The annual TechNet Augusta conference welcomed thousands of military and GovCon experts to discuss challenges and potential solutions related to cybersecurity, procurement, and Defense Department missions. Hosted by AFCEA International, with assistance from the U.S. Army Cyber Center of Excellence, the event fosters communication between the defense and commercial sectors.
Members of U.S. Army Cyber Command, the Army Cyber Center of Excellence, program executive offices, the Army chief information officer, G6 offices, cyber components, and academia gathered at Georgia’s Augusta Marriott at the Convention Center from Aug. 18-21. This year’s theme was “Non-Kinetic Dominance in Multi-Domain Operations,” and more than 200 vendors showcased their latest and greatest in the exhibit hall.
Procurement Proposals
Lt. Gen. Maria Barrett addresses how solutions need to work at the tactical edge. Credit: FedTech Magazine
Defense Department Secretary Pete Hegseth’s Army Transformation Initiative is driving DoD to streamline acquisition. Lt. Gen. Maria Barrett, commanding general of Army Cyber Command (ARCYBER), said that means emphasizing off-the-shelf capabilities over custom ones.
“The biggest opportunities that I see are from a modularity and platform independence standpoint,” Barrett said. “Our approach is to use shared frameworks and APIs in order to have cyber and [electronic warfare] effects be able to talk to each other.”
Still, solutions from industry must work at the tactical edge, especially in less-than-optimal environments, she added. “Don’t try to take an enterprise solution and then really try to do cheetah flips to make it work at the edge,” Barrett added. “Start with designing for that contestation when you’re building it.”
Additionally, the Army is readying a new e-commerce platform for buying radios. Dubbed Common Hardware Software Solutions Tactical Radios, the model is still in the concept stage. To be part of the catalog, government contractors will have to get products, such as software, hardware, and lifecycle management tools, approved for compliance with DoD standards. Units will be able to browse the e-catalog and order what they need, said Maj. Dominic Adams, a requirements development branch chief at Army Futures Command (AFC).
“Speed at pace with the development of industry is the idea,” commented Adams.
An increased focus on software modernization by the Trump administration has led the Defense Information Systems Agency (DISA) to examine the expansion of the Joint Enterprise Licensing Agreement (JELA) contracting vehicle. The decade-old vehicle consolidates software contracts into one agreement. For instance, if more than one branch contracts with a government contractor for a service, JELA puts those agreements together into one.
Next-gen Technology in Use Today
Unsurprisingly, artificial intelligence was a hot topic at the conference. ARCYBER is conducting several cybersecurity-related AI pilot tests, including AI assistants, agentic AI, and human/machine teaming.
As part of the testing, the Army is sending ARCYBER and 11th Cyber Battalion red teams into real-world events. They’re using a new tool called GHOSTCREW that uses AI to predict attack vectors and recommend responses, but humans make the final decision on action.
That aligns with the vision of Brandon Pugh, an Army reservist who is the Army’s principal cyber adviser. He said that the service must use AI for cybersecurity at the operational, not just enterprise, level. Pointing to existing AI efforts such as ARCYBER’s, Pugh said, “How do we take what they’re doing now and amplify that and continue to invest in it? I think that’s key.”
To encourage innovation and collaboration, Army units will open in December the Lt. Gen. James M. Gavin Joint Innovation Outpost in Fort Bragg, North Carolina, as a space where members of the military, GovCon, and academia can brainstorm on ways they can work together.
Meanwhile, AFC is making progress with the development of Next Generation Command and Control, which shifts from network-centric command-and-control posts to data-centric ones. Now in its prototyping phase, team members are soliciting feedback from warfighters about what they need.
“We’re going to continuously evolve the software, because this is a data-centric thing,” said Brig. Gen. Michael Kaloostian, director of the Command and Control Cross-Functional Team for AFC. “We are evolving the data layer. We’re going to add in more capability. We’re going to add more front-facing applications to replace those warfighting functions. That’s where we’re going; that’s the difference.”
Top-of-Mind Tech
Maj. Nelson Godbolt discusses bolstering U.S. capabilities in electromagnetic warfare. Credit: AFCEA/Michael Carpenter Photography
Bolstering U.S. capabilities in electromagnetic warfare (EW) was another major talking point at this year’s conference. Maj. Nelson Godbolt, senior instructor at the U.S. Army Cyber School, said it stems from Russia’s yearslong claims to the electromagnetic spectrum (EMS).
The United States is behind on using and securing EW because it focused on other areas, he said. Although the Army is starting to deploy EW platoons, Russia’s battalion tactic groups on the front lines in the war with Ukraine have about 300 pieces of equipment: including handheld devices, drones, and defense systems. The Russian military also has counter-radar, long-range counter-positioning, navigation and timing, and counter-synthetic aperture radar systems, highlighting how it combines kinetic and non-kinetic war.
“We’re in a resource-constrained Army right now,” Godbolt said. “Budgets are not expanding, but the Army is investing in increased [command and control] because it gets that our legacy systems that have been out there for decades, our adversaries invested against them. It sees that in Russia and Ukraine, and understands that [Army] has to invest in it, or else the same thing that the Russians and Ukrainians are doing to each other could be done to us.”
The defense space is always fascinating to watch because things change so quickly. We can’t wait to see what has evolved by the time TechNet Augusta 2026 comes around!