It’s high time for the high-tech sector to support Defense
By Dov S. Zakheim, opinion contributor — 11/26/18 08:30 AM EST
The cultural gap between the tech world of Silicon Valley, North Carolina’s Research Triangle, Massachusetts Route 128, and Austin, Texas, on the one hand, and the Department of Defense (DOD) on the other, shows no sign of getting any smaller. For years, the proprietors and workers of the non-defense industrial base refused to work with the U.S. government in general, and DOD in particular.
Company managers and boards felt that their access to worldwide markets, notably in China, far outweighed whatever benefits of selling to DOD might offer. And those benefits have been perceived as few and far between. Profit margins rarely exceed 8 percent, while DOD usually claims intellectual property rights so that it can compete any given product among multiple suppliers.
https://thehill.com/opinion/technology/418094-its-high-time-for-the-high-tech-sector-to-support-defense
