In July 2025, Brian Erickson retired as a Captain after serving 33 years in the United States Coast Guard (USCG). He is currently the President of Cirrostrategies LLC, and specializes in defense, homeland security, Artificial Intelligence and aviation. In his final military assignment, he prepared the 255,000 member department for an administration change as the Deputy Director of the Dept of Homeland Security (DHS) Presidential Transition Office. Just prior to that, he was the USCG’s first Chief Data & Artificial Intelligence Officer (CDAO) where he was principally responsible for the coordination of data and Artificial Intelligence activities across the organization, and integration with DoD, DHS and the Intelligence Community. His previous military assignments focus primarily in engineering and operations, serving at five operational units flying MH-65 Dolphin helicopters and HC-130H fixed wing aircraft performing search and rescue, law enforcement & other all-weather military mission profiles. He also served in the Office of Budget and Programs working directly for the Chief Financial Officer (CFO). In 2020, he was selected as the Coast Guard’s MIT Sloan Fellow, following service as Commanding Officer of Coast Guard Air Station Savannah, GA. He is a 1998 graduate of the U.S. Coast Guard Academy and is a licensed Professional Engineer specializing in aerospace. He also holds a Master of Science degree in Aeronautics and Astronautics from Purdue University and a Master of Business Administration from Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He has been appointed to the CDO Magazine Global Editorial Board and has been named as a 2022 and 2024 DataIQ top 100 most influential persons in data and the 2023 MachineCon AI Leader of the Year.