Turning the So-Called 'Valley of Death' Green.

• Author: Chew, James S.B.
• Position: Emerging Technology Horizons

* The defense technology community spends a lot of time grumbling about the "Valley of Death," a term referring to the place where innovative technologies funded by the Defense Department fail to make it into warfighters' hands because they can't make the transition from prototype to a real product.

All this grumbling can lead high-level decision makers in the Pentagon and Congress and new companies and young, talented technical people thinking about entering the defense sector to question whether anything--including a business or career --could grow in such a barren and hostile valley.

But there are green pastures in that valley, where technical teams are finding paths and meeting partners, customers and users and crossing over to deliver next-generation technologies to support national defense.

The National Defense Industrial Association's Science and Engineering Technology Division recendy held its annual conference, which focused on how science and technology programs can support critical operational missions, with speakers from the Joint Staff, Africa Command and Southern Commands.

The week showcased those who survived the Valley of Death. Conference attendees learned about the success of the Office of the Secretary of Defense's Joint Capability Technology Demonstration program in transitioning more than 75 percent of its activities into capabilities for operational forces or into acquisition programs.

The Defense Innovation Unit described programs that have delivered capabilities based on commercial technologies to warfighters and have funded contracts in place in areas ranging from hypersonics to cybersecurity.

Army speakers discussed transitions of vehicle and body armor, ground vehicle subsystems, fuels and lubricants, combat rations and uniforms. Attendees learned mat the Office of Naval Research's Future Naval Capabilities program has transitioned more than 200 products.

Other activities are well known for their successes. The Small Business Innovation Research program has delivered coundess products providing next generation capabilities to operational forces over the past decades. The program's economic impacts are even wider. A Defense Department-commissioned study of the program found it had delivered $347 billion in economic impact and helped create more than 1.5 million jobs.

A few key themes were repeated throughout the weekend and should be considered best practices and replicated across the science and technology...