An increasing number of technology workers in Rhode Island spend their days creating new technologies for the U.S. military and law enforcement agencies on all levels, as the defense and homeland security industries continue to boom in the aftermath of 9/11.
“They’re looking for unique technologies that can help them meet their mission requirements,” said John Riendeau, defense industry specialist for the R.I. Economic Development Corporation.
About 22 percent of all scientists, technicians and engineers in Rhode Island worked directly in the defense industry last year, and nearly half of all technology professionals in the state were involved in at least some defense-related work, according to an economic impact report released by the EDC last August.
Much of the state’s defense-related technology work is concentrated in undersea technology and surface surveillance technology, emanating from the Naval Undersea Warfare Center (NUWC) and the Naval War College in Newport, and their numerous private and academic partners.
Rhode Island’s position as the nation’s leading hub for undersea warfare technology was cemented by the U.S. Base Realignment and Closure Act of 2005, when the U.S. Department of Defense decided to maintain or grow its military programs in Newport despite closing bases in other states, Riendeau said.
Evidence that the federal government is seeking to do business with technology firms in Rhode Island came June 14 in the form of a visit by retired Adm. Jay M. Cohen, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s undersecretary for science and technology, who was the keynote speaker at the third annual Rhode Island Defense & Oceanography Day at the University of Rhode Island Graduate School of Oceanography.
Speaking to a gathering of local technology companies, Cohen said a certain percentage of his budget is set aside for essentially gambling on new technologies. He described in detail the types of applications that DHS hopes to develop, and he issued an open invitation to contact his staff with ideas and sales pitches.
“I’m open for business,” Cohen told the group.
Both long-established local military contractors and smaller technology companies new to the industry are seeking to cash in on the increased availability of defense contracts and subcontracts.
“We’re seeing both,” Riendeau said. “We’re seeing the large defense contractors; we’re seeing the small- and medium-sized companies who see an opportunity here and are jumping at it.”
Last week, General Dynamics Corp. announced it would hire up to 200 new workers for its Electric Boat plant at Quonset Point, North Kingstown, which already employs about 2,000 people.
Electric Boat needs to hire more workers as a result of the passage of next year’s defense budget, which doubles production of the company’s Virginia-class submarines from one per year to two, according to Mary Crisostomi, an EB spokeswoman.
In May, Warren-based TPI Composites Inc. unveiled its new generation of truck cabs for the U.S. Army’s tactical wheeled vehicles. The company, which specializes in fabricating large composite structures, started out in boat-building, but pushed into the defense industry a few years ago when it won its first contract to improve the design and structure of Humvees, Riendeau said.
Another example of a small technology company that hit pay dirt by creating defense-related applications from its existing technology is Newport-based LiveWave Inc., which was formed in 1999 as an early innovator in video streaming over the Internet.
The company started out creating and installing video camera networks for zoos to monitor animals. But in 2001, LiveWave refocused its technology and began scoring video surveillance contracts from the Department of Defense and U.S. Secret Service, among others. In October 2005, LiveWave was acquired by Smiths Detection, a global security solutions company based in the United Kingdom.
“They started to realize that, ‘Hey, there’s an application here. We can not only watch animals, we can watch other things and distribute it over the Internet,’” Riendeau said. “When people start thinking and talking about, ‘Hey, government needs this and DHS needs that,’ then the entrepreneurial spirit takes over.”
