Defense Tech Renaissance: How Acquisition Reform Will Reshape Innovation
Emerging technologies meet streamlined procurement as defense sector enters transformative era of public-private collaboration and talent mobilization
The defense industrial base stands at an inflection point. For decades, complex acquisition processes, lengthy development cycles, and risk-averse procurement strategies have created barriers between cutting-edge commercial innovation and military applications. Meanwhile, near-peer threats have accelerated, drone warfare has redefined modern conflict, and the technology gap between commercial and defense sectors has widened. The result: promising technologies languish in development limbo while warfighters wait years for solutions that could be deployed in months. This disconnect doesn’t just slow innovation, it puts national security at risk and discourages the next generation of talent from entering the defense sector entirely.
On a recent episode of Facing Disruption, guest-host Chris Barlow had a chance to chat with Adam McLintock, Managing Director at Korn Ferry specializing in aerospace, defense, and government services executive search, at the Emerging Technologies for Defense Conference. With a background as a Navy pilot and over a decade placing executives in the defense sector, McLintock brings a unique perspective on how talent, technology, and acquisition reform are converging to create what he describes as very positive tailwinds for the industry. The conversation revealed not just the promise of emerging technologies, but the fundamental structural changes needed to bring innovation from concept to deployment.
The Acquisition Reform Imperative: Breaking Down Barriers to Innovation
The defense community has long acknowledged that its acquisition system needs modernization, but the urgency has never been greater. McLintock identifies acquisition and requirements reform as the central challenge, and opportunity, facing the sector today. The potential impact extends far beyond procurement efficiency. Meaningful reform would enable dual-use technology adoption, creating efficiencies for government operations while delivering better tools to warfighters through platforms that are actually easier to use and maintain.
The current system often forces promising technologies into a binary outcome: win a single contract or face extinction. This winner-takes-all approach stifles innovation and prevents the military from accessing multiple competing solutions that could serve different needs or contexts. A reformed system would fundamentally shift this dynamic, allowing prime contractors to work with multiple vendors and test various technologies simultaneously. Instead of defaulting to the lowest bidder, procurement decisions could prioritize the best technologies and crucially, there wouldn’t need to be just one winner.
Consider the example of drone technology development. In the current environment, a Series B startup developing advanced autonomous drone systems might spend two to three years navigating procurement processes, only to lose out to an established contractor with existing relationships but potentially inferior technology. By the time the contract is awarded, the startup’s technology may be obsolete, its funding exhausted, and its talent scattered to other opportunities. Under a reformed system, multiple drone technologies could be tested simultaneously in operational environments, with procurement decisions based on demonstrated performance rather than incumbent advantage.
Research from the Defense Innovation Board has consistently highlighted these challenges. Their 2019 report on software acquisition noted that traditional defense procurement timelines average 5-7 years from requirement to deployment, while commercial software cycles operate in months or weeks. This temporal mismatch creates a fundamental barrier to incorporating cutting-edge technology into defense systems.
Early-stage companies face what McLintock describes as a critical vulnerability period, the valley of death between prototype and production. Reform would provide these companies the breathing room to mature their technology and get it on the board to compete, rather than being eliminated before their solutions can demonstrate full capability. This maturation window is critical, it provides the time needed for rigorous testing and development while maintaining the company’s viability through the process. For Series A through D companies trying various entry points into the defense market, reform would create clear platforms to demonstrate technology effectiveness rather than forcing them to find backdoor approaches.
The Public-Private Partnership Evolution: Beyond Transactional Relationships
The relationship between defense primes, emerging technology companies, and government buyers is undergoing a fundamental transformation. McLintock describes an ecosystem of co-op competition where companies simultaneously compete and collaborate. When a major contractor like L3 Harris takes the lead on a program involving technology from an earlier-stage company, streamlined processes and greater visibility across all parties becomes essential. True acquisition reform, in McLintock’s view, means making it easy for everyone involved while ultimately delivering the best product.
This collaboration model represents a significant departure from traditional prime contractor dynamics. Historically, large defense contractors maintained tight control over their supply chains and subcontractors, often absorbing or squeezing out smaller innovators. The emerging model recognizes that no single company, regardless of size, can maintain cutting-edge capabilities across all relevant technology domains.
Take shipbuilding as an example. McLintock notes that while shipbuilding presents unique challenges and isn’t as central to his work as some sectors, the potential for transformation across multiple related industries generates genuine excitement. Modern naval vessels integrate systems from dozens of specialized vendors, propulsion, radar, weapons systems, communications, and cyber defense. A reformed acquisition approach would allow the Navy to work directly with specialized technology providers while maintaining the systems integration role of traditional shipbuilders, accelerating innovation cycles without abandoning the industrial capacity needed for large-scale production.
The venture capital and private equity communities have recognized this shift, pouring unprecedented funding into defense technology startups. According to PitchBook data, defense tech startups raised over $33 billion between 2021 and 2023, compared to less than $10 billion in the preceding three-year period. This capital influx creates new dynamics in the talent market and changes the risk calculus for innovative companies entering the sector.
McLintock observes the practical implications daily in his executive search work. The ecosystem now includes both traditional primes and an entirely new class of well-funded startups backed by venture capital and private equity. These well-funded startups can now compete for top talent previously available only to established defense contractors or commercial tech giants, provided they can offer credible paths to actual defense contracts rather than perpetual prototype development.
Artificial Intelligence: Promise, Skepticism, and Practical Application
While artificial intelligence dominates conference agendas and investment theses, McLintock offers a refreshingly pragmatic perspective that many in the sector privately share but rarely voice publicly. He positions himself as an outlier on AI, acknowledging significant promise while questioning whether the expense justifies the ultimate value. This skepticism isn’t rooted in technological pessimism but rather in practical considerations about implementation, verification, and actual value creation.
Autonomy has existed in defense applications for years, McLintock points out, and machine learning has been deployed in various forms across the sector for even longer. What’s changed isn’t the underlying capability but rather the supercharging of these existing concepts and the investment flows following them. The challenge lies in moving beyond exciting conversations to understanding true applications, which remains in early stages. Current applications appear in drone technology and manufacturing, though manufacturing has leveraged these capabilities for some time already.
The trust-but-verify principle becomes paramount when lives depend on system performance. McLintock emphasizes that trusting AI systems still requires verification mechanisms at every stage. Beyond verification concerns, the fundamental production levels and performance of the physical items themselves, whether drones, ships, or other platforms, must meet requirements before AI can shoulder significant responsibility. The technology enhancing a system cannot compensate for inadequate baseline performance of that system.
This perspective aligns with recent findings from the RAND Corporation, which documented numerous instances where AI systems performed well in controlled environments but failed when deployed in complex, adversarial settings. Their 2024 study on AI in military applications concluded that human-machine teaming remains essential for the foreseeable future, with AI augmenting rather than replacing human decision-making in contested environments.
Consider autonomous logistics planning, an area where AI shows genuine promise. The military moves vast quantities of personnel, equipment, and supplies across global supply chains with countless variables; transport availability, weather, threat conditions, fuel costs, and diplomatic constraints. AI systems can process these variables far faster than human planners, optimizing routes and timing. However, the final decision authority must remain with experienced logisticians who understand the operational context, can recognize when AI recommendations don’t align with ground truth, and can adapt when conditions change unexpectedly.
McLintock sees value where AI enables scale and reduces costs, particularly in manufacturing improvements that allow companies to compete effectively and thrive. He acknowledges broader societal concerns about AI while recognizing it as a key term in the current market environment. Manufacturing quality control, predictive maintenance, and production optimization represent areas where AI applications are mature, measurable, and increasingly essential. A defense contractor using AI-powered inspection systems might detect defects that human inspectors miss while processing 10x more components per hour, directly improving both quality and throughput.
The Talent Dimension: Attracting and Deploying Leadership in a Transforming Sector
Perhaps the most overlooked aspect of defense technology transformation is the human element, specifically, the challenge of attracting, developing, and deploying leadership talent in an industry undergoing rapid change. McLintock’s executive search work positions him at the intersection of talent supply and organizational demand, revealing patterns that illuminate the sector’s evolution.
The perpetual need for strong leadership becomes especially acute at earlier-stage companies seeking to bring in talent from large organizations. Success requires more than simply recruiting experienced executives; it demands careful attention to culture fit and alignment while ensuring these leaders bring capabilities that help smaller companies compete effectively, potentially even against the larger players they came from. This talent arbitrage, moving experienced executives from mature defense contractors to growth-stage startups, requires careful consideration beyond simple compensation packages.
The challenge extends beyond individual placements to sector-wide talent attraction. For decades, the most ambitious engineers and technologists gravitated toward commercial tech giants or venture-backed startups in Silicon Valley, viewing defense work as bureaucratic, slow-moving, and ethically complex. McLintock sees the current transformation as an opportunity to shift that perception. The combination of defense sector innovation and emerging technologies could change how people think about defense work entirely. Someone who might have previously targeted Silicon Valley or other commercial tech hubs might reconsider when recognizing what’s happening in Washington DC and other defense ecosystems.
This isn’t merely about recruitment marketing, it requires substantive changes in how defense organizations operate. A software engineer considering offers from a commercial tech company and a defense startup will compare not just compensation but development cycles, technology stacks, decision-making speed, and impact visibility. If the defense role involves two-year procurement cycles, legacy programming languages, and limited autonomy, no amount of mission-focused recruiting will overcome the structural disadvantages.
McLintock’s current work spans multiple technology domains, reflecting market diversity. At present, the portfolio includes work in armaments, munitions, and energetics, a sector drawing considerable attention. This diversity creates opportunities for specialized talent to find niches aligned with their expertise and interests. An engineer passionate about advanced materials might contribute to next-generation armor systems, while a software architect focused on distributed systems could revolutionize command and control networks.
The talent challenge varies significantly by company stage and type. Established defense contractors need leaders who can drive cultural transformation while maintaining their core competencies in systems integration and large-scale production. Growth-stage companies need operators who can scale manufacturing, navigate regulatory requirements, and build sustainable business models. Early-stage startups need technical visionaries who can also understand military requirements and customer dynamics.
Research from McKinsey on defense workforce trends indicates that the sector faces a demographic cliff, with experienced engineers and program managers retiring faster than junior talent developing the necessary expertise. Their 2023 analysis projected a 20-25% shortfall in critical technical roles by 2030 without significant intervention. This talent gap makes McLintock’s work in repurposing talent for earlier-stage or growth companies increasingly strategic; moving experienced leaders from mature organizations to emerging ones doesn’t just help individual companies, it multiplies the impact of scarce expertise across the ecosystem.
Sector-Specific Opportunities: Where Innovation Meets Operational Need
McLintock observes that selecting a single exciting technology becomes difficult because of their interconnected nature. However, certain sectors present particularly compelling opportunities where technology innovation, operational need, and market dynamics converge.
Armaments, munitions, and energetics have gained renewed attention as conflicts in Ukraine and the Middle East have revealed concerning inventory levels and production constraints. The United States and its allies have struggled to maintain ammunition supplies at the rates required for sustained conflict, highlighting the need for both increased production capacity and more efficient, cost-effective manufacturing processes. Technologies that can reduce production costs, improve manufacturing throughput, or create more capable systems represent high-priority opportunities.
Consider the example of advanced manufacturing techniques applied to artillery shell production. Traditional manufacturing involves multiple specialized facilities, complex logistics, and lengthy production cycles. Additive manufacturing and advanced robotics could potentially consolidate production steps, reduce material waste, and accelerate output but only if acquisition processes allow new manufacturers to enter the market and scale rapidly.
Drone technology represents another area of convergence between technological capability and operational requirement. McLintock’s assessment that future conflict increasingly involves spectrum warfare and drone warfare aligns with observations from Ukraine, where inexpensive commercial drones have proven devastatingly effective for reconnaissance, targeting, and even direct attack roles. The ability to rapidly iterate drone designs, test them in operational environments, and scale production of effective variants represents a competitive advantage that traditional acquisition processes struggle to enable.
The spectrum warfare dimension encompasses electronic warfare, cyber capabilities, and the increasingly contested electromagnetic environment. Modern military operations depend on secure communications, GPS navigation, and sophisticated sensors all vulnerable to jamming, spoofing, and cyber attack. Technologies that provide resilient communications, accurate positioning without GPS, and effective electronic countermeasures will prove essential in near-peer conflicts.
Interoperability emerges as a critical but often overlooked challenge across these domains. McLintock expresses particular enthusiasm about service alignment, noting that each military service currently uses different platforms. Better alignment would enable improved interoperability and joint service operations, encompassing everything from manufacturing to drones to software. A battlefield network that seamlessly connects Army ground forces, Marine Corps expeditionary units, Air Force aircraft, and Navy ships sharing targeting data, coordinating fires, and maintaining situational awareness requires not just compatible hardware but common protocols, shared security architectures, and aligned operational concepts.
The Path Forward: From Optimism to Implementation
McLintock maintains strong optimism about the sector’s future, grounded in the belief that current conditions will drive acquisition reform. The logic follows a clear path: desiring new technology creates questions about accelerating acquisition and helping innovative companies survive long enough to deliver what they’ve built. This demand-pull approach where operational requirements drive process reform rather than reform existing in isolation offers the most promising path forward.
The market environment presents what McLintock characterizes as favorable tailwinds: a new administration potentially open to reform, recognized near-peer threats creating urgency, and a vibrant ecosystem of companies developing relevant technologies. However, translating these favorable conditions into sustained transformation requires deliberate action across multiple dimensions.
First, acquisition reform must move beyond pilot programs and special authorities to systemic change. Programs like the Defense Innovation Unit and Army Futures Command have demonstrated alternative acquisition approaches, but they remain exceptions rather than norms. Scaling these models requires changes to regulations, training for acquisition professionals, and executive commitment to accepting the risks inherent in faster, more flexible procurement.
Second, public-private partnerships need formalization through clearer pathways, transparent criteria, and predictable timelines. Emerging companies need to understand what the military actually needs, how to demonstrate capability, and what the path from prototype to program of record looks like. Defense organizations need mechanisms to engage with multiple vendors simultaneously, test competing solutions, and make evidence-based procurement decisions.
Third, the talent challenge requires coordinated action beyond individual hiring decisions. Industry associations, educational institutions, and government organizations must collaborate to create career pathways that attract young people into defense technology roles, develop their capabilities, and retain them long enough to generate return on investment. This includes addressing security clearance backlogs, offering competitive compensation, and creating work environments where talented people can do their best work.
Fourth, the sector needs honest conversations about technology maturity and realistic assessments of capability gaps. The AI discussion provides a useful example; rather than treating every problem as solvable through artificial intelligence, the community needs rigorous analysis of where AI adds value, where it introduces unacceptable risks, and where traditional approaches remain superior. This applies equally to other hyped technologies: not every defense application needs blockchain, quantum computing doesn’t solve all encryption challenges, and directed energy weapons have real physics constraints.
McLintock points toward first-principles engineering thinking as essential in determining what problem actually needs solving rather than creating products searching for applications. While he jokes about the term “defense tech,” he acknowledges it has always existed but now represents the right moment to leverage what enterprise technology has accomplished and bring those capabilities into defense applications. The opportunity includes potential simplification across services using disparate platforms, enabling better interoperability through alignment.
Actionable Recommendations for Defense Industry Leaders
For Defense Contractors and Primes:
Start identifying technology domains where your organization lacks cutting-edge capability and cannot realistically develop it internally. Build genuine partnership models with emerging companies that go beyond traditional subcontracting, offer technical mentorship, provide access to testing facilities, and create clear pathways to program inclusion. One major aerospace contractor recently established an innovation partner program that embeds startup engineers alongside company program managers, accelerating both technology transfer and mutual understanding of requirements and constraints.
For Defense Technology Startups:
Focus relentlessly on understanding actual operational requirements rather than building technology in search of a problem. Engage directly with military end-users whenever possible, even before formal procurement processes begin. Invest early in understanding security requirements, manufacturing scalability, and compliance obligations; these non-technical challenges kill more promising technologies than technical failures. Consider that the most successful defense tech companies often hire former military operators and acquisition professionals to bridge the cultural and procedural gaps between commercial technology development and defense procurement.
For Government Acquisition Professionals:
Champion reforms within your sphere of control rather than waiting for top-down mandates. Leverage existing authorities like Other Transaction Agreements (OTAs), middle-tier acquisition, and rapid prototyping programs. Document both successes and failures rigorously to build the evidence base for broader reform. Create opportunities for vendors to demonstrate capabilities before formal procurement begins, reducing risk and improving decision quality.
For Investors and Board Members:
Adjust expectations about timeline to revenue for defense technology companies. The path from technology development to sustained defense revenue typically measures in years, not months. However, companies with genuine operational traction, strong military relationships, and clear procurement pathways represent increasingly attractive opportunities as reform momentum builds. Pressure portfolio companies to focus on production readiness and manufacturing scalability alongside technology development; the valley of death often appears between successful prototypes and scaled production rather than between idea and prototype.
For Military Leadership:
Articulate clear, stable demand signals that emerging companies can design toward. Nothing kills innovation faster than granular requirements that change every six months. Simultaneously, create protected spaces for experimentation where failure provides learning rather than career consequences. The most successful military innovation efforts combine clear outcome objectives with flexibility about technical approaches. When technologies prove valuable in pilots or experiments, commit to creating acquisition pathways that allow vendors to scale rather than leaving promising capabilities in perpetual prototype status.
Conclusion: A Sector at the Threshold
The defense technology sector stands at a pivotal moment. The combination of geopolitical pressure, technological opportunity, favorable policy environment, and capital availability creates conditions for transformation. McLintock’s perspective from the talent side of the equation reveals that this transformation extends far beyond hardware and software to encompass organizational culture, career trajectories, and the fundamental relationship between innovation and procurement.
The promise is substantial; faster technology adoption, more effective military capabilities, revitalized defense industrial base, and a sector that attracts rather than repels top talent. The challenges are equally significant: entrenched processes, risk-averse culture, competing stakeholder interests, and the inherent difficulty of changing complex systems.
Success requires action at every level from individual hiring decisions to legislative reform, from startup go-to-market strategies to prime contractor partnership models. McLintock envisions a future where diverse ecosystems and innovative technologies become visible enough to excite the broader public and attract young people into the sector, contributing in various capacities to national security needs.
That excitement must translate into sustained commitment. The tailwinds are favorable, but wind alone doesn’t sail ships; it requires skilled crews, seaworthy vessels, and clear destinations. The defense technology community has all three elements emerging. The question is whether the sector can coordinate its efforts effectively enough to capitalize on this moment before the window closes and favorable conditions shift once again.
For executives navigating this transformation, the path forward demands both boldness and pragmatism; boldness to challenge established processes and pursue new partnerships, pragmatism to focus on genuine capability gaps rather than technological fashion. Those who can balance these competing demands will not only succeed commercially but contribute meaningfully to national security in an increasingly contested era.
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