Pentagon tech hub to launch dozens of new projects with FY24 funding

The Protection Innovation Unit plans to spend most of its almost $1 billion fiscal 2024 price range to speed up present initiatives and add new ones in expertise areas like counter uncrewed aerial methods and house transport.

Congress permitted a virtually 10-fold funding improve in FY24for the Pentagon’s business expertise hub to assist its increasing mission to assist the Protection Division shortly foster and area business capabilities in giant numbers. Extended price range deliberations delayed the discharge of appropriations, which meant that DIU’s funding got here greater than 5 months into the fiscal 12 months, presenting the group with the problem of utilizing that cash in a brief time period.

DIU Director Doug Beck has mentioned the funding can be cut up amongst 4 areas: accelerating present applications; launching new ones; supporting initiatives housed inside different Protection Division innovation organizations; and addressing a few of the challenges business corporations face as they attempt to work with DoD.

In a June 20 assertion, DIU mentioned supplied extra particulars on that cut up, revealing that fifty% of the funding — or about $491 million — can be directed towards rushing up its precedence efforts. One other 25%, about $246 million, will fund new initiatives.

“Whereas DIU has already begun placing the brand new price range into motion, with Congressional oversight, over the following few months, DIU expects to launch two dozen solicitations utilizing our FY24 appropriations for brand spanking new initiatives,” the group mentioned.

Current priorities embody applied sciences to assist attritable uncrewed methods, the Pentagon’s Joint Fires Community and different house, cyber, vitality, logistics and human methods efforts.

Together with house transport and Counter UAS, new initiatives will give attention to cross-cutting software program and superior manufacturing with the purpose of serving to allow extra resilient and built-in autonomous methods working throughout a number of domains.

“DIU’s FY24 spending is focused on closing the U.S. navy’s most crucial operational functionality gaps with the main target, pace, and scale required to assist us deter main battle or win if pressured to combat,” Beck mentioned in a press release.

The remaining 25% of funding will assist DIU’s function in coordinating varied Pentagon innovation organizations just like the Air Pressure’s AFWERX and the Navy’s NavalX and breaking down “systemic limitations” to adopting non-traditional expertise throughout the Pentagon. That features increasing DIU’s community of OnRamp Hubs, that are primarily based across the U.S.

“DIU, working with companions throughout the Division, will proceed trade outreach by way of quite a lot of in-person and digital engagements, offering informational content material about the best way to work with DIU and, extra broadly, the best way to higher interact the DoD,” the group mentioned.