[1] While working at Radio Corporation of America (RCA), Wright was instrumental in developing semiconductor devices for thermoelectric cooling and electrical generation on spacecraft, improving early night vision technology, and semi-conductor amplifiers for communication satellites.
After his honorable discharge from the Air Force in 1954, Wright returned to Morro Bay and enrolled in California Polytechnic State University at San Luis Obispo (Cal Poly).
[2] Later, while director of ATL, Wright attended the Harvard Business School six-week Advanced Management Program in 1976 and 1977.
[7]) Wright's later work at RCA focused on the use of III-V elements for energy generation, including the prototype radioisotope thermoelectric generators for deep space probes and Vuilleumier cycle refrigeration for spacecraft sensor cooling,[8] cooling (holding the record for the greatest temperature drop using thermoelectric materials), and for improving night vision glasses.
Under Wright's direction, a magnesium-mercuric oxide battery was developed which exhibited an energy density of watt-hours per pound.
Wright served as director of RCA Advanced Technology Laboratories from 1972 to 1977, now part of Lockheed Martin.
During his time there, they built the largest thermo-vac chamber for the testing of satellite systems in a space-like environment.
[14] Wright spent 28 years at RCA, rising to the position of Senior Vice President, Corporate Planning and Development in 1985.
Indeed, the day of a board meeting in which Thorton Bradshaw and then CEO Robert Frederick presented a detailed strategic plan, Bradshaw later met Jack Welch, Chairman of GE met in the apartment of Felix G. Rohatyn of Lazard Freres, the company's investment banker.
[15] Wright, who was then serving as Senior Vice President responsible for planning, was likewise caught unawares of the meeting.
[21][22] Wright guided the company's focus toward spacecraft, defense electronics, and selected industrial products.
Wright was a member of the board or advisors for the Colleges of Engineering for Cal Poly and the University of Pennsylvania.
In 1995, President Bill Clinton named Wright a member of the National Security Telecommunications Advisory Committee (NSTAC).