agile, bmnt, business model, corporate innovation, customer development,dod,nsa, diux, h4d, hacking for defense, lean, lean launchpad, lean startup, stanford, steve blank

1. Skynet
Sam Gussman (creative generalist), Alvin Goh (hacker), Olga Musayev (project development),
Kevin Mott (project manager)
Liaisons/Mentors: Steve Behmer, Ryan Blake, Wayne Chen
# Interviewed this week: 10
6 Users, 4 Experts
# interviewed total: 63
# Total Blog Followers: 1
Developing autonomous drones for situational
awareness. Helping prevent battlefield fatalities by
pinpointing friendly and enemy positions.

2. Customer Discovery
Hypotheses Results Actions
Recognizing objects then
classifying into
enemy/friendly/civilian is
possible with computer vision
technology today
Interviews, research,
talking to experts
Validated. However, recognizing
details of people sufficient to
determine gender/age/threat-level
is difficult, and may not result in
high confidence
Focus on just recognizing people first.
Classification into enemy/civilian can
come later. Classification should also
come as likelihood, rather than
categorization
Acquisition: there are existing
S&T and SBIR proposals that we
can use to get money from
SOCOM today
FedBizOps, socom.mil
website, interviews
No relevant and current SOCOM
topics found on fedbizops, but
several non-SOCOM. Socom.mil
website has S&T topics that could fit.
Search through past USSOCOM SBIR
awards shows interest in tagging
and identifying individuals.
Do more research on past SBIR and S&T
proposals and examine reasons for
success/failure. Keep looking for
applicable BAAs. Contact RRTO and CTTO.
Border Patrol is a potential
beneficiary
Interview, research Partially validated. Would be more
effective on the eastern border
(Arizona and Texas) where the
terrain is flatter.
Interview people at RRTO, CTTO, CTO, etc.
to see if we can work with them
Experiments
We can achieve the level of
confidence required for
identification
Interviews, research None yet Validate hypothesis with more interviews
Next Week:

3. Get/Keep/Grow Diagram
Awareness
S&TorSBIR
acquisition
Joint
Programof
Record
Up-sell
Unbundling
Adoptionby
otherAgencies
Become Program of Record
Keep Customers

4. Get / Keep / Grow
Get
Strategy: Awareness, Excitement, Pressure on Management, Acquisition through S&T or
SBIR process
Tactics: Demo days, industry days, company nights, technical experimentation events,
yearly conference, quarterly exercises, cold calling, referrals by network, hackathons, focus
on Tier 1 Units (e.g. JSOC) and echelon 1 PMs
- Both operators and PMs
Keep
Strategy: Become program of record, training and support
Tactics: Take steps to become program of record, maintenance program & warranty,
quality customer support, youtube training videos “How to do X in 5 mins”
Grow
Strategy: Get adopted by other agencies, upsell, develop dual use
Tactics: Unbundle from ATAK, develop new interfaces (AR), upgrade to object
classification, partner w/ traditional vendors and manufacturers, become joint program of
record, work with CTTO, RTTO and other agencies,

5. MVP 1.0
https://youtu.be/V1I8rcmAJus

6. Mission Model Canvas
- Fly autonomously on route
- Object detection,
recognition, classification
- Identifying and tracking
friendlies, enemies, civilians
- Integration with ATAK
- SOF (green beret, ranger,
SEALS)
- SOCOM, RRTO, CTTSO,
JCTD, CTO
- Programmable drone
manufacturers (eg: Solo)
- ATAK Program
- Neurala (or other computer
vision firm)
-Kespry
-Stanford Computer Vision
Lab
Tactical operators - SOF
(SF, Ranger, SEALS,
MARSOC/Recon, drone
operators)
Private sector and academic
partners (Neurala, drone
manufacturer, Stanford lab)
ATAK Program Manager
SOCOM Small UAV
S&T/Acquisition Program
Managers
Dual Use: Border Patrol
- Keep track of friendly,
potential hostile and neutral
actors/equipment
automatically
- New contracts and revenue
streams
- Opportunities for tech
development
-Added value to current
program/technology
-Cost effective, agile and
quick method of filling
capability gaps
- Low-cost detection of
movement and people at
border
-Improved situational awareness for small units in combat
-reduce workload for tactical operators and feed-monitoring operators
-decrease strain on other traditional aerial assets
Demo days, technical
experimentation
conferences, etc.
S&T or SBIR Process,
depending on level of
prototype
“How to” youtube videos,
customer support
Fixed:
- Equipment - drones, development toolkits
- Software design & engineering
Variable:
- Costs of maintenance, updates, and training
-Demonstrate utility- gain
support from senior personnel
-Show opportunities for new
revenue streams
-Add utility to current program
of record to increase adoption
-Provide low cost product
with new capability filling gap
Saboteur - competition within
SOCOM PMs
Beneficiaries
Mission AchievementMission Budget/Costs
Buy-In/Support
Deployment
Value PropositionKey Activities
Key Resources
Key Partners
- Programmable Drone
- Computer vision SDK
- ATAK API + source code
__= New

7. SkyNet: Value Proposition Canvas
- Image recognition software
applied on video feed
- Aerial perspective
- Hi-def camera
- Flexible deployment
Monitor the border
and respond to
emergencies, aliens
and complaints
Customer
Jobs
- border area is too large,
unable to ensure full coverage
- Impossible to look at the whole
border 24/7
- Limited aerial assets
Border Patrol
Gains
Pains
Gain
Creators
Pain
Relievers
- Survey more area without needing
more men
- Increased awareness when
entering situations
- utilize low-cost drone
swarm to increase border
coverage
- distributed autonomous
drones ensure high refresh
rate across the whole border
Products
& Services
Drone with visual
recognition
software

8. SkyNet: Value Proposition Canvas
- Knowing the locations of
friends/enemies/civilians
- Reduced ambiguity
- autonomous assessment of
aerial perspectives and video
feed Customer
Jobs
Shoot bad
guys without
getting shot
- Cognitive overload from
existing tools
-Manpower losses
- Hassle of systems not
communicating
SOF Elements (combat)
Gains
Pains
Gain
Creators
Pain
Relievers
-Increased situational awareness on
the battlefield
- Reconnaissance of
inaccessible places
- Integrate with current
systems that soldiers are
familiar with
- Frees up another soldier
Products
& Services
Situationally aware
drone with visual
interface

9. SkyNet: Value Proposition Canvas
- Automatic patrol
- Facial Recognition of people
identified in vicinity
- Automatic threat detection
to flag security threats
Customer
Jobs
Force protection
Day-to-day security patrols
are manpower intensive
Difficult to be always aware of
surroundings
SOF Elements (non-combat)
Gains
Pains
Gain
Creators
Pain
Relievers
- Reliable 24/7 Security Awareness
- Knowing who lives around you, and
who doesn’t
- Ability to respond quickly
to threats
- Swarms of drones can
replace patrol units
-24/7 situation awareness of
surroundings
Products
& Services
Situationally aware
autonomous
drones

10. SkyNet: Value Proposition Canvas
- Access into SOCOM
acquisitions
- building company’s
presence in military
Customer
Jobs
Make more money
Build customer
relationships
- Difficult to get large
contracts, technology still
maturing, only have limited
consumer market share
Commercial Partners
Gains
Pains
Gain
Creators
Pain
Relievers
-New revenue stream
-Potential long term partnership
- Contracts with military,
willing and eager to adopt
new technology (early
adopters) even if tech is not
fully matured
Products
& Services
Partnership /
contract

11. SkyNet: Value Proposition Canvas
- Integrating drone camera
feed enhanced with image
recognition
- augmenting ATAK interface
with image processing Customer
Jobs
Manage ATAK
System under
cost
- Proprietary technology
that does not talk to other
tech
- low adoption rate, ‘fancy new toy’
that’s not used much
ATAK Project Manager
Gains
Pains
Gain
Creators
Pain
Relievers
-Increased value to ATAK program
- Easy integration with ATAK
- Promote culture of open-
source
- improving receptiveness to
ATAK
Products
& Services
Autonomous drone
with live video feed
integrated with
ATAK

12. SkyNet: Value Proposition Canvas
-Image recognition software
first of its kind in the military
- tool could potentially be
applied across platforms (as
a software plugin) Customer
Jobs
Manage Programs
Fill gaps
- Tech is new and recognition
of potential enemy may trigger
blowback
- new technology always too expensive,
sometimes they don’t get used after
purchasing
SOCOM Small UAS PM
Gains
Pains
Gain
Creators
Pain
Relievers
- Provides new tool that existing
programs don’t provide
- Potential to scale
-Retain man-in-the-loop, test
software during training
stateside and slowly scale to
overseas.
- Maintain low costs by
utilizing COTS, consistently
engage user feedback at all
stages of development.
Products
& Services
COTS Drone with
visual recognition
software