ACCELERATING COAST GUARD INNOVATION Providing mission support at the speed of need BY EDWARD LUNDQUIST
The U.S. Coast Guard Strategic Plan 2018-2022 states that the service will “strive to lower the barriers to innovation, including programmatic stovepipes, and recognize that smart failures in low-risk venues in the short term often yield lessons-learned that lead to longterm organizational success.” To deliver the support at the “speed of need,” the Strategic Plan calls for the service to “encourage and reward our workforce for developing innovative ways to increase delivery speed and efficiency of mission support functions” noting that “innovation requires smart risk taking.” According to the Strategic Plan, the Coast Guard brings enduring value to the nation and must adapt to the changing character of maritime operations. “To remain at the cutting edge, we will: foster a culture of experimentation and encourage acceptance of warranted risk to affect change; challenge our workforce to evolve and improve long-standing processes and operational constructs; and strengthen service innovation initiatives and accelerate the process of moving the best ideas to service-wide implementation.” Wendy Chaves is the Coast Guard’s chief of RDT&E and Innovation, which stands for research, development, test, and evaluation, as well as the more recent addition: innovation. “The Strategic Plan emphasizes emerging technology and innovation – RDT&E and innovation all work together. They’re all important to the future success of the service,” she said. That’s why the Coast Guard is taking major steps to accelerate innovation, including the establishment of the Blue Technology Center of Expertise (BTCOE); integration with the Defense Innovation Unit (DIU); leveraging its Research and Development Center (RDC); and partnering with the Department of Homeland Security Science and Technology Directorate (DHS S&T), to include the Science and Technology Innovation Center (STIC) and participation with the Silicon Valley Innovation Program (SVIP).
La Jolla, California, to increase the service’s awareness of emerging technologies. Blue technology includes technology that supports maritime domain awareness (MDA), search and rescue, emergency response, maritime law enforcement, and protection of the marine environment. Chaves said the BTCOE’s job is to educate academia, industry, and nonprofits that make up the innovation ecosystem about what the Coast Guard does and how it does it, and what the Coast Guard’s needs are – the gaps and challenges – so they have a better understanding of how they might be able to help. “We want them to better understand what our needs are, and we want to better understand what technology is out there that we could potentially leverage,” Chaves said. At the same time, the BTCOE is essentially a tech scouting arm for the Coast Guard. “They learn about the technologies that are out there that have potential applicability to the Coast Guard, and educate Coast Guard members on what those are so we might possibly leverage them,” Chaves said. “We foster and facilitate that discussion. We’re one of the conduits to help the tech sector to get their technology out to the Coast Guard,” said Peter Vandeventer, a program manager at the BTCOE. “The BTCOE is an avenue for industry to talk to us to share their information.” “We have a great partnership with Scripps Institution of Oceanography,” said Jennifer Ibaven, also a program manager at BTCOE. “Scripps has opened the door to their blue tech and academic partners within the Scripps Corporate Alliance. Now we have to let our stakeholders know we’re here, and what we can do for them.” U.S. Coast Guard Vice Commandant Adm. Charles W. Ray recently remarked during the virtual Blue Tech Week that the blue tech community is a “key enabler” and said, “As we look to work smarter, as we work to leverage technology … the blue tech community is a group that allows us to do that.”
BLUE TECHNOLOGY CENTER OF EXPERTISE
DEFENSE INNOVATION UNIT
The Coast Guard recently established the BTCOE at Scripps Institution of Oceanography at UC San Diego in
Chaves said the Coast Guard stood up a detachment this past summer at the DIU, which is a Department of
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Coast Guard OUTLOOK
