Trends in military market opportunity

Hi, this is Bob Rutherford. As background on my TMC case study about the process of beating competition in a government bid, this week I offer some thoughts on the tremendous opportunities represented by government acquisition requirements. This domain is especially lucrative in the military, and as a subset, the aerospace sectors, but one must be attuned to changing trends. From the very highest strategic and long range perspectives, it is clear that defense acquisition planning and focus is shifting away from the cold war defensive mindset which envisioned preparing for conventional conflicts against peers or near-peer nation states. Understanding the change in strategic requirements toward defense against stateless actors engaged in asymmetric unconventional warfare is the first step in appreciating the opportunities. While the Defense Department recognizes a need to maintain a balanced approach toward materiel acquisition, one which retains conventional combat superiority, much funding today is specifically targeted toward supporting the global war on terrorism (GWOT). The foundations of this campaign are found in intelligence gathering, communicating, and processing. Any capabilities related to these requirements will find fertile marketing space in the DoD. The aerospace industry sector is especially well adapted to addressing the first two. Intelligence gathering, to the extent that much of that occurs within the electromagnetic spectrum - either in the form of signals interception or imaging, is enhanced by elevating the associated sensors on airborne or space based platforms. The latter are generally expensive, and as strategic assets, often not very flexible. The former are more flexible tactical platforms but often limited by mission duration. Persistence is a particularly valuable trait when considering airborne sensor and communications platforms. This is one reason for the proliferation of unmanned air vehicles (UAVs), and that is where I'll leave this discussion today: the use of unmanned air vehicle systems as platforms for persistent intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) support is a clear direction that the military is taking. Use as weapons platforms is equally expanding and there is a visible move to develop them as force multipliers - allowing multiple UAVs to be managed by a single ground controller or operator. That is where the technology is headed, and that is where the future opportunities lie. Cheers, Bob