WT 360: The market from all angles

Latest Episodes:

All about AE Industrial Partners and its GovCon investing approach Nov 15, 2023

Show notes

Aerospace, defense, government services and space represent four key focus areas for the private investment firm AE Industrial Partners and also cover practically all of the government market.

Our guest for this episode in Kirk Konert, a partner at AEI, joined the firm at around the time it started to further scale out its investments in the mid-2010s.

Konert describes to our Ross Wilkers how that approach has evolved, why AEI focuses much of its portfolio on companies that are founder-led and what the firm looks for an investment.

The discussion also includes Konert's observations on what is driving private investment activity across the entire government market landscape, plus the attributes that make for successful leadership teams at companies.

How artificial intelligence can help make better proposals Nov 08, 2023

Show notes

Generative artificial intelligence is all the rage everywhere and those tools are being applied in multiple ways across the market, including in the proposal writing process.

But even with AI's promise, its effectiveness depends on the person using the tool. Which makes AI just like any other tool we have, in that it often comes down to knowing the right questions to ask.

This episode goes over many of those questions with the help of Bruce Feldman, a former senior vice president from Science Applications International Corp. who now monitors AI in his current role as a principal consultant at Lohfeld Consulting.

Feldman tells WT Editor Nick Wakeman that even with his advocacy for using AI and seeing its potential, he also will warn of the shortcomings and risks.

All about how OTA contracts really work Oct 23, 2023

Show notes

Other Transaction Authority contracts have existed for many decades as alternative means for federal agencies to quickly bring in new technologies and systems when the usual acquisition processes will just not cut it.

But the focus on speed puts artificial limits on the promise and potential of what OTAs can do when used correctly, as NSTXL’s founder and chief executive Tim Greeff tells our Ross Wilkers in this episode.

Greeff leads NSTXL in its mission to manage consortia that work with agencies when they decide to run OTA processes, many of which are being used for programs of increasing size.

How OTAs work and what agencies are using for are focal points of the conversation that also has the backdrop of near-peer competitions for new technologies, and not just of the international type.

Budget disconnects and opportunities define today's federal market landscape Oct 10, 2023

Show notes

The prospect of a government shutdown is far from the only budgetary headwind that agencies and contractors alike have to navigate, but it is the one that causes more anxiety than any other.

Funding delays and protracted procurement cycles are also facts of life in the market that are the starting point for this episode featuring John Caucis and James Wichert, public sector analysts at the market intelligence firm Technology Business Research.

Caucis and Wichert take our Ross Wilkers through how in one sense the work goes on and the budget environment looks promising for contractors on the surface, but that other factors get in the way of a more ideal picture.

Also on their agenda: the competition for tech talent, merger-and-acquisition highlights, leadership transitions at some of the largest companies and what the federal market's cloud computing landscape looks like today.

RTX Ventures casts its net wide and far across an expanding tech ecosystem Sep 18, 2023

Show notes

More startup tech companies and investors are looking to enter the defense industrial base, which RTX is one of the largest members of and pushing to expand through its venture capital arm.

How this blue chip aerospace-and-defense hardware giant is taking on the role of business and technology scouting hat is the focus of this episode featuring Dan Ateya, president and managing director of RTX Ventures.

The former Raytheon Co. was a player in the venture game before its merger with United Technologies to create RTX in 2020. But as Ateya explained to our Ross Wilkers, RTX formalized the venture fund as a means to link the corporation's own innovation agenda with the Defense Department's critical technology priorities.

Also on the agenda for this conversation: what happens after RTX Ventures invests in a company, why the overall innovation and investment ecosystem is growing, and Ateya's advice for how to connect with the ventures team.

For Lockheed's ventures team, its investments are merely step one Sep 05, 2023

Show notes

The world's largest defense company also takes on the role of scout through its venture capital organization, which searches for technologies and businesses whose creations are of promise to customers and the industry.

But those investments are just the first step in what Lockheed Martin and those companies are looking to achieve together as explained in this episode by Chris Moran, executive director and general manager of Lockheed Martin Ventures.

What happens after the capital is committed from the fund? Moran tells our Ross Wilkers that the post-investment relationship has been a focus area for the ventures team with new staff on-board after the fund doubled in size one year ago.

How does the startup ecosystem that Lockheed Martin Ventures taps into really operate? Moran saw it up-close during his time as a Silicon Valley executive and leans on that experience in his answer, which also includes perspective on why more startups are entering the defense market.

All about Amentum's tech strategy and 2 key legs of it Aug 28, 2023

Show notes

Amentum's identity as an engineering and technical services provider naturally places the company at the front end of many large-scale efforts by government customers to incorporate new technologies.

Where the federal government's second-largest services provider is concentrating its time and resources in technology is the focus of this episode featuring Jill Bruning -- president of Amentum's engineering science and technology group.

Bruning explains to our Ross Wilkers that much of Amentum's tech focus centers on the front end: so think of work like research, development and testing of advanced systems.

The conversation also works its way to hypersonics and counter-unmanned aerial systems, two areas that Bruning sees as being like most technologies: on an accelerated development cycle that means today's inventions can often get quickly outpaced by tomorrow's.

People are at the center of all cyber talk Aug 21, 2023

Show notes

Cybersecurity started to evolve into an enabling technology area more than a decade ago, which means today it is in the core of what government technology companies do for federal agencies.

Dr. Sarbari Gupta founded Electrosoft in 2001 to focus on helping agencies with their own postures in cyber, the evolution of which she describes in this episode that also goes over what the government is asking of industry in today's cyber landscape.

Gupta explains to our Ross Wilkers how companies such as hers have carried out their own cyber practices and cultures amid the emergence of standards like CMMC as the final rule is in-the-works for that particular program.

She also shares her lessons learned along the way on growth, entrepreneurship and industry teaming as a small business founder.

Click here to watch Gupta's Ted Talk that was discussed in this episode.

IBM's blueprint for making a bigger impact across public sector Aug 07, 2023

Show notes

IBM showed its prioritization of public sector and federal markets through its $1.2 billion acquisition of Octo Consulting, which closed in the spring and is the largest such transaction in the history of Big Blue's consulting business.

This episode features an update on the integration and where that combination fits into IBM's larger, global vision for itself. The guests are Susan Wedge, managing partner for the U.S. public and federal market at IBM Consulting; and Mark Johnson, vice president of technology for the U.S. federal market at IBM.

One way IBM characterizes that vision is in its push to make a bigger impact for its clients, including those in U.S. government. Wedge and Johnson explain to our Ross Wilkers what that means and how they see the combined IBM-and-Octo team contributing to Big Blue's larger strategy and vision that centers around artificial intelligence and hybrid cloud computing.

IBM ranked at spot No. 28 on our 2023 Top 100.

What 2023's economy means for GovCon Jul 26, 2023

Show notes

Some truth exists in the often-repeated statement that the government market has some resilience to pressures from the global economy, but companies do still have to deal with them.

How contractors are navigating a world of inflation and higher interest rates is the launch pad of this episode featuring Ruth Ann Clark, managing director for aerospace, defense and government services at JPMorgan Chase Commercial Banking; and Don Irwin, managing director and banker team leader at J.P. Morgan Private Bank.

Unlike other markets, GovCon has the unique fabric of how its singular customer set buys and adopts technology and that shapes how companies position themselves to win contracts.

Clark and Irwin share with our Ross Wilkers their perspectives on how companies are deciding which tech domains to focus on, plus where the middle-tier contractor fits in today's market landscape that often looks like a barbell shape between small businesses and large multibillion-dollar corporations.