NUWC Newport ‘hacks’ for innovation

NEWPORT – Inventors, innovators and problem solvers from the Naval Undersea Warfare Center division participated in a “Hacking for Undersea Technical Excellence” event recently to inaugurate a new rapid innovation center.

The innovation center, designed as a place to encourage innovation and creative thinking, was organized by NUWC’s chief technology office with assistance from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Innovation Initiative.

Thirty-five scientists, technicians, engineers and mathematicians from various NUWC Newport departments generated ideas in response to four undersea technology challenges: submarine stealth, platform design, payload technology and sailors’ quality of life.

From the dozens of ideas presented by individuals during the forum, five were selected by the group for further team exploration and development.

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The teams also had access to senior warfare center mentors and active duty Navy personnel with extensive fleet experience. Over two days, ideas grew into four-minute pitches to the entire group and a panel of evaluators who judged the results on criteria including teamwork, prototyping, creativity, effectiveness, future plans, communication and whether or not challenge areas were properly addressed.

The innovation center was designed to provide an opportunity to give participants experience with a new set of innovation tools at NUWC.

“While generation of actual, workable and applicable technological solutions to the challenges could be the final result of the rapid innovation center event, it was not a necessary result for the event to be judged a success,” a press release from the NUWC said.

George McNamara, the chief technology office’s chief development officer and an organizer of the event, said in a statement, “We are being challenged by technology around the world. We need to think about things in new ways and in order that we can continue provide the same level of success that NUWC has always provided.”

The ideas have been posted on NUWC’s internal website for further evaluation by NUWC’s entire federal workforce using crowdsourcing tools. The number of projects will be narrowed and focus refined for further development over the next several weeks. From there, each will be evaluated for real world potential and possible funding for development.

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