Jenn Gustetic

Jenn Gustetic is currently the Program Executive for Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR/STTR) at NASA Headquarters. The NASA SBIR and STTR programs fund small businesses approximately $200M annually for research, development, and demonstration of innovative technologies that fulfill NASA needs and have significant potential for successful commercialization.

She is an experienced innovator and policy entrepreneur, having served as the Assistant Director for Open Innovation at the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (2014-2016), and a leader in the federal open innovation community, having served as the program executive for prizes and challenges at NASA (2012-2014) and co-chair of the interagency Maker working group (2016-today). She also led NASA’s formulation efforts for its Grand Challenges including the Asteroid Grand Challenge to “find all asteroid threats to human populations and know what to do about them”.

Ms. Gustetic holds a bachelors degree in aerospace engineering from the University of Florida and a master’s degree in technology policy from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.  She has published numerous writings on innovation including in Space Policy and Issues in Science and Technology.  Outside of her NASA duties, she is also currently a 2018-2019 digital Harvard Kennedy School research fellow focusing on research related to the future of work and a board member for the Van Alen Institute, a non-profit that used design to transform cities, landscapes, and regions to improve people’s lives.