Dr Manickam Suresh did his Bachelor of Engineering in Electronics and Instrumentation Engineering from Annamalai University and completed his Master of Engineering and Doctoral degree from the Aerospace Department in the Indian Institute of Science (IISc), Bangalore.

He joined DRDO in the year 2002, and he worked primarily in the area of flight mechanics, flight and mission control systems of unmanned aerial systems.  As a Scientist ‘G’, he is currently serving as Joint Project Director of a tri-services, multi-lab, mission-mode project. Prior to his current assignment, as a project director, he successfully completed a project on cooperative systems jointly with AFRL, USA 

He was awarded the laboratory scientist of the year from ADE in 2009 and the DRDO scientist of the year award in 2015. He is a Life member of Aeronautical Society of India (AeSI), Senior Member of Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) and Associate Fellow, American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA).