, a Ministry of Defence unit that finds and funds new technologies, was"much more nimble and more able to bring companies in quickly into the defense supply chain and to work more dynamically." The development of defense AI needs this kind of support in the UK, Kinniburgh said.the first two SMEs to receive funding through its Defence Technology Exploitation Programme.
Kinniburgh said:"The way that the market is structured at the moment is the big companies tend to grab the big lumps of money, and the little bits that fall from the table are where the SMEs kick in. [There are] a number of SMEs who are doing some really innovative things, and that's where DASA comes in."
However, he pointed out that the frontline commands of the Navy, Army, Royal Air Force, and UK Strategic Command have their own innovation units, which are"largely impenetrable" to SMEs. "They don't seem to have a front door, and that's a great concern for me. The frontline commands are not spending huge amounts of money, but they're spending significant bits of money in AI and other kinds of leading-edge technologies, and the SMEs can't get in there," Kinniburgh told the House of Lords Committee. ®