INSUBCONTINENT EXCLUSIVE:
While Silicon Valley executives like those from Palantir, Meta, and OpenAI are grabbing headlines for trading their Brunello Cucinelli vests
for Army Reserve uniforms, a quieter transformation has been underway in the U.S
red tape and shrinking the protracted procurement cycles that once made working with the military a nightmare for startups
The efforts represent a less visible but potentially more meaningful remaking that aims to see the government move faster and be smarter
NewsRoom in a recent Zoom interview
adoption kit, a series of frameworks and tools that aim to bridge the so-called Valley of Death, where promising tech dies on its path from
eight-year-old, Somerville, Mass.-based cybersecurity startup that helps big organizations protect sensitive data and digital identities
Companies move through three phases: evaluation, structured piloting, and scaling to enterprise services
The key difference from traditional government contracting, Fanelli says, is that the Navy now leads with problems rather than predetermined
Originally a scholarship cadet in the Air Force studying electrical engineering, he was disqualified from military service due to a lung
have thought it a waste of time to try
Fanelli points, for example, to one competition run through the Defense Innovation Unit (DIU), wherein the Navy expected a handful of
before but were already solving similar problems in the private sector.Fanelli says his team has documented dozens of success stories
altogether, including a venture-backed startup that used robotic process automation to zip through a two-year invoice backlog in just a
Another example involved rolling out network improvements to an aircraft carrier that saved 5,000 sailor hours in the first month
The other four are operational resilience, cost per user, adaptability, and user experience.As for what the Navy is looking for right now,
Fanelli outlined several high-priority areas, including AI, where the service is actively talking with teams
The Navy apparently wants to accelerate AI adoption beyond basic generative AI use cases into more agentic applications for everything from
onboarding and personnel management to data processing on ships
particularly for integration with unmanned systems
liberty to provide specific budget breakdowns, but he said the Navy currently allocates single-digit percentages to emerging and commercial
(Here, he pointed to ongoing initiatives like digital twins, additive manufacturing, and on-site production capabilities that can reduce
to partnering with the U.S
previous years, as longtime industry observers can attest
interest to the Navy specifically
