Today they provide critical functions in air bags, virtual-reality animation, gaming systems like the Wii and Kinect, ink-jet printers, smartphones, tablets, and high-definition TVs. military used them in systems that tracked soldiers inside buildings, armed torpedoes, detected biological weapons, and improved avionics. In the early 1990s, DARPA broke new ground in devices that combine sensors, actuators, and electronics on a chip. Photography: Courtesy of DARPA Motion-Sensing Micromachines Such independence allows the organization to move fast and take bold risks, and helps it persuade the best and the brightest to join it. Its model also challenges assumptions about how personnel are hired, and how contracting and intellectual property are managed. Independence.īy charter, DARPA has autonomy in selecting and executing projects. They are led by about 100 technical managers who have been brought in for fixed terms. Temporary project teams.ĭARPA contracts world-class experts from industry and academia to work on projects with relatively short durations. Projects are designed to push the boundaries of science to solve urgent real-world problems or create new opportunities. The model has three critical, mutually reinforcing elements: Ambitious goals. In this article, two former DARPA leaders who now head an advanced research group at Google decipher the DARPA model and explain how it can be adapted for the private sector. With its unconventional speed, efficiency, and effectiveness, DARPA has created a “special forces” model of innovation. What makes these accomplishments even more impressive is DARPA’s swiftness (its programs last only three to five years) and relatively tiny organization (about 120 permanent staffers) and modest budget (about $3 billion annually for roughly 200 programs). The agency’s advances are now used in everything from smartphones to sporting equipment to artificial limbs, and it has played a central role in creating a host of multibillion-dollar industries. Over the past 50-plus years, DARPA has produced an unparalleled number of breakthroughs, including the internet, global positioning satellites, stealth technology, MEMS, and carbon composites. The Pentagon’s Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency arguably has the longest-standing track record of radical invention in history.
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