The Defense Department wants to forge relationships with Silicon Valley firms in an effort to address intellectual property rights and government acquisition issues, Federal News Radio reported Monday.
Scott Maucione writes the Defense Innovation Unit Experimental seeks to reach out to Silicon Valley companies and invest in man-machine teaming, autonomous learning systems, semi-autonomous weapons systems and assisted human operations as part of DoD’s third offset strategy.
Stephen Welby, assistant defense secretary for research and engineering, told the station more than 200 companies came to DIUx and discussed what the DoD needs in areas such as advanced computing and big data, according to the report.
“We want to try and help those companies understand the problems that we have, the places where they can help and the ways that they can do business with us,†Welby told Federal News Radio.
Maucione writes the intellectual property rights issue is one challenge that halts the companies’ plan to do business with DoD.
“The department is only focused on retaining the minimum set of intellectual property rights to do our business,†Welby told the station.
