Associate Attorney

Joseph Nieto

the vision

from the beginning

Aegis was founded from a desire to love both the work we do and the people we do it with. That vision has come to life—through a team we’re proud of and clients who trust us as true partners. Every day, we work to bring greater efficiency and innovation to legal services, improving quality while reducing costs. Our focus on the space industry stems from a deep belief in its potential to serve humanity, and we’re proud to be setting a new standard for legal accessibility.

Overview And Experience

Joseph “Joe” Nieto advises clients in the aerospace and cybersecurity industries on complex legal and regulatory matters. With a doctorate in law focused on space, national security, and cyber law — and degrees in philosophy and astrophysics from UNC-Chapel Hill— Joe brings a rare multidisciplinary perspective to his practice.

He assists clients with international trade compliance (ITAR, EAR, OFAC), launch and reentry licensing, and cyber compliance, including data reporting, privacy, and open-source licensing. Joe is also qualified to sit for the patent bar, enabling him to bridge technical and legal domains for clients developing innovative technologies.

Before joining Aegis, Joe worked at one of the nation’s oldest rocket launch companies, where he supported satellite and crewed launches, conducted contract reviews, and conducted export risk assessments across supply chains. He also collaborated with scientists and inventors on patenting and commercializing emerging technologies.

Joe began his space career at the intersection of astrophysical research and ethical inquiry. At Chapel Hill, he operated a specialized survey telescope to search for stellar anomalies, sometimes called “alien megastructures,” in pre- and upper-main sequence stars, and wrote novel data-reduction code. His philosophy thesis examined the ethical challenges of space mining and terraforming on non-Earth planetary bodies.