By Geoff Fein

John Thackrah, currently serving as the Deputy Assistant Secretary for Management and Budget, is expected to become the interim head of Navy acquisition.

Navy Sec. Donald Winter is expected to name Thackrah within the next two weeks, a source told Defense Daily.

Thackrah was sworn into his present position in April 2005.

Prior to joining government service, Thackrah was a senior executive at United Technologies Corp. [UTX], Pratt and Whitney Division, according to his Navy biography.

Thackrah will take over for Delores Etter, the current Navy acquisition chief, who is retiring from the post later this month.

Etter resigned Oct. 5 in order to return to teaching at the United States Naval Academy. She was sworn in as the assistant Secretary of the Navy for Research, Development and Acquisition (ASN RDA) Nov. 7, 2005 (Defense Daily, Oct. 9).

She had been a professor at the naval academy prior to taking the job as the service acquisition czar.

Thackrah served as interim acquisition chief once before, when John Young left to head up the Pentagon’s Defense Research and Engineering (DDR&E) office and prior to Etter being sworn in.