Silicon Valley and the U.S. Government

Bill Perry was the 19th US Secretary of Defense, serving under Bill Clinton. Prior to this role, Secretary Perry was also Deputy Secretary of Defense and Under Secretary of Defense for Research and Engineering, as well as the founder of a Silicon Valley electronics firm. Currently, Secretary Perry is a professor at Stanford, and advocates for the elimination of nuclear weapons through the Nuclear Threat Initiative and the William J. Perry Project. In this video, teaching assistant Michael Piech interviews Secretary Perry on his experiences attempting to reduce the size of the military in the post-Cold War era, as well as his attempts to reform the Defense acquisitions process, and open up the supply-chain to smaller firms and commercial “off-the-shelf” sources, as opposed to defense contractors. Further, Secretary Perry shares his outlook on the contemporary political landscape, outlining some of the major threats to the national security of the U.S.

Bill Crowell is the Former Deputy Director of National Security Agency (NSA) and Chairman of the Director of National Intelligence (DNI) Senior Advisory Group. In this video, lecturer Ernestine Fu interviews Bill Crowell on the NSA’s approach to security during the emergence of digital communications technologies, and the ways in which advancements in communications technology have provided new and interesting logistical challenges for the organization. Further, Crowell describes his work as a venture capitalist, helping to connect entrepreneurs working in the security field with the U.S. government.

Gilman Louie is a venture capitalist and the founder and former CEO of In-Q-Tel, a strategic venture fund created to help enhance national security by connecting the Central Intelligence Agency and U.S. intelligence community with venture-backed entrepreneurial companies. Before In-Q-Tel, Louie was highly active in the interactive entertainment industry, where he founded and ran the company Spectrum HoloByte, where, among other accomplishments, he designed the popular Falcon F-16 flight simulator. He is currently a founding partner of the venture capital firm Alsop Louie Partners. In this video, lecturer Ernestine Fu interviews Louie on the history of In-Q-Tel, the strategic need the venture addressed, as well as the process of building a successful government-industry partnership. Louie also explains the challenges faced when working with classified information, and the process by which In-Q-Tel obscured top secret information while working with industry partners to develop the techno

James Geurts is the Acquisition Executive for U.S. Special Operations Command, based in MacDill Air Force Base, Florida. He is responsible for all special operations forces research, development, acquisition, procurement and logistics. In this talk, Mr. Geurts discusses the manner in which U.S. Special Operations Command procures next generation technology and the initiatives they have undertaken to bridge the divide between the U.S. military and top Silicon Valley talent and technologies.

Mark Hartney is the director of the Office of Strategic Planning at SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, prior to which he served at the Department of Energy as one of the founding program directors of ARPA-E. In this position, he was responsible for selecting and managing technical projects, and defining new research program opportunities. In this video, lecturer Ernestine Fu interviews Hartney on the origins of ARPA-E, and the process by which the agency helped to guide and finance new energy technologies, particularly the types of capital-intensive technologies that would not be sustainable without government support, but represent a pressing public interest.