Mark Fernandez

Mark R. Fernandez, Ph.D.

Principal Investigator for Spaceborne Computer-2

Chief Scientist, Space Technologies and Solutions

Dr. Mark Fernandez has 20+ years of experience in creating, configuring, and assisting with multiple types of technical, scientific and high performance computing (HPC) solutions. His current position with HPE is Principal Investigator (PI) for Spaceborne Computer-2 and Chief Scientist, Space Technologies and Solutions.

His duties included completion of the original Spaceborne Computer (SBC) experiment as Payload Developer for Software; participating in over 350 international press and media events and publications; and the creation, approval and submission of the final report. Spaceborne Computer exceeded its mission life while also meeting all of its objectives. SBC demonstrated that modern, unmodified Commercial Off-The-Shelf (COTS) computer systems could be used in space exploration to address scientific and engineering computational needs.

Dr. Fernandez led the internal effort to obtain executive approval for the follow-on Spaceborne Computer-2 (SBC-2), to secure internal funding for the SBC-2 experiment; to assemble the virtual Team required for this 2-3 year mission; and to begin to track this new market. In addition, Dr. Fernandez remains the Payload Developer for Software for SBC-2 and leads the software development Team which continues the advanced development of the “HARDening with SOFTware” architecture.

Dr. Fernandez is also responsible for working to capture requirements and incorporating them into future HPE HPC and AI/ML systems and solutions. He also works closely with Engineering throughout the product development cycle to insure not only that the products are relevant and meet requirements, but also are candidates for inclusion into larger, more complete solutions.