Randy Spicer, 2022

Randy Spicer is a Staff Engineer at Northrop Grumman Space Systems in Dulles, Virginia. He has over 15 years of experience in spacecraft design, analysis, integration, and test across a wide range of government and commercial space vehicles. He is a subject matter expert for additive manufacturing and leads several research & development projects advancing 3D printing applications for spacecraft.

Mr. Spicer began working at Orbital Sciences Corporation (now NGSP) in 2007, immediately after defending his master’s thesis in electric propulsion simulation. During his first five years at Orbital, Randy worked for the Mechanical Analysis group and performed finite element analysis and dynamic testing of spacecraft. Throughout this time, Randy served as the test director for nearly every spacecraft level vibration and acoustic test performed at the Dulles Satellite Manufacturing Facility. Mr. Spicer then entered a rotation program and held positions in Electrical Integration & Test, Flight Assurance, and Systems Engineering. Upon compilation of this rotation program, Randy stayed in the Systems Engineering department where he has held multiple roles over the years.

Mr. Spicer started collaborating with Virginia Tech senior design projects in 2015 after reaching out to Dr. Shinpaugh to see if Orbital ATK (now NGSP) could sponsor a project. Since then, Mr. Spicer has mentored at least one spacecraft senior design project a year as well as provided feedback to dozens of other projects. Mr. Spicer brings his space industry knowledge to bear with the students and to help guide their projects to be the best that they can be. After years of successful collaboration with the AOE department, Mr. Spicer has expanded NG sponsorship to Mechanical Engineering and Electrical and Computer Engineering senior design. Mr. Spicer also engages with student design teams, including RockSat-X and OLVT, and is also involved with the Hume Center.

After years of working with Virginia Tech students, Mr. Spicer decided that he wanted to be a Virginia Tech student again. In 2017, he started his Ph.D. in aerospace engineering with a specialization in space engineering. Mr. Spicer’s research has been published in conference papers and journal articles. Additionally, Mr. Spicer’s research recently resulted in a patent award. 

Ph.D. Student, Aerospace Engineering, Virginia Tech, Current
M.S., Systems Engineering, The George Washington University, 2010
M.S., Aerospace Engineering, Virginia Tech, 2007
B.S., Aerospace Engineering, Virginia Tech, 2006