From the Lab to the Marketplace: MITRE Licenses Innovations, Spurs Economic Growth

Half of Saudi Arabia’s oil production was halted by enemy drone strikes in 2019. The attacks were unprecedented and largely preventable. Workers on the ground noticed the unusual aerial activity, but had no way to report it. 

As malicious drone activity continued to escalate worldwide, the military tapped MITRE to address the detection challenge. We responded with CARPE Dronvm, a smart phone app that uses AI to enable users to rapidly identify suspicious drone activity. 

The app's lifecycle didn't end with military deployment. Last fall, MITRE's Technology Transfer Office (TTO) licensed the technology to AeroParagon, a drone defense firm. CARPE Dronvm's commercialization is slated to amplify its impact and be a boon for the broader security industry.

The value of our technology transfer activities is far-reaching, says Barry Costa, director of MITRE's TTO. MITRE licensed over 200 innovative technologies to more than 800 businesses across the nation in the last 10 years. As the operator of FFRDCs, or federally funded research and development centers, it's part of our charge to share technology with industry. 

"Commercial companies can leverage MITRE's innovations to create products needed by our sponsors and industry—from cybersecurity to defense to aviation and healthcare and more," Costa explains. 

The Gift of Economic Impact that Keeps on Giving

All of MITRE's intellectual property (IP) has its own origin story and unique journey to reach the private businesses that eventually license it. Some are developed as part of our independent research program while others are generated in response to specific problems government sponsors bring to us. CARPE Dronvm was a combination of both. 

Despite their individual paths, each innovation is an extension of MITRE's mission to innovate quickly to solve tough problems and then transfer the results to sponsors and often industry, who can bring it to market. Our licensing efforts have a ripple effect on the nation's well-being, leading to more jobs and greater economic growth. 

"The end goal is to promote our national security and foster economic development by working with startups and large companies alike," Costa says, detailing the regional economic impact our IP has recently had in Arkansas, South Carolina, Texas, and Florida.

"The objective is for companies to take the technology we've created and make it into market- ready products," says Debi Davis, licensing and IP principal. She shared some noteworthy examples of the unique ways our IP is making its way out of the lab and into the marketplace. 

Breathing New Life into Government IP

Serial entrepreneur, Herbert Drayton III, founded his South Carolina-based venture capital firm, Hi Mark Capital, to target high-growth markets with scalable solutions. His model flips the proverbial VC script by unearthing business ideas first, then mobilizing his network to find and mentor entrepreneurs to execute them as viable enterprises. Two recent ideas stem from a set of MITRE technologies he licensed last year. 

"Now We’re Talking" is a platform promoting positive personal communications that could save relationships, and maybe lives, among people in high-stress jobs. The desktop program was developed in our independent research program to help veterans contextualize and improve their personal relationships after deployment. 

Drayton teamed up with a Charleston-based psychologist to upgrade and tailor the technology to primarily serve first responders. Rebranded as Haruki (Japanese for resilience), the platform's new iteration is designed to preemptively train users with techniques on how to respond to stressful scenarios they may encounter on the job. 

"If we're engaging with veterans, and in our case first responders, before they're deployed to help them understand the dynamics of their relationships, that has a direct impact on readiness," Drayton says. "These tools support their gainful employment moving forward."

Hi Mark also licensed MITRE FOIA Assistant™, which uses AI to help Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) analysts handle growing volumes of requests more efficiently and effectively. For that effort, Drayton tapped a group of entrepreneurs to advance the tool and target federal, state, and local agencies subject to FOIA requests. 

"With a reputable company like MITRE, we know exactly the problem we're solving, why the problem needs to be solved, and, additionally, the impact of the solution," Drayton says.

Community Building in the Sweet Spot Between Government and Industry

Former MITRE employees Lane Patterson and Joe Comizio now run a venture studio, Highway Ventures, whose mission is moving federal lab technology into the marketplace through "impact investing." They’re working closely with our tech transfer office to make that happen.