About
Seven microelectronics firms received nearly $10 million in combined funding to commercialize technologies of interest to the U.S. military services as winners of the Defense Business Accelerator (DBX) Microelectronics Challenge. This groundbreaking initiative is funded by the Department of Defense (DoD) and led by the U.S. Partnership for Assured Electronics (USPAE).
The challenge aims to revolutionize how the DoD drives the development of dual-use technology, which can be used for both civilian and military applications. The challenge is testing the hypothesis that the DoD can accelerate growth of a robust domestic industrial base by focusing its resources on commercialization of early-stage, hardware-intensive technologies and then scaling them into resilient businesses in partnership with private capital.
Within just a ten-week period, the DBX effort solicited 279 microelectronics entries, selected 25 finalists who pitched to investors and industry experts, chose seven awardees to receive a total of $9.6 million, had contracts signed within an hour of award and transferred award money to their banks within 48 hours. This resulted in USPAE and the DBX program being cited in The National Defense Strategy: June 2024 Interim Implementation Report as an example of “Flexible Acquisition.”