Future of Aviation Speaker

Nick Matcheck

Partnerships and Strategic Initiatives Manager
Supernal (Hyundai Urban Air Mobility)

Nick is a former naval aviator and served multiple overseas tours as a maritime patrol and reconnaissance pilot and mission commander. A graduate of UCLA, he also holds an MBA from UC Berkeley's Haas School of Business where he focused on energy and mobility. At Supernal, he's helping make urban air mobility a reality by leading efforts in autonomy, energy & infrastructure, operations, and R&D. He holds a commercial pilot license with instrument and type ratings and lives in San Francisco.

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Torrie Meliska

Vertiports Product Manager
Wisk Aero

Torrie leads Wisk Aero's vertiport and infrastructure efforts as a Product Manager. She works with standards development bodies and infrastructure partners to define vertiport requirements, both physically and operationally. She also contributes to NASA’s Transformative Vertical Flight Working Group on Intra-City AAM as a vertiport expert. In her graduate work at Northwestern University Transportation Center prior to Wisk, Torrie focused on optimizing vertiport locations.

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Benjamin Merran

Director
NEXA Capital Partners

Benjamin is a director and senior economist supporting NEXA Advisors’ work with market and economic research, due diligence, financial analysis, and other functions supporting Advanced Air Mobility (AAM) projects. He has authored AAM economic impact assessments for a number of cities and regions, including Toronto, Vancouver, the state of Ohio, and the state of Arkansas, among others. This original research uncovered 25 years of economic growth potential in the form of new jobs, GDP growth, and tax revenues for each case study. Additional project roles include literature review,...

Dave Merrill

Chief Executive Officer
Elroy Air

Dave Merrill is the co-founder and CEO of Elroy Air, where he leads a team of kind, dedicated experts working to expand the reach of express logistics. Dave is a technology executive and startup founder with a background in computer science and robotic, interactive systems. Alumnus of MIT (Ph.D.) and Stanford Computer Science / Symbolic Systems (BS, MS), and TED speaker. Elroy Air is developing advanced, autonomous, safe vertical-takeoff-and-landing (VTOL) cargo aircraft systems in collaboration with NASA and the US Air Force. The company has been featured by Wired, Forbes,...

Joshua Metz

Executive Director and Co-Founder
Monterey Bay DART Initiative

Josh Metz is the Executive Director and co-founder of the Monterey Bay DART Initiative, which grew out of his tenure as Economic Development Manager, then Executive Officer at the Fort Ord Reuse Authority (FORA). In those roles, Josh worked with multiple public and private sector partners to advance regional recovery from the economic impact of the 1994 Fort Ord base closure. Josh was instrumental in securing the Joby Aviation presence at the Marina Airport, and continues to work to realize a robust DART-related...

Timothy Middleton, C.M.

Principal Consultant
HMMH

Timothy Middleton, C.M. has fifteen years of airport management, noise abatement, and environmental compliance experience. With a background in Political Science and Public Policy, Tim leverages his technical knowledge and public outreach expertise to effectively communicate to a wide range of clients, including members of the public, airport managers, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), and state and local officials.

Tim is a thought leader at HMMH in supporting work with clients in understanding and fostering community acceptance of new aircraft entrants in to the...

Sam Morrissey

Executive Director
Urban Movements Lab

With a professional career spanning a wide variety of transportation and mobility projects and initiatives across the US, Sam works at the intersection of transportation planning, policy, implementation, and operations. Sam is an innovative, resourceful, passionate, and service-oriented executive and thought leader with demonstrated success in the public sector and local government, focused on addressing complex mobility challenges. He has over 20 years of experience in transportation technologies, planning, and implementation, Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS), autonomous...

Suzanne Murtha

Vice President Connected and Automated Technology
AECOM

Suzanne Murtha is the Global Lead for Connected and Automated Technology at AECOM. She is based in Alexandria, Virginia and Punta Gorda, Florida. She is on the Board of Directors of the OmniAir Consortium, a trade association that advocates for the development and promotion of certification for the intelligent transportation industry as well as the Board of Directors for AUVSI. Suzanne is the Chair for the ITS America eVTOL Task Force and the AUVSI AV Goods Movement Task Force.

A 25-year veteran of the transportation industry, Suzanne has a background in ITS and advanced...

Chris Musei-Sequeira

Principal
CJSC, LLC

Chris Musei-Sequeira’s mission is to radically elevate the authenticity of transportation community engagement to meet the challenges of environmental justice and climate change. His passion lies at the intersection of transportation justice, community engagement, and environmental policy. At this intersection, Chris builds relationships across a wide range of stakeholder groups to improve environmental outcomes. Chris has practiced this passion in multiple leadership roles, including leading improvements to nationwide noise and air emissions policies at the Federal Aviation...

Ryan Naru

Government Affairs Senior Specialist
Joby Aviation

Ryan is a senior specialist with Joby Aviation’s government affairs team. In this role, he leads numerous regulatory, policy and standards development initiatives to facilitate the introduction of a new generation of safe, quiet and sustainable electric aircraft. Ryan joined Joby following two years with the Uber Elevate project, Uber's initiative to develop and launch a multimodal air-taxi service called Uber Air.

Ryan studied aerospace engineering at the Georgia Institute of Technology, and also holds a Bachelors in Economics from SUNY Binghamton.