Leidos CEO Thomas Bell Recognized With 2nd Consecutive Wash100 Award
Executive Mosaic is honored to announce the selection of Leidos CEO Thomas Bell for the 2025 Wash100 Award for his leadership and efforts in shaping the company’s strategic direction and goals and advancing innovation to help customers meet complex national security challenges.
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This marks the second consecutive time that the Leidos chief executive has been selected to Executive Mosaic’s annual list of the top 100 leaders from the federal government and GovCon sector.
“Tom’s second consecutive Wash100 is further confirmation of both his rapid assimilation into Leidos and his consistent, steady stewardship of the company,” said Jim Garrettson, CEO of Executive Mosaic and founder of the Wash100 Award.
“As CEO, Tom is leading his senior team through major wins across defense, healthcare and transportation security. From a $331 million Army network modernization contract to a $327 million NIH award for agile software development, Leidos continues to secure high-impact programs under his leadership. With new awards coming in like clockwork and a clear focus on innovation, Tom is keeping Leidos at the forefront of GovCon and we believe the best is yet to come,” added Garrettson.
Leidos ‘NorthStar 2030’ Strategy
At the company’s fourth-quarter earnings call, Bell mentioned a new growth strategy called NorthStar 2030. He said the contractor plans to fully launch the new strategy, which was developed in 2024, at its upcoming Investors Day.
According to the CEO, the new strategy “keys on a specific group of growth pillars, where we know customer needs are growing, market profitability is robust and Leidos differentiation is evident and accelerating.”
He noted that working on the strategy in the past year positioned the company well for the priorities of a new U.S. government that is transforming government operations in pursuit of efficiency.
During the call, Bell stated that the company’s strategy and growth pillars are aligned with customer priorities.
“Leidos exists to make our customers’ outcomes smarter and more efficient. Everything we do for every one of our customers is linked to that statement,” he noted.
3 Government Priorities
The 2025 Wash100 awardee told analysts that the U.S. government’s three focus areas or priorities “are right in our wheelhouse” and those are IT modernization, transformational warfighting capability and increased privatization.
“First, the new administration has said that IT modernization is low-hanging fruit for government efficiency. We totally agree,” Bell said during the call.
For IT modernization, he cited as an example the disability case processing system that the company developed for the Social Security Administration. He said the system has improved the disability claim processing time by more than 90 percent, increased the accuracy of benefit calculations by 20 percent and reduced backlog by over 50 percent.
Notable Contract Awards
Under Bell’s leadership, Leidos booked several major military and government contracts in 2024.
These include a $2.6 billion contract with the Transportation Security Administration for integrated logistics support services for the maintenance of checkpoint screening equipment deployed at airports and government-designated facilities; a $738 million contract with the U.S. Air Force for IT and telecommunications support; and a $823 million task order from the Defense Information Systems Agency to provide sustainment and operations support services for the Department of Defense Network program.
Other military awards are a $670 million contract with the U.S. Army for the development of the common-hypersonic glide body and thermal protection system; a $331 million contract with the Army for network modernization; and a U.S. Air Force contract worth $303 million for digital infrastructure support.
The company also secured a $107 million contract from the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency for GEOINT products and a $326.5 million contract with the National Institutes of Health for agile software development and design support for NIH’s eRA enterprisewide grants management system.
Cyber Contract Wins
During the company’s third-quarter earnings conference in October 2024, Bell told analysts that Leidos won over $700 million in new and takeaway wins in full-spectrum cyber. He stated that the contract wins reflect the company’s capability in the market and success from its investments in platforms within the digital modernization sector.
In response to a question about the contract awards, the defense industry leader called cyber “one of the golden bolts” Leidos has been investing in as a core competency.
“And so not only are we very proud of the team that’s leveraging our cyber chops for cyber wins, especially for our very, very important in the intelligence community customer,” Bell said.
“But we’re also very proud of the fact that our cyber capabilities and our zero trust gravitas is frequently commented on by customers as a reason we win in other markets also. So we’re very proud of the return on investment we’re getting in our cybersecurity business and as an underlying capability of everything Leidos does,” he added.
Industry-Government Collaboration
During a fireside chat at a Leidos-hosted event in August 2024, the CEO highlighted the importance of collaboration between military and industry partners to address emerging global threats and adversaries.
“If we in this room are going to help our nation avoid the next conflict, it’s going to be because we help our nation be the smartest government on the face of the earth,” said Bell. “Our presence in the intelligence community and your ability to help us with tools and techniques to make them smarter. Making smart smarter, is going to be key to help that next world war not happen.”
Executive Mosaic congratulates Thomas Bell and the entire Leidos team for their fantastic year and second Wash100 win. Show your support for Thomas Bell at Wash100.com!