Serco appoints new CEO

Michael LaRouche will succeed Tom Watson as CEO of Herndon-based federal contractor Serco on Oct. 1.

According to a Monday news release, Watson is stepping down after seven years with Serco, the North American subsidiary of British parent company Serco Group. He became CEO in 2022, after four years as Serco’s senior vice president of defense business.

LaRouche most recently was founder and president of Emalar, a tech company focused on national security, according to his LinkedIn profile. He previously was president of the Science Applications International Corp. (SAIC) national security and space sector for five years.

Before joining SAIC, LaRouche was a vice president at Raytheon (now part of RTX) for 11 years. Before that, he held leadership roles at Lockheed Martin and Hughes Network Systems.

“Michael is an excellent appointment for Serco, and I am delighted to welcome him as our CEO for North America,” Serco Group CEO Anthony Kirby said in a statement. “Michael is a strategic leader and has deep experience in growing businesses, in the United States and internationally.”

LaRouche serves on the board of directors for the Intelligence and National Security Alliance, a nonprofit association focused on advancing intelligence and national security through public-private-academic partnerships. He previously served a three-year term that began in 2020.

He earned an undergraduate degree in electrical engineering from the University of Michigan and a master’s degree in the same subject from the University of Colorado.

Serco has more than 100 sites across North America and more than 10,000 employees across the U.S. and Canada. In May, it completed its $327 million purchase of Northrop Grumman’s mission training and satellite ground network communications software business. Parent company Serco Group reported almost 4.8 billion pounds — about $6.4 billion as of Tuesday — in 2024 revenue.