Sridhar Kuppanna, Senior Vice President of Engineering. Photo: ST Engineering iDirect

ST Engineering iDirect promoted Sridhar Kuppanna to the position of chief technology officer effective immediately, the company announced Feb. 4.

Kuppanna will continue to serve as senior vice president of Engineering. He has over 25 years of experience in telecom innovation, AI applications, virtualization, cloud computing, and network orchestration. Kuppanna will help ST Engineering iDirect as it aims to integrate satellite and terrestrial networks.

Prior to joining ST Engineering iDirect in 2023, Kuppanna worked at Ribbon Communications for over 20 years, where he contributed to the development of scalable and interoperable networks.

Kuppanna’s leadership helped the development of Intuition, ST Engineering iDirect’s next-generation ground system, initially released in October 2024. Intuition will be available to the broader market this year.

ST Engineering iDirect CEO Don Claussen said: “Sridhar’s philosophy on turning customer challenges into innovative solutions has driven the creation of Intuition and aligns with ST Engineering iDirect’s dedication to advancing the satellite communications industry. His telecom expertise and success with next-generation solutions like Intuition reflect our shared commitment to innovation and solving real-world connectivity challenges for our customers.”