Russell R. Smith - Managing Director
Russell R. Smith founded Third Coast International Group in June, 2001 and grew the firm into a significant DC-based boutique global public sector consulting practice specialized in the defense, national security, energy & counter-terrorism verticals with offices in Washington, D.C., Seoul, ROK, Singapore & Dubai, UAE. With the sale of Third Coast in the Spring of 2016, he spun off Hemisphere Strategies as a domestic consulting practice to provide strategic counsel, advisory services, policy development and education & training for enterprises interested in developing, refining or expanding public sector market opportunities. Rebranded as Cactus Constituency Consulting in 2024, Russell has focused the firm's practice upon working with growth stage and SME sized clientele.
Smith is a widely respected expert in helping both growth stage & established firms create and expand business opportunities within the public sector space throughout the United States, the Middle East and across East Asia. He brings over 30 years of experience as an entrepreneur, global government relations executive and defense, security, energy, national security and legislative policy adviser to his role as Managing Director. His Multi-Modal approach to strategic market development has won broad acclaim from market participants and has delivered repeated success for clients under his management. Cactus Constituency Consulting’s Strategic Training Seminars have now, for the first time, made the Multi-Modal Strategic Approach available to enterprises and organizations in the general business environment across the vertical landscape.
A recognized resource in National Security & GeoStrategic Policy, Smith has served as a policy adviser and consultant to Members of the United States Senate and House of Representatives, Department of Defense officials, Defense Program Initiatives, DOE & DOD R&D Programs, elements of the United States Armed Forces, Executive Branch Leadership and senior legislative, defense and policy development officials in several U.S. allied nations as well as major metropolitan law enforcement entities. Throughout the early years of the post September 11, 2001 war on terror, Smith was one of many public policy advisers active with advisory elements to the Executive & Legislative Branches advancing policy recommendations domestically and in the Central Asia and Middle East Theaters of Operations and many of its clients remain actively involved in delivering solutions valuable to our uniformed services worldwide. Working with and advising both public and private sector clients and active with issues and strategic considerations domestically and in support of U.S. policy with allied nations worldwide has given Russell a depth of knowledge and a perspective base uniquely positioned to deliver client value.
His knowledge of the processes required to successfully penetrate public sector and international marketplaces combined with his extensive political, legislative community and executive relationships provide the firm's clientele with a unique set of Policy and Strategic capabilities. Throughout his career, Smith has developed & impacted aggregate program values on behalf of his clients that exceed U.S. $7.5 billion and developed and managed projects resulting in over $1.4 billion in Congressionally Directed Funding. He additionally has helped write numerous pieces of federal legislation that have positively impacted policy and business environments for the technology, defense, energy, healthcare and other industries on a wide variety of issues.
Before founding Third Coast and its predecessor firms in the Spring of 2001, Smith served as an Executive Team Member and Executive Vice President of Worldwide Sales for GeoTrust, a leading provider of enterprise authentication and transaction risk management infrastructure for IP enabled supply chains and B2B / B2G transactional platforms. Smith was responsible for the company-wide development and direction of sales, policy and strategic activities and the execution of partnership and channel sales development. Significant successes included the conclusion of major reseller channel agreements with Fortune 50 technology firms and with providers of international electronic trading platforms including the US/Mexico Southwest Border Initiative, numerous B2B exchanges and a major Asian Trade Center Association. At the center of innovation in transactional entity authentication, risk mitigation and security in the IP enabled Global Supply Chain, GeoTrust developed the first insurable and bondable transaction party authentication capability for the high transaction value global B2B/B2G electronic trading platform environment. GeoTrust was acquired by Verisign.
Prior to GeoTrust, Smith served for 4 years as a VP and Practice Group Director at a top Five Washington, DC government relations & public policy firm where he co-founded and served as Practice Group Director for the first dedicated Innovation Practice Group in any major DC Government Relations firm. During his tenure, he additionally served as a Co-Director of the firm's Defense and Energy Practice Groups. Clients under his management ranged from startup innovators to major publicly traded defense contractors, financial services firms, information technology companies, energy and infrastructure development firms.
Russell was a key government relations principal active in the early efforts to protect the online delivery of goods & services from legislative and bureaucratic overreach. He developed, drafted and successfully advocated Language included in H.R. 1 (The Gramm, Leach, Bliley Banking Bill) providing key platform, ISP and hardware liability protections from privacy provisions of the bill, paving the way for online provider, software services and hardware manufacturer indemnification and the unfettered development of eCommerce and online payment platforms.
His work on behalf of innovators in the defense technology, platform development, defense & energy R&D partners, micro devices and life sciences verticals has resulted in Congressionally directed funding to numerous acquisition, collaborative R&D and year over year program awards throughout his career.
In another widely recognized and substantive example of Smith’s major policy and funding successes - in support of the Office of National Drug Control Policy and on behalf of the Partnership for a Drug Free America, Russell led efforts that resulted in the successful Congressional direction of $195 Million per year in year over year funding to the first large scale demand reduction effort under the management of ONDCP. These efforts, first initiated in the FY 1998 Appropriations cycle still bear fruit to this day as represented by the continuous funding of public anti-drug media messaging targeting youth and family markets and programs delivered across multiple public messaging environments. He additionally has been active for over thirty years as a consultant and adviser on the supply side of anti-drug efforts in support of interdiction, enforcement and inter-agency action across the spectrum of entities tasked with implementing our nation's war on drugs.
Over the course of his career, Russell has interfaced on a regular basis with Market Makers within the Executive Branch at the Career / SES Level in addition to his extensive network of Presidentially Appointed and Senate Confirmed Executives. Integral to, and as a result of his representation, his clients have met with Cabinet Secretaries, Assistant Secretaries, DAS level appointees and West Wing officials in furtherance of their objectives. Often of even greater importance, Smith's ability to create opportunities for his clients to partner with career program heads and managers has been a key part of implementing his Multi-Modal strategies.
He has served on National and DC Steering Committees and as an outside defense policy adviser for Members of the U.S. House of Representatives and the U. S. Senate, is a Life Member of The National Defense Industry Association (NDIA) and was a DC Finance Event Vice-Chairman for two Presidential Campaigns. He has also served on the Bi-National Board of Directors of the U. S. - Mexico Chamber of Commerce and was the founding member of the Internet Advisory Committee to the Partnership for a Drug-Free America.
Smith has also advised the campaigns & political activities of Members of the U. S. Senate and House of Representatives as well as several state Governors giving him unique insight into the political process and further expanding relationships and, more importantly, process visibility of value to our clients.
Russell additionally brings several years of experience in the private sector in the real estate development industry. He has served as an outside business process consultant to a number of startup technology firms and was the co-founder and President of GovernmentSource.com, the first comprehensive Active-X portal to federal and state government online resources. GovernmentSource.com was a precursor to and one of the concept models for solutions such as FirstGov, the current primary comprehensive U.S. federal government online resource.
Smith's Public Speaking appearances have included the University of Chicago School of Business Administration, technology seminars, global security conferences, youth service organizations, college and university athletics groups, numerous business and trade associations and the annual Spring Meeting of the global World Trade Center Association in Seoul, ROK.
