Joel B. Predd is the director of the Center for the Geopolitics of AGI, part of the RAND Global and Emerging Risks division, and a senior engineer at RAND. Predd’s current research portfolio focuses on the geopolitics of artificial intelligence and on the intersection of the security and economic competition with China. Previously, Predd served as director of the Acquisition and Technology Policy Center (ATP) within the RAND National Security Research Division from 2018 until early 2022, where he oversaw a period of growth in the breadth and depth of RAND's portfolio of force planning, technology and acquisition, and supply chain research for Office of the Secretary of Defense (OSD), the Joint Staff, the Combatant Commands, defense agencies like DARPA, and international sponsors.
Predd spent fiscal year 2013 working in Office of the Undersecretary of Defense for Policy as a force development analyst, supporting Policy leadership in activities related to the 2014 Quadrennial Defense Review and the Strategic Choices Management Review. From October 2022 through May 2023, Predd served as executive-technical director for pilot National Network for Critical Technology Assessment led out of Carnegie Mellon University. As a researcher at RAND, Predd led studies that had direct impacts on the formulation of the 2018 National Defense Strategy, the Australian shipbuilding enterprise, and a range of policy implementations across the U.S. national security community. Prior to joining RAND, Predd earned a Ph.D. in electrical engineering from Princeton University on topics of machine learning, wireless networks, and probabilistic judgment aggregation. He has a B.S. in electrical engineering from Purdue University.
Ph.D. in electrical engineering, Princeton University; B.S. in electrical engineering, Purdue University
