Thursday, April 25, 2024
Key Issues Optical clocks Prototype funding SPAFORGEN
Justin Doubleday was managing editor of Inside the Pentagon until June 2021, where he focused on defense-wide topics including budgets, acquisition policy, combatant commands, missile defense and cyber. He has also worked for ITP sister publications Inside the Army and Inside the Navy. Justin previously reported for The Chronicle of Higher Education. He graduated from the University of New Hampshire in 2013.
The Pentagon will release a strategy to guide the move toward what the Defense Department's top IT official says is a "pivotal" shift in network security, as officials are also warning against vendors hawking holistic "zero trust" technologies.
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) today reintroduced legislation expected to serve as the basis of a China technology competitiveness package, as he also eyes plans to add funding for semiconductor manufacturing to the bill.
The National Spectrum Consortium has launched joint working groups involving government and industry members to recommend best practices and potential standards for spectrum sharing and other fifth-generation wireless networking issues.
The head of U.S. Southern Command is calling for the return of the "ISR transfer fund," as he anticipates intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance will continue to be one of his major unfunded priorities this year.
Two Republican lawmakers are urging the Commerce Department to enact tighter restrictions on the sale of key computer chip design equipment to Chinese companies.
The Defense Department is accelerating its adoption of a "zero trust" cybersecurity architecture, including through the potential creation of a new portfolio management office, as officials say recent hacking campaigns show U.S. adversaries are becoming more sophisticated in cyberspace.
Top Defense Department research officials today told lawmakers the Pentagon's newly formed innovation steering group is studying internal changes DOD can make to accelerate technology adoption and reduce barriers to working with the department.
President Biden met with the chief executives of 19 U.S. firms today to tout his plan to invest $50 billion in semiconductor manufacturing and research as part of a sweeping infrastructure proposal.
Defense Department officials are seeking to influence standards and specifications for fifth-generation wireless networks in key areas like cybersecurity.
The Biden administration and Congress are on the cusp of pouring billions of dollars into creating new U.S. manufacturing plants for semiconductors, the tiny computer chips that underpin most modern technologies, including advanced military systems. Officials are particularly concerned about China's plans to dominate the semiconductor industry by 2030.
The Defense Department's Rapid Reaction Technology Office is planning a meeting this year with select companies to discuss potential prototyping plans for technologies that fall under the broad auspices of DOD's modernization priorities, including artificial intelligence, biotechnology, and microelectronics.
Michael Brown, director of the Defense Innovation Unit, has been picked to become the Pentagon's acquisition chief, putting a new spotlight on a career previously spent in Silicon Valley and a public profile focused on countering Chinese technology.
When Mark Lewis walked into the Pentagon in late 2019, he thought his most important job as a leading research official would be overseeing the development of new, high-speed missiles.
The Joint Artificial Intelligence Center is finalizing a new acquisition vehicle that would allow the Defense Department to place orders from technology companies to curate data sets for military AI applications.
The U.S. government is still struggling to understand the full scope of the SolarWinds hack as well as a more recent compromise of Microsoft's email servers, as the head of U.S. Cyber Command said the government struggles to track foreign adversaries who launch attacks using U.S. infrastructure.
The Pentagon's joint development environment for artificial intelligence applications is up and running, according to the leader of the Joint Artificial Intelligence Center, who says the platform will be key to sharing data and connecting systems across the military services.
House Armed Services Committee Chairman Adam Smith (D-WA) said boosting the Pentagon's efforts to drive U.S. technology innovation and combat climate change could help get progressives to back down from calls to cut the defense budget.
Influential defense innovation leaders, asserting the Defense Department's slow budget process is hindering the adoption of new technology, are recommending Congress establish a technology transfer fund to serve as a "bridge fund" between promising prototypes and large programs of record.
Stefanie Tompkins was sworn in as director of the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency today.
The Federal Communications Commission this week will vote on an order outlining how a key slice of spectrum currently set aside for military use will be opened to commercial, fifth-generation wireless networks.