Daniel Hicks, BSME

Daniel Hicks began his highly successful 34-year career with the U.S. Army White Sands Missile Range in 1982 as a test conductor within the Materiel Test Directorate.

In 1991, he became the supervisory general engineer of the Patriot Missile System, leading the execution of all aspects of developmental testing and combined developmental and operational testing in the acquisition of a major military system. Hicks went on to become the acting division chief, where he managed the activities of the three branches in the division: Air and Missile Defense, Tactical Missiles and Targets, and Space, Sensor and Interoperability. These programs focused on theater missile and national missile defense, air defense battle management, U.S. Army directed energy and space programs, space related programs/applications under NASA, Department of Defense, foreign and other commercial programs.

Later, Hicks was appointed by the commanding general to start up a new Business Development Directorate. His responsibilities included leading the overall business, instrumentation and test infrastructure development. He led the merger of two directorates, maximizing investment dollars based and creating direct cost savings.

Hicks then became technical director, chief of staff and in 2013, deputy executive director at the White Sands facility. In these leadership roles he was responsible for assisting the commanding general and the executive director in the operations of the entire missile range, with more than $11 billion of infrastructure and a noontime population of approximately 12,000 personnel.

Hicks is responsible for the direct oversight of the command planning functions for the range where he has just completed “WSMR 2046” a 30-year strategic plan and maintains oversight for all external relationships, congressional and state legislatures, federal, state and local agencies, and other community and business stakeholders.

A graduate of Las Cruces High School, Hicks received a Bachelor of Science in mechanical engineering from New Mexico State University and received an honorary selection to the Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Academy at New Mexico State University.