Vijay Desai

Chief Information Officer

Federal Retirement Thrift Investment Board

Vijay R Desai currently serves as the Chief Information Officer of the Federal Retirement Thrift Investment Board (FRTIB), an independent agency of the US Executive Branch that manages the Thrift Savings Plan (TSP: ~$750B Assets under Management; ~7M participants), a defined contribution retirement plan for Federal civilian employees and members of the uniformed services. Over the past 5 years, Vijay has either led or been an integral part of several transformational initiatives to modernize the Agency’s technology environment. These include transitioning the TSP’s record keeping and IT operations to a performance-based managed services operating model; moving the Agency’s technology to a Zero Trust-based Architecture; eliminating data centers and moving to a cloud-based model—all while maturing and maintaining a strong cybersecurity posture.
Prior to the FRTIB, Vijay held several roles at the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB), including serving as the Acting CIO during a critical period of the Bureau’s maturation and growth.
Before joining the Federal government, Vijay was an executive with a leading management consulting firm where he led its financial services practice. He was a senior director at Capital One, where he led several post-merger integration efforts, and advised the Chairman/CEO on the development of the firm’s outsourcing/offshoring strategy of IT services and other business processes. Vijay also managed loan servicing operations for a private student lending start up.

Vijay has a BE in Mechanical Engineering from the Birla Institute of Technology and Science (Pilani), an ME in Ocean Engineering (Acoustics) from Florida Atlantic University and an MBA from Virginia Tech. He serves as senior advisor to a non-profit organization that helps children in India, and was on the Board of an organization that helped other non-profits address their technology needs.

Event Participation