Fractional CTO  ·  Technical Operations Leadership

Bridging research-grade innovation
and scalable technical operations.

Baryon Forge partners with DOE-funded and scientific engineering organizations to operationalize systems, infrastructure, and security as they scale beyond the research environment.

Built for
DOE SBIR / STTRINL-adjacent firmsAdvanced nuclear & energyScientific instrumentationModeling & simulationScientific computing / HPC
The Operational Maturity Gap

Brilliant science. Strained systems.

Scientific and engineering organizations often become operationally strained as they transition from research and prototype work into commercialization, larger contracts, and organizational growth. The technology that won the SBIR isn't the technology that scales the company.

FROM
Research environment
→ Commercialization
Research-grade systems become production systems overnight — without the underlying reliability discipline.
FROM
Small technical team
→ Growing organization
Informal coordination breaks. Key-person dependency becomes a continuity risk.
FROM
Prototype delivery
→ Operational deployment
Customer reliability expectations outpace the team's infrastructure maturity.
FROM
Informal operations
→ Compliance environment
CMMC, NIST, contract security requirements arrive faster than the team can absorb them.
How we work

Embedded technical leadership — without the full-time hire.

A structured engagement designed for technical founders who need senior operational judgment, not another consultant deck.

01 — DIAGNOSE

Technical operations audit

Systems, infrastructure, security posture, engineering coordination, key-person risk. A clear-eyed map of where the maturity gap is widest.

02 — PRIORITIZE

Maturity roadmap

Sequenced by commercial impact and contractual exposure. We don't fix everything — we fix what's blocking the next stage of the company.

03 — EMBED

Fractional execution

Ongoing technical leadership at a cadence that matches the company. Decisions get made. Systems get built. The founder gets bandwidth back.

04 — HANDOFF

Build the internal capability

The goal is not dependency. We document, hire alongside, and graduate the engagement when the internal team can carry it.

Service areas

Operational outcomes, not technology projects.

Engagements are scoped around the business transitions that put technical pressure on the organization — not around vendor categories.

Fractional CTO

Senior technical leadership embedded in your executive cadence — strategy, hiring, vendor decisions, board-level technical narrative.

  • Engineering org design
  • Technical roadmap & governance
  • Vendor & build/buy decisions
  • Investor & contract technical diligence

Technical Operations Maturity

Move from research-grade tooling to production-grade systems without losing the team's innovative culture.

  • Infrastructure & environment standardization
  • Engineering coordination systems
  • Documentation & continuity
  • Reliability & deployment practice

Security & Compliance Posture

Build a security posture that matches the customers and contracts you're chasing — without slowing engineering down.

  • NIST 800-171 / CMMC readiness
  • Cloud & identity architecture
  • Data handling for regulated work
  • Security program operationalization

Commercialization Readiness

The technical operating model that lets SBIR Phase II → III, deployment scale-up, and larger contracts happen without breaking.

  • Phase II → III transition planning
  • Customer-facing reliability posture
  • Scaling org design
  • Facility & environment expansion
About

Built where science meets systems.

Baryon Forge exists because there is a specific shape of organization that conventional consulting underserves: technically brilliant, mission-driven, and operationally outpaced by its own growth.

The principal brings doctoral-level work in nuclear physics and engineering together with deep technical operations and infrastructure leadership experience. That combination matters — the conversations a scientific founder needs to have about systems, security, and scale don’t translate cleanly through generic IT vendors.

Located within ninety minutes of Idaho National Laboratory, Baryon Forge is embedded in the DOE and advanced-energy ecosystem it serves. Engagements are intentionally selective, focused on organizations where the principal can substantively move the technical operating model forward.

PhD-level
Nuclear physics & engineering grounding
~90 min
From Idaho National Laboratory
12–75
Employee sweet-spot for engagements
Selective
Limited concurrent engagements

Is your team outgrowing its systems?

If your organization is somewhere between SBIR Phase II and commercial deployment, and the technical operating model is starting to feel like a constraint — let's talk.

Start a conversation Email directly
Get in touch

A research conversation, not a sales call.

Tell me a little about where the organization is and what's straining. Initial conversations are exploratory — the goal is to understand whether this is a fit on both sides.

Located Eastern Idaho · INL ecosystem
Response time Typically within one business day
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