Matt Francis
A. Matt Francis has served as President and CEO of Ozark integrated Circuits, Inc., of Fayetteville, AR since founding the company in 2011. As President and CEO, he has grown the company into a premier provider of high-temperature electronics and rugged computing solutions for the aerospace, defense and energy industries. His company’s XNode(R) computers have been flown in low-earth orbit for over a year, operated on jet engines, and are quickly moving into geothermal energy and energy transformation technologies. He is an expert in design, test, programming, packaging and manufacturing of extreme environment electronics and enjoys building robust supply chains and partnerships to solve hard electronics challenges.
Matt holds Electrical Engineering, Physics, Masters and PhD degrees from the University of Arkansas. He currently serves as a Director (Region 5) for the IEEE, bringing resources to IEEE members and their communities across the US Southwest. He serves on the IEEE Industry Engagement committee, the IEEE Awards Board and many other committees and groups where he strives to advance technology for humanity by growing and connecting leaders; from K-12 to professionals in business, technology, government, entrepreneurship and industry. He serves his town as a Councilmember, co-founded his local robotics club (the IEEE Elkins Robotics/Electronics Club) and is a co-founder of SURGE-AR (Scaling Up Regional Economies in Arkansas) that connects semiconductor/technology stakeholders in Arkansas.