Science and Technology panel (DARPA) (ISAT) chairman Stephen Cross has been announced as the keynote speaker at the 9th Asia-Pacific Software Engineering Conference to be held on Queensland's Gold Coast from December 4 to 6.
DARPA is the central research and development organisation for the US Military.
Cross, currently director and CEO of the US Defense Department's (DoD) funded Software Engineering Institute (SEI), is widely regarded as one of the US DoD's heavyweight IT strategists having headed a variety of projects ranging from secure military communications, cruise missile guidance systems and embedded computer systems for F15 and F16 fighter aircraft.
More recently, Cross has earned a reputation as an open systems evangelist.
Australian defence sources were unable to confirm (by Computerworld's deadline) whether or not Cross would be meeting his Australian counterparts; however, they did not exclude the possibility outright. DARPA, amongst other projects, is currently working on a wearable computer to enable soldiers in the field to translate Arabic languages.