Holiday Wishes
2024 Projections
This year the Reagan National Defense Forum is celebrating "10 Years of Promoting Peace Through Strength."
The Reagan National Defense Forum (RNDF) brings together leaders from across the political spectrum and key stakeholders in the defense community, including Members of Congress, current and former Administration officials, senior military leadership, industry executives, technology innovators, and thought leaders. Their mission is to review and assess policies that strengthen America's national defense in the context of the global threat environment. It’s one of the premier defense conferences of the year that bring together a wide set of stakeholders to discuss and debate how the United States can and should continue to lead the world in an era of increasingly complex challenges and opportunities.
The discussions will be livestreamed: https://www.reaganfoundation.org/reagan-institute/events/2023-reagan-national-defense-forum-rndf/
Defense Innovation Re-baselining
2021 marks the high point when startups experienced a time of wild optimism. Capital was plentiful and cheap, and enterprise buyers were heavily into experimentation, making it a great time to be a startup. But in March 2022 (ironically 20 years after March 2000 when the Dot Com Boom busted) the wind shifted suddenly. Inflation popped out of no where, the Fed raised interest rates multiple times, and money became and remains much more expensive. Many business models no longer worked. Capital allocators pulled from allocating to venture, venture capitalists re-evaluated their models, exhorting their startups to get profitable.
Will we bounce back in 2024? It remains to be seen. But, the measured approach to business growth, especially for companies creating markets, and looking to implement strategies that actually work, should portend better outcomes for everyone - even if it takes a little longer. The business muscles startups build in this more austere environment are foundational for any era, especially for when the economy picks up again, no matter when that is.
And, so, Always Be Bootstrapping!
Space Corner
COSMIC
On Nov 7-8, COSMIC, the Consortium for Space Mobility and ISAM Capabilities had its formal kickoff meeting at the University of Maryland in College Park. Formulated and funded by NASA’s Space Technology Mission Directorate, the consortium brought together experts from academia, industry, government, startups and more to advance space mobility and in-space servicing, assembly, and manufacturing (ISAM) technologies. From the government, the event featured engaging discussions with civilians and uniformed personnel, including Dr. Ezinne Uzo-Okoro (White House), Col. Pam Melroy (NASA), and Maj. Gen. John M Olson (Space Force). Seeing it as an opportunity not to be missed, many companies from the SpaceWERX Orbital Prime program (who we have spotlighted here before) joined and indeed led panel discussions. Keeping in line with COSMIC’s goals of making ISAM a routine part of space architecture mission lifecycles, we look forward to seeing the technology assessments, white papers, recommendations, and summary roadmaps that will be coming soon. Keep an eye out for those!
Startup Corner
Teams and Operations
How creative a company is, how well it harnesses it’s most precious intellectual property assets - its people - set it apart in the marketplace. Because of this, we thought it interesting and important to shed some light on how to harness the thinking within teams. This article ran on New Space Economy not too long ago - we add it here for reference, but also discuss our experience implementing some of these techniques.
We list 5 Structured Brainstorming Techniques for you to explore. We have the most experience with Nominal Group Technique and Mind Mapping. We plan to explore using Reverse Brainstorming and 6 Thinking Hats.
Round Robin Brainstorming
Process: Participants sit in a circle. Starting from one person, each member contributes one idea in turn. The round continues until everyone has had multiple opportunities to contribute or pass.
Application: This method is particularly effective in groups where some members might be reticent to share ideas in a less structured environment.
Key Benefit: Prevents dominance by vocal participants, ensuring equitable contribution.
Stepladder Technique
Process: Starts with the core team discussing the problem. Additional members are added one at a time, each adding their ideas before being influenced by the group discussion.
Application: Ideal for teams where some members might be influenced or intimidated by group dynamics or dominant individuals.
Key Benefit: Ensures fresh perspectives are heard and integrated into the group's thinking.
Mind Mapping
Process: Starts with a central idea. Participants then branch out with related ideas, creating a visual map of related concepts and subconcepts.
Application: Effective for complex problems where visualizing connections between different ideas is beneficial.
Key Benefit: Enhances creativity and helps in seeing new connections between ideas.
Reverse Brainstorming
Process: Instead of solving the problem directly, the group focuses on how to cause or exacerbate it. These ideas are then reversed to find potential solutions.
Application: Useful in situations where conventional brainstorming hasn't yielded effective solutions.
Key Benefit: Helps in identifying hidden problems and approaching solutions from a different angle.
Nominal Group Technique (NGT)
Process: Begins with silent, independent idea generation, followed by sharing ideas in a round-robin format. The group then discusses these ideas and finally votes to prioritize or rank them.
Application: Suited for decision-making scenarios where equal participation is crucial.
Key Benefit: Combines individual and collaborative thinking, reducing the impact of groupthink.
Six Thinking Hats
Process: Participants wear metaphorical ‘hats', each representing a different type of thinking: White (facts), Red (emotions), Black (cautious), Yellow (optimistic), Green (creative), and Blue (process).
Application: Effective in diverse groups to explore problems from multiple perspectives.
Key Benefit: Facilitates parallel thinking and comprehensive exploration of ideas.
These techniques help teams ideate and pull out experience and thinking from many different perspectives. However, you must use them to gain experience with how you/your team experiences them, for them to be effective. Ideally, you have someone who has facilitation expertise on the team, in order to manage conversation and not allow for any one dominant voice to squelch out good ideas.
H4XLabs is happy to help - reach out if you want to explore- especially if you are alumni. Reconnect with us!
For access to the original article, please click here.
Funding Opportunities:
For all Dual Use Startups and Companies, the current DoD SBIR cycle is in fully swing. The pre-solicitation period, where you can connect with programs and technical points of contact to discuss your idea, lasts the whole month. Then, proposal writing is supposed to start; no more talking to program managers after 2 January. Here’s the link: https://www.dodsbirsttr.mil/submissions/baa-schedule/active-baa-announcements
The Power at Sea Prize expands on the Ocean Observing Prize, and is structured to support competitors through the early stages of developing a new system, subsystem, or component from original conception to teaming to a testable stage of initial development.
The prize aims to be a proving ground for ideas that have not yet had the opportunity to flourish and is structured so competitors end the prize with concepts, materials, and media collateral to better position them for future technology development.
Prize Structure
Through two phases, CONCEPT and DEVELOP, the Power at Sea Prize will provide winners with access to direct support, including training, testing assets, and new connections that aim to accelerate the advancement of concepts into real prototypes. In the CONCEPT Phase, competitors will select a blue economy application that their proposed system, subsystem, or component will support, and an integration challenge their solution intends to resolve. At the end of this phase, up to 20 winners will be awarded from a cash prize pool of up to $200,000. Apply now on HeroX!
Small Unmanned Ground Robotic Systems, SOCOM
The objective of this topic is to develop applied research toward an innovative cyber hardened small unmanned ground robotic system that is capable of being operated using both a vendor developed .apk TAK GOV software controller, able to be installed on an Android Team Awareness Kit body worn device already utilized by SOF Operators and a Tomahawk Robotics Grip S20 universal controller w/Galaxy S20 Tactical Edition (or more recently updated versions) which will be delivered as part of the ground robotics system. The ground robot platform must integrate the best of breed C2/data link components and be operable with both Silvus Technologies and Persistent Systems radios on the edge to meet various end-users’ suitability and ability to connect to given digital mesh networks.
The objective of this topic is to research and develop an innovative weapon mounted capability that will be employed in short to medium range target engagement scenarios both day and night by Special Operations Forces. The Thermal Reflex Sight (TRS) feasibility study shall address all viable system design options that allows for an assaulter to simultaneously wear head-borne night vision goggles and be able to engage targets with the TRS sight. The TRS sight should be the combination of a long wave infrared thermal weapons sight and a reflex day optic sight to accommodate targeted engagements in varied lighting conditions. Unlike a clip-on thermal weapons sight, the TRS should be a standalone weapon mounted sight that is affixed to the weapons picatinny rail for day/night operational use. The TRS should be optimized for short to medium range engagements.
Precision Control Lens Eye Tracking Sensors, Army
The objective of this topic is to develop precision contact lens eye tracking sensors for Extended Reality (XR) interaction, training optimization and cognitive monitoring. Eye tracking is poised to serve as a critical technology for enhancing C2 capabilities in XR environments, optimizing training and cognitive monitoring for enabling real-time adaptive systems. However, current eye tracking technologies do not have form factors which can operate in rugged, highly mobile army environments and the precision necessary to enable necessary capabilities. A contact lens form factor would allow for operational integration into multiple wartime dynamic scenarios for joint mission precision to include manned and unmanned air operations and ground vehicle systems.
Proliferated Warfighter Space Architecture (PWSA) Advanced Capability Development Open Topic, SDA
The objective of this topic is to provide novel and innovative new technology supporting the USSF Space Development Agency continued development of the PWSA (Proliferated Warfighter Space Architecture). – The Space Development Agency (SDA) is soliciting proposals for novel architecture concepts, systems, technologies, and capabilities that enable leap-ahead improvements for future tranches of currently planned PWSA (Proliferated Warfare Space Architecture) capability layers, or, enable new capability layers to address other emerging or evolving warfighter needs.
Shout Outs:
CausalTwin Awarded DARPA Direct to Phase 2
CausalTwin, a standout from our H4D 2022 Cohort, has been awarded DARPA Direct to Phase 2. CausalTwin stands at the forefront of bespoke defense solutions, specializing in computer vision, large language models and system design. Their expertise in these cutting-edge technologies enables them to provide innovative solutions for complex defense and security challenges. Congratulations to CausalTwin on this well-deserved recognition!
Sergio Gallucci of SCOUT Space Named to Forbes 30 Under 30
Sergio Gallucci, Co-Founder and CTO of SCOUT Space, a member of SpaceWERX’s Orbital Prime Cohort, was named to the 2024 Forbes 30 Under 30 list. SCOUT Space develops sensors and autonomous systems to help satellites better navigate and avoid issues with debris or other satellites. Their first prototype spacecraft entered orbit in 2021 and they have raised over $5.5 million from investors. Congratulations, Sergio!
What are we reading and listening to?
What Does the U.S. Space Force Actually Do?
Stanford Emerging Technology Review
The Math: A Venture Capitalist Breaks Down Investment In Defense Startups
Acquired Podcast on Lockheed Martin
DOD Software Chief Breaks Down Tech Shifts in Pacific Region
DISA HAC Director Shares Commercial Cloud Capability Progress for Indo-Pacific
Indopacom CIO Looks to Data Centricity, Assured Command and Control