What I Am and What Drives Me
I am, at my core, a builder. I love to create things that make a tangible, positive impact—whether that’s laying tile and framing walls in the physical world, or designing intelligent systems that orchestrate vast amounts of data in the digital one. I build both physical and digital systems: the former taught me how things fit together; the latter taught me how they can think. My “why” is simple but powerful: to unite the physical and digital worlds into systems that think, sense, and act intelligently. I see engineering not just as solving problems, but as designing the “brain” of complex machines, organizations, and infrastructures.
My Background Story
My journey began in construction. From childhood through my early undergraduate years, I remodeled homes and worked on heavy civil projects, learning how systems fit together in the physical world. While installing moisture sensors for an irrigation system, I realized that data and computation could be as powerful a building material as wood, steel, or concrete. That insight shifted my trajectory.
I went on to earn a degree in Applied Statistics and Computer Science at BYU while launching my software engineering career, developing a full-stack network monitoring application.
Professional Journey
My career began in aerospace, where I developed satellite software for space situational awareness. I worked on image processing systems and applied optimization models—including vehicle routing approaches for satellite scheduling—which gave me a front-row seat to the complexity of mission-critical, large-scale systems.
I later transitioned into cybersecurity, applying big-data analytics at petabyte scale and machine learning to track malicious actors across massive networks.
Today, I’m a systems engineer specializing in data architecture and engineering. I lead and mentor a team that designs and builds data warehouses for business intelligence, architects analytics pipelines, and establishes the foundational infrastructure for full data science ecosystems.
But the data ecosystem itself is only the beginning. I’m now working to leverage this foundation—along with advanced AI, simulation tooling, and model-based engineering—to develop a robust digital twin platform that drives our mission into the next era of modeling, analysis, and decision intelligence. This effort requires aligning cross-domain teams across the enterprise—including modeling, operations, software, systems, mission analysis, and leadership—to converge on a unified architecture capable of extending our organization’s analytical capabilities well into the future.
Selected Work Highlights
Designed and developed a dimensional data warehouse and automated pipeline that enables multi-enterprise decision intelligence for mission-critical space infrastructure.
Operationalized satellite image processing and analytics using containerized, cloud-native architectures for an already-deployed space situational awareness mission.
Designed and trained ML models that detect malicious cyber activity at petabyte scale to protect enterprise networks.
Developed a full-stack network monitoring platform that gave cybersecurity and network operations teams real-time visibility into system health and threats.
Led and mentored software teams through development, deployment, and production to accelerate delivery and reduce technical risk.
Designed and built two homes end-to-end, demonstrating systems thinking across architecture, logistics, and physical execution.
If you would like to see more of what I’ve done in more detail see my CV.
My Vision and Mission
My mission is to transform mission-critical industries by leveraging robotics, IoT, AI, and digital twins—not as separate tools, but as integrated systems. I want to bridge the gap between machines that can act and systems that can think. Others build hardware and algorithms; I aim to architect the optimization, orchestration, and simulation frameworks that make them work intelligently together at scale.
At the center of this is decision-making under uncertainty—where optimization, simulation, and AI converge to guide physical systems.
Through software design, decision intelligence, and systems-level AI, I intend to turn isolated automation into coordinated, adaptive workflows. The long-term mission is to pioneer systems-scale intelligence that unites humans, machines, and AI into safe, resilient, autonomous infrastructures.
An Invitation to Collaborate
I see this as a mission bigger than myself, and one that requires collaboration. If my story resonates with you—whether you’re an engineer, researcher, entrepreneur, or builder in any domain—I invite you to connect with me. Let’s build together, share ideas, and push the boundaries of what’s possible in intelligent, cyber-physical systems.
I’m particularly interested in collaborating on:
- Digital twin platforms and simulation-driven decision systems
- Cyber-physical infrastructure and intelligent construction technologies
- AI- and OR-driven planning, optimization, and coordination frameworks
- Robotics, sensing, and edge/IoT systems for mission-critical environments
- Gmail
- LinkedIn - jonathanwil
- GitHub - jonathanwilsonami
- Virginia, USA
Professional Interests
- Software design & engineering
- Robotics & controls automation
- Edge/IoT for cyber-physical systems
- AI/ML & data science
Industries I Care About
- Construction
- Aerospace
- Civil Infrastructure
Core Domains of Proficiency
- Data & AI Platform Architecture
- Systems Engineering & Systems Design
- Machine Learning & Decision Intelligence
Tooling & Technical Stack
- Languages: Python, Java, SQL, R, Bash, C/C++
- Data & ML: Polars, Spark, PyTorch, scikit-learn, OR-Tools, Elasticsearch
- Distributed & Pipeline Systems: Dagster, Airflow, dbt, Kafka, object storage (S3/MinIO)
- Cloud & Compute: AWS, Kubernetes, Podman, Docker, Linux
- Simulation & Modeling: Discrete event simulation, agent-based modeling, optimization solvers
- Visualization & BI: Tableau, Grafana, Splunk, R Shiny, custom front-end dashboards
Personal Interests & Hobbies
- Trail running & hiking
- Deep reading across diverse topics
- Construction projects & remodeling
- Traveling & exploring
- Cross-functional fitness