Silicon Valley

TAKEAWAY: Silicon Valley

AUDIENCE MEMBER:
Going back to your points on AI and some of the divisiveness, would you say that the big Silicon Valley tech companies could do more to help or work with the defense industry?

NOVAKOVIC: 
Yes, and I’m frankly alarmed when I see some companies to whom much is given not want to work with the US government. Who do they think provides them this freedom? Where do they think the platform for their technology innovation comes? It comes from the security and stability of this nation. So I find, as an American, that a little troubling.  

That said, there are real opportunities for cooperation, and many of those companies do cooperate. And we have set—and as I know Raytheon has—established some strategic alliances with many of what the Defense Department calls non-traditional suppliers. We’re always looking for people with smarter or better ways to do things.  

I actually have a business in Silicon Valley. And it’s sometimes a little bit challenging to get the workforce there, because we’re competing with some really high-end companies in that regard. But I think it’s our jobs, as we were talking about earlier, to canvass throughout the United States and take that rich body of research that we produce as a nation every year and figure out how we can make that work to the benefit of our national security.