Meet our team

We're here to help you maximize your visibility to federal buyers, find teammates who want to work with you, and respond to contracting opportunities that you can win!

Leadership

  • Ignacio Rivera

    President & Chief Executive Officer

    Ignacio Rivera is the President and CEO of GovCon in a Box, a government contracting software platform built to help small businesses find federal contracting opportunities, improve visibility in SAM.gov and DSBS, and win more government contracts through data-driven workflows and automation.

    Ignacio is also the founder of Ironroot Holding, Inc., a GovTech-focused holding company that acquires, builds, and scales software products serving regulated industries and U.S. government contractors. His work focuses on transforming fragmented, manual government contracting processes into repeatable, scalable systems powered by modern cloud infrastructure and AI.

    With a background in cloud engineering, data platforms, and SaaS product development, Ignacio brings an operator's mindset to GovCon — prioritizing execution, systems, and measurable outcomes over theory. He has built and operated production-grade platforms in highly regulated environments, giving him first-hand insight into the compliance, security, and operational constraints faced by federal contractors.

    As CEO of GovCon in a Box, Ignacio leads product strategy, platform architecture, and roadmap execution, driving the evolution of GCB into an all-in-one operating system for government contractors. The platform supports key GovCon workflows including:

    • Federal opportunity discovery and filtering
    • Contractor visibility optimization (SAM.gov, DSBS, and profile readiness)
    • Teaming and partner identification
    • Proposal readiness and pipeline management
    • AI-assisted insights for win probability and prioritization

    Ignacio's leadership philosophy is simple: government contracting success should be systematic, not speculative. GovCon in a Box is designed to help contractors stop chasing low-probability bids and instead focus on opportunities aligned with their capabilities, past performance, and strategic growth goals.

    Unlike traditional GovCon training programs or static databases, GovCon in a Box combines software, automation, and practical guidance into a single platform — giving small businesses the same analytical and operational advantages long held by large primes and established incumbents.

    Ignacio remains deeply hands-on across the business, working directly on platform development, customer feedback loops, and strategic partnerships to ensure GovCon in a Box stays grounded in real-world contracting challenges and continues to deliver measurable results for its users.

Advisors

  • Neil McDonnell

    Co-Founder & Advisor

    Born and raised in San Francisco, California, Neil started his career in Silicon Valley developing his IT and sales skills. He joined the US Army in the early 1990s as an Airborne Ranger and quickly advanced to supporting Fort Lewis' Garrison Commander, then I Corps' Commanding General, and finally the Secretary of the Army.

    Between 1998 and 2017, Neil ran two IT-focused small businesses in the federal market. He personally led sales, securing federal contracts with the US Army, WHMO/WHCA, US Air Force, DISA, Executive Office of the President (EOP), Departments of Homeland Security (DHS), Health & Human Services (HHS), Veterans Affairs (VA), Education, Transportation (DOT), Interior (DOI), and Treasury. As both prime and sub, Neil has teamed with small and large businesses, including GDIT, Booz Allen, and Microsoft.

    After spending 20 years as a small business government contractor, federal sales expert Neil McDonnell founded the GovCon Chamber in 2018 and co-founded GovCon in a Box in 2024 to empower over 350,000 small business government contractors in the federal marketplace. Neil trains small business owners to find their 'niche', identify 'slam dunk' opportunities, and build strategic relationships that lead to repeatable, predictable results.

    Since 2022, Neil has delivered over 500 live trainings for free, teaching the 'how' of federal sales and providing step-by-step, actionable guidance to over 10,000 small businesses. His '7 Step Process for Federal Revenue Success' teaches that "government contracting is not a secret... it's just a process."