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INDUSTRY INSIDER June/July 2015 airportbusiness 21 For a guy focused on technology since he was a little kid, this new role is a dream come true. "The concept itself—the idea that you can bring innovation to the airport community quick- ly—is incredibly exciting to me," Runde says. "I see this job as a perfect fit for my interests and my background. It has a perfect mix of technology, airports, start-ups, innovation, and the fact that it's tied to an organization with a tremendous reputa- tion could make this something really incredible." Runde is no stranger to technological devel- opments. Upon graduating from the systems engineering program at the University of Virginia, he set to work delivering large-scale IT systems for Accenture. He later moved to a role with the Transportation Security Administration (TSA), back in 2002, when the organization was brand new and faced with many challenges, one of which was vetting the backgrounds of 50,000 new employees. In this position, Runde was intricately involved in creating the TSA's per- sonnel security vetting system. "At that time, the administrator of the TSA was trying to figure out how to get through that many background checks in a compressed timeframe," Runde says. "In the meantime, all of these people were out on the front lines working, so there was a mandate to get it done before the end of the fiscal year." Runde says he must have done something right on this project because by the end of the contract, about two years later, the TSA hired him to manage that system. By the time he left this post, the TSA was vetting around 10 million individuals every year. He was then tapped in 2008 to step-up the biometric credentialing effort for airport employees. "At the time, there were some issues at a major airport," he recalls. "One of their vendors was using old badges for new employees. When new hires started, the manager would point to a box in the corner and say 'Pick out a badge that looks like you and go off and conquer.' That raised concerns when investigators found out about it." He says that this is often how the security industry works. "When you uncover vulnera- bilities, it's important to find solutions that can address them quickly," he says. "That sort of ties us back to the Accelerator, and the need for a system like this." Airport Business chatted with Runde to learn more about the AAAE Airport Innovation Accelerator and the ways it hopes to bring technology to the airport sector. T he stars aligned when the American Association of Airport Executives (AAAE) tapped Chris Runde to take on the opportunity of a lifetime running its new Airport Innovation Accelerator. The Accelerator strives to drive great- er innovation in airports by assisting qualified companies in bringing their technology and services to the airport marketplace.