Heather Phelps refocuses Nebula Business Solutions with vCISO vision

Influential Women has recognized Heather Phelps, a U.S. Navy combat veteran and technology leader, as she renews her long-term plan for Nebula Business Solutions. The Texas-based effort builds on more than two decades in engineering, cybersecurity, and executive leadership, with a 2026 push aimed at serving smaller organizations and future growth.

Why it matters: - Heather Phelps is moving from senior technology roles into a broader advisory and business-building effort centered on Nebula Business Solutions. - The shift matters because Phelps is aiming to translate enterprise-grade security, architecture, and leadership into support that smaller organizations can actually use. - Influential Women’s recognition highlights a veteran technologist whose next chapter is tied to entrepreneurship, cybersecurity, and long-term business design.

What happened: - Influential Women recognized Heather Phelps, MISM, Founder & vCISO, for a career that spans more than 20 years in technology, cybersecurity, and leadership. - Phelps is renewing her focus on Nebula Business Solutions, a venture first developed in 2023. - Phelps is based in Texas and is a U.S. Navy combat veteran. - Phelps’s career began in U.S. Navy aviation as an in-flight avionics technician on mission-critical aircraft systems. - Her civilian career later moved through telecommunications, manufacturing, retail, and global enterprises.

The details: - Phelps has held roles at Ericsson, Walgreens Boots Alliance, Fortune Brands Innovations, Grainger, and Ribbon Communications. - At Ribbon Communications, she served as Director of Information Security and Security Operations. - Her work has covered engineering, systems architecture, enterprise technology, cybersecurity, governance, risk management, compliance, and security operations. - Phelps says her Navy experience taught her that technical work is always tied to human consequences and shared accountability. - In 2023, Phelps began developing Nebula Business Solutions while balancing a demanding career and life as a single mother. - The original goal for Nebula Business Solutions was to create an additional source of income for her family. - The venture also reflected a long-held ambition to build an organization that combines technology, engineering, architecture, cybersecurity, and business leadership. - The venture was later paused, but Phelps kept the idea in mind. - By 2026, Phelps began reconsidering the business with a broader purpose and a longer-term view. - Phelps plans to use virtual Chief Information Security Officer work and consulting as an entry point, not the ceiling, for the business. - Her broader interests include research, innovation, and future product development. - Phelps wants Nebula’s model to account for inherited systems, organizational obligations, resource constraints, and long-term ambitions before offering solutions. - More information is available through Heather Phelps’s profile.

Between the lines: - Phelps is framing security as part of a larger operating model, not a standalone service. - Her background across aviation, telecom, retail, manufacturing, and enterprise security gives her a cross-disciplinary lens that many smaller firms lack internally. - The 2023 start date matters because Nebula Business Solutions was not created as an emergency pivot; it was already taking shape before the current career reset. - Her emphasis on leadership, systems thinking, and translation between board-level strategy and day-to-day execution suggests a consulting approach built around context, not templates.

What’s next: - Phelps is taking steps in 2026 toward a multidisciplinary business that could expand into 2027 and beyond. - The near-term offer centers on vCISO services and consulting. - Longer term, Phelps wants room for experimentation, learning, and eventual product development as Nebula Business Solutions grows. - The company’s early direction will likely focus on helping smaller organizations understand existing systems and make more sustainable technology and security decisions.