Government Practice – Selected Products and Services

Technology Scouting to Support Investment Strategy and Decisions

Technology acquisition decisions require quickly obtained in-depth information to assure good decisions and lower the risk of poor ones.  The kind of information to best support mission-critical decisions can only come from fast, accurate current intelligence and in-depth focused analysis.  We specialize in continually assessing the global technology environment so we are always “up to speed” in assessing, and monitoring those technologies that can meet our clients’ strategic objectives, and meet public and military program needs.  Once we report out our information and analysis, we can also monitor chosen technologies on a continuous basis.

The kinds of decisions into which we input include:

  • Acquiring new systems
  • Establishing and managing public-private partnerships
  • Tracking and assessing commercially available technology
  • Upgrade decisions about hardware and software systems
  • Advance views and projections beyond current technology thinking

Our decision support process can offer you any or all of these services:

  • Assessing Current Situations and Future Technology Projections – Intelligence collection and analysis focused on complete understanding of current conditions and future trends applied to specific program needs and Concepts of Operations.  This includes analysis of emerging technologies and their potential application to today’s and future needs, and identifying key forces driving and influencing change in the technology space.  We also project plausible futures and identify potential risks, threats, and opportunities.
  • Identifying and Evaluating Technologies – We find attractive technologies worldwide.  Our experienced sources can identify commercial off the shelf technologies that can be adapted for government use.  We also find emerging technologies that can be applied to systems to help offset limitations, or represent practical technology jumps to offer advantages over current system performance.  We creatively focus on feasible solutions to assure adoptability.  Our approach often finds technologies and adaptations that are outside our clients’ usual areas of focus.
  • Ranking Technologies and Specific Technology Candidates – The decision to select the highest value technologies from a group of candidates is a difficult one.  Our technology ranking process is an objective, systematic approach using economic and other relevant metrics pursuant to mission requirements that makes the highest value choices.  We establish the decision factors upon which to base the ranking using decision-makers and experts within and outside our client organization.  The factors include cost, benefits, availability, verification, risks, and probability of success.
  • Ongoing Technology Monitoring – Full and timely information helps improve decision-making and avoid surprises. We offer monitoring of chosen technologies and events affecting them via regular intelligence reports including the developments in the technologies themselves, government and industry indicators, and risk factors that may arise.

Capability Intelligence for Red Force Technology Surprise

More than ever, it is essential to understand how existing and potential adversaries can use technologies in traditional and asymmetric ways to diminish US capabilities. We identify outlier technologies/capabilities that are advancing, and how these advancements can be used by conventional and irregular Red Forces to disruptively affect key existing and emerging US capabilities.

Open source techniques are used to understand Red Force objectives, likely CONOPS, TPPs (Tactics, Techniques, and Procedures), and applications of technologies that could be used based on culture and other factors. As part of this effort, we can assess Red Force state of the art, where they will be in X years, what milestones they must achieve for them to meet the X year goal, and how these technologies/capabilities could be utilized to threaten key existing or developing US national security capabilities.  Scenarios are then developed for a particular potential adversary, technology/capability and target.

Based on the outcome of these investigations and models, we locate emerging and disruptive technologies that can be used by Blue Forces for “Quick Fixes” to counteract potential Red Force developments and then rank-order these technologies on a dollar for dollar comparative basis for investment purposes.

Strategic Cultural Intelligence

Future conflicts are likely to focus on Irregular Warfare (IW) and Counterinsurgency (COIN) operations.  In this regard, it is essential that our nation be prepared for future regional instability before it occurs by understanding the critical drivers that will cause such instability, and enable preparation to operate in poorly understood environments to better ensure successful outcomes.  Strategic Cultural Intelligence identifies and analyzes the interconnection and complex interplay of the geographic, historical, political, economic, cultural, military, and social drivers that, when combined, help predict how a country, region, group or enterprise is likely to act under external or internal incentives, influences, pressures or opportunities.

We provide our clients with Strategic Cultural Intelligence using our Risk Awareness Intelligence™ process, which focuses on the combination of factors that can negatively impact a strategy, program or plan.  We identify, analyze, and understand known risks.  But most importantly, we use Risk Awareness Intelligence™ to identify and analyze potential risks others do not see or are not thinking about, and future risks likely to affect operational strategy or tactics.  Our findings and recommendations are based on verifiable data.

We apply Risk Awareness Intelligence™ to provide threat and risk assessments, verifiable data, and scenario modeling.  Organizations can then use our findings to identify, evaluate, and manage the risks inherent in a region’s, country’s or enterprise’s changing political, economic, policymaking, and regulatory spaces.  Our sources include in-region current or former industry leaders, recognized public figures, and academics so we provide customized and proactive open source international research and analytical products when others come up empty handed. This approach can be applied to current and potential hot spots in the Middle East, South and Southeast Asia, Africa, and Latin America.

Open Source Intelligence Training

We offer intelligence training and related activities in association with the renowned Intelligence and Security Academy. Training modules can be designed for half day or longer sessions, with in-depth follow on courses.

Modules concentrate on how you first think about what you are being asked to answer – how you formulate the right questions – and how you search for open source intelligence based on your requirements.  We show you how to have a process in place that ensures that you understand exactly what you are being asked for – or even better – that you have a process in place that allows you to anticipate your intelligence needs.

We then focus on tools for collection across each of the intelligence collection disciplines, and discuss analytical methodologies designed to optimize the production of actionable intelligence.  All of this is designed to be customer-based, focusing on the customer’s unique intelligence needs.  Specific modules include:

  • Open Source as All-Source Intelligence
  • Technology Intelligence
  • Risk Awareness Intelligence and Risk Management
  • Creating Actionable Intelligence Products
  • Capability Surprise Analysis

We can also help organizations establish their own in-house Open Source Intelligence capability if that is desired.