DIB Innovators

RADICL
  • 5.0 (1)
  • TECHNOLOGY
  • UPDATED BIWEEKLY

The DIB Innovators podcast celebrates the brilliant minds behind innovation within the Defense Industrial Base. In each episode, host and co-founder of RADICL, David Graff will speak with DIB leaders who are driving technological advancements, championing our nation’s security, and shaping the future of defense technology. Brought to you by RADICL — Cybersecurity-as-a-Service purpose-built for small and mid-sized businesses in the Defense Industrial Base. Starting your CMMC journey? RADICL guides and accelerates your compliance—while reducing ransomware and other cyber risks—with a transparent, turn-key solution. www.radicl.com/cmmc_solved

  1. EP 87 — Galvion's Todd Stirtzinger on the Warfighter Lab That Replaced Self-Reporting with Design Science

    1D AGO

    EP 87 — Galvion's Todd Stirtzinger on the Warfighter Lab That Replaced Self-Reporting with Design Science

    Galvion built a warfighter lab in Portsmouth, NH: a configurable shoot house with high-speed cameras, VR, 3D sound, and a double-PhD cognitive scientist on staff. Elite special operators ran the course with night vision and called their gear perfect, but the data showed they were slower, their muscles tighter, and compensating the entire time without knowing it. That gap between what a trained operator feels and what the science measures is where Galvion makes its design decisions. Todd Stirtzinger also breaks down why open architecture is the reason they win programs, not just a feature. With over 2 million head systems installed across Europe and new US programs now in hand, Todd makes the case that information and decisiveness are becoming as critical as protection on the modern battlefield, and that NATO forces are already moving faster in that direction than North America.  Topics discussed: Building head systems as integrated platforms combining ballistic protection, wearable power delivery, and open architecture compute for dismounted warfighters Replacing operator self-reporting through a warfighter lab using high-speed cameras, VR, and cognitive science measurement Winning U.S. Marine Corps and FBI/DEA programs through user intimacy, iterative trials, and showing customers a clear upgrade path Avoiding vendor lock by building on open system architecture that integrates into existing ecosystems without ownership dependencies Managing intelligent power scavenging and prioritized recharging for digitally connected soldiers carrying increasingly power-hungry equipment Positioning Galvion's value at the decide-and-act layer of the OODA loop where battlefield data must become fast, actionable decisions Shifting warfighter doctrine from maximum ballistic protection toward information superiority, decisiveness, and keeping out of harm's way Accelerating human-machine teaming and robot-soldier integration as the defining capability gap on the future battlefield

    43 min
  2. EP 86 — Firehawk's Will Edwards on Cutting Propellant Production from 60 Days to 6 Hours, No $1B Facility

    FEB 19

    EP 86 — Firehawk's Will Edwards on Cutting Propellant Production from 60 Days to 6 Hours, No $1B Facility

    Will Edwards, CEO & Co-founder of Firehawk walked around defense conferences with what was essentially Lego plastic demonstrating it could become rocket fuel. Everyone laughed until Firehawk proved thermoplastic works as a binder for 3D-printable solid propellant, cutting production from 60 days to 6 hours. The breakthrough came from a failed pivot: they tried selling hybrid rocket engines to disrupt the supply chain, but learned the military won't swap proven systems for new architectures. Success required replicating solid motors exactly, just manufactured differently.  Will also explains why missile startups without propellant production will fail and why comparing defense manufacturing to SpaceX misses the point: primes already produce thousands of complex systems annually, they're just constrained by cast-and-cure physics, not capability.  Topics discussed: Using thermoplastic binders to 3D print solid rocket propellant, cutting production time from 60 days to 6 hours Why hybrid rocket engine disruption failed and success required replicating solid motors with different manufacturing physics instead How traditional cast-and-cure propellant production constrains scale through 5,000-pound batches requiring hundreds of molds before curing Why missile startups without propellant production capacity will fail competing against Northrop and L3Harris manufacturing queues Debunking SpaceX comparisons in defense: primes already produce thousands of systems annually, constrained by physics not capability Scaling from thermoplastic fuel experiments to 200,000 base bleeds annually and 10,000 rockets monthly by 2028 Designing only for systems requiring 300,000+ units annually to ensure meaningful defense production impact at scale Building distributed propellant manufacturing in Europe and Indo-Pacific regions to match Ukraine artillery consumption rates

    43 min
  3. EP 85 — Hermeus' Zach Shore on Building Mach 5 Aircraft & the Path to Reusable Hypersonics

    FEB 13

    EP 85 — Hermeus' Zach Shore on Building Mach 5 Aircraft & the Path to Reusable Hypersonics

    Zach Shore, President of Hermeus, and his team have demonstrated a turbine-based combined cycle engine in a wind tunnel for roughly $20 million. NASA and DARPA spent nine figures on the same architecture. The system uses proprietary modifications to an F100-229 to hit Mach 3, then routes airflow around the cocooned turbine directly into a ramjet to reach Mach 5. Reverse the process to decelerate. The result is reusable air-breathing flight from zero to Mach 5. No rockets required for acceleration or terminal glide on descent. They proved the complete architecture with a GE J85 engine. Now they're scaling to the F100-229 with the ramjet integration coming next. Quarterhorse, their 30,000-pound Mach 2+ aircraft powered by the F100-229, flies from White Sands this year. It's not a test article; it's the first platform with actual utility. Think unmanned F-16 capability stack: electronic warfare, rails for weapons, red air, high-speed target. Darkhorse will hit low Mach 5 before decade's end. Zach walks through why they're building metal airframes with removable panels and modular inlets rather than exotic composites, how they're using proven components like the F-16 landing gear and MiG fuselage design to avoid reinventing solved problems, and why demonstrating incremental capability beats PowerPoint pitches when you're trying to crack into integrated heavy systems programs.  Topics discussed: Demonstrating turbine-based combined cycle engine architecture in wind tunnel for $20M versus NASA/DARPA's nine-figure development  Routing airflow around cocooned F100-229 turbine into ramjet at Mach 3 to achieve reusable Mach 5 flight capability Building 10,000-pound unmanned aircraft from design to flight in 15 months to validate high-speed outer mold line Deploying Quarterhorse 30,000-pound Mach 2+ platform with F-16 capability stack including electronic warfare and weapons rails Designing metal airframes with removable panels and modular inlets rather than exotic composites for production scalability Using proven components like F-16 landing gear and MiG fuselage design to avoid reinventing solved engineering problems Navigating defense R&D contracting where labs compete with private innovators and prime contractors receive cost-plus incentives Building hardware-rich iterative development approach with smaller engines before scaling to full F100-229 and ramjet integration

    43 min

  4. FEB 3

    EP 84 — Ashish Parikh on Building Mesh Radios That Frequency-Hop Faster Than Jammers Can Track

    Doodle Labs engineered multi-band radios that frequency-hop in milliseconds, outpacing jamming attacks that make satellite control impossible for real-time drone operations. When conflict in Ukraine started, the engineering team repurposed this architecture for anti-jamming by hopping between bands faster than adversaries could track and jam.  Ashish Parikh, Co-CEO, details their monthly software release cadence driven by field engineers embedded with Ukrainian operators, where mission requirements emerged directly from combat: silent-mode mesh networking for operators who become targets the moment they emit RF, listen-only modes for monitoring video feeds without signature exposure, and coordinating multiple drones plus ground users while one expeditionary asset pushes 100+ kilometers into heavily jammed territory. Their modular architecture layers like Lego blocks that combine for complex mission profiles.  Topics discussed: Repurposing multi-band capability from Army requirements into millisecond frequency-hopping anti-jamming during Ukraine conflict Monthly software releases driven by field engineers embedded with Ukrainian operators testing under active electronic warfare Building modular architecture layering sense anti-jamming algorithms, mesh optimization, and silent modes for coordination at 100km+ range Designing point-to-point mesh networks for 20-100km missions requiring sub-100ms latency where satellite infrastructure adds prohibitive delay Maintaining NDAA-compliant supply chains with Singapore and US manufacturing capacity scaling to millions of units at commercial pricing Deploying listen-only modes and RF signature management so ground operators monitor feeds without becoming targetable network nodes

    41 min

  5. JAN 27

    EP 83 — Oura's Geoff Wylde on Building Wearables That Guide Troop Readiness and Effectiveness

    Oura tracked an armored unit's gunnery qualification and found baseline heart rate variability statistically predicted top-quartile performance on weapons platforms. Their three-tier privacy architecture gives individuals AI-driven feedback, lets them share data with coaches by explicit consent, and provides command aggregate de-identified metrics. This information helps command know not only when to back off on training, but when they can push harder and how trainees are recovering. Geoff Wylde, VP & General Manager of Health & Human Performance, discusses how Oura invested in NSA-approved hardware that operates in airplane mode for SCIF access and edge applications that sync intermittently with eight days of on-device storage for denied environments.  Topics discussed: Tracking baseline heart rate variability to statistically predict top-quartile gunnery qualification performance on weapons platforms Implementing three-tier data architecture with individual insights, provider coaching access, and aggregate command-level readiness metrics Achieving 80% alcohol consumption reduction among special operators through biometric feedback loops from wearable ring data Building consent-based privacy systems using de-identified accounts where no personal information enters company databases for DoD Developing NSA-approved hardware with airplane mode capability and Bluetooth antenna for SCIF access and classified environments Creating edge applications with 8-day on-device storage for intermittent sync in denied environments

    39 min
  6. EP 82 — DEWM's Clark Haymond on Using Networks to Accelerate Product Validation Cycles

    JAN 20

    EP 82 — DEWM's Clark Haymond on Using Networks to Accelerate Product Validation Cycles

    Clark Haymond, COO of DEWM, leveraged active duty relationships to compress validation timelines that would take years through traditional AFRL sequences. Having friends now in squadron leadership enabled direct jet time allocation for hypothesis testing, proving DEWM's DART could complete actual SEAD kill chains before committing to the formal program of record pathways. This network-driven approach delivers a combined operation with real-time feedback loops impossible in controlled SBIR phases.   Clark also explains why Air National Guard units became initial customers: state-controlled budgets enable faster procurement decisions than ACC. Guard wings need robust EW environments but face $5-15M price tags for traditional threat emitters. DEWM's 2-foot dish exploits the power threshold gap between legacy radar warning receivers and modern HTS pods, achieving tactically relevant detection ranges without massive amplifiers. Haymond candidly admits the MBA network delivered "almost none" of the value compared to Defense Ventures Fellowship placements and direct operator access.    Topics discussed:   Transitioning from permissive environments to building training systems for contested near-peer warfare scenarios Solving range emitter density problems where NTTR has tens of systems due to prohibitive replication costs 5th gen sensor sensitivity differences that enable lower-powered threat emitters to achieve tactically relevant detection ranges for training Building attritable radar targets using open architecture software-defined radios that customers can reprogram without vendor dependency or additional costs Leveraging active duty networks and squadron relationships to accelerate product validation cycles and compress AFRL timelines Comparing MBA network value versus Defense Ventures Fellowship placements for defense startup founders building hardware solutions  Scaling from Wessip weapon evaluation to international F-35 customers seeking cost-effective EW training infrastructure for SEAD mission preparation

    29 min
  7. EP 81 — Inversion's Justin Fiaschetti on Hiring Engineers Who Think Like Founders

    JAN 13

    EP 81 — Inversion's Justin Fiaschetti on Hiring Engineers Who Think Like Founders

    Storing cargo in orbit is becoming cost-comparable to maintaining hundreds of terrestrial warehouses scattered globally, but in orbit, they’re not as vulnerable to atmospheric conditions, geographic limitations, and single points of failure. Justin Fiaschetti, CEO & Co-founder of Inversion, explains how this approach requires orders of magnitude fewer units to cover the same geographic area because any satellite can deliver to any location within its coverage zone. When launch costs continue declining with reusable systems like Starship, the economics shift dramatically toward orbital warehousing that eliminates moisture, temperature variations, and the fragility of ground-based logistics networks while providing true global reach. But what would a company journey be without some challenges? Recruiting for a hardware startup demands different strategies than software companies where engineers are somewhat interchangeable. Inversion needed distinct specialists, each requiring completely different screening processes and networks. Justin's solution was screening every candidate against one question: could this person be a future founder? That mindset ensured each hire could own an entire engineering discipline autonomously, allowing Inversion to build a 25-person team capable of designing and launching operational spacecraft in under 3 years.  Topics discussed: How pre-positioning cargo 400 km above Earth eliminates geographic constraints while maintaining coverage of any point on the globe. Recruiting strategies for hardware startups requiring distinct engineering disciplines, focusing on founder mentality over domain expertise. Why resource constraints force startup focus and efficiency that unlimited funding prevents. Implementing commander's intent leadership philosophy where clear direction replaces micromanagement. The economics of space logistics becoming cost-comparable to maintaining global warehouse networks. Autonomous landing systems achieving sub-3-meter accuracy using guided parachutes that surpass human skydiver precision. Defense applications for 1-hour delivery including medical supplies within golden hour treatment windows and mission-capable parts. Cold email conversion strategies for reaching military decision makers by targeting specific innovation offices and logistics personnel.

    41 min
  8. EP 80 — Lothric Labs' Jonathan DiMattei on Capability vs Compliance in Defense Manufacturing

    JAN 6

    EP 80 — Lothric Labs' Jonathan DiMattei on Capability vs Compliance in Defense Manufacturing

    Jonathan DiMattei, Founder & CEO of Lothric Labs, describes his pathway into defense manufacturing as fearless, relentless, and totally unbiased networking. He attended every ribbon cutting, grand opening, and Chamber of Commerce event he could find, regardless of industry. The breakthrough came at World Trade Center Denver, where events put him directly in front of United Airlines, Lockheed Martin, and defense contractors. His team's thousands of hours of lived 3D printing experience made the elevator pitch natural rather than rehearsed. Ten months after opening Lothric Labs to the public, they secured over 50 active clients and became the US strategic partner for Ultimaker, the only 3D printer adopted by the U.S. Army. The biggest challenge for small manufacturers entering defense isn't technical capability but compliance, warns Jonathan. You can master aerospace-grade 3D printing, network into meetings with defense contractors, and shake hands with CEOs, but without CMMC certification, you're not getting the 3D model files. Some defense companies are softer, asking to see compliance on the roadmap. Others had hard lines. Luckily, publicly accessible SCIF spaces are now creating pathways for smaller manufacturers to access government-compliant networks and start bidding without building multi-million dollar facilities. The real bottleneck isn't equipment but knowledge: which materials to use among thousands of options, how to optimize CAD models for additive manufacturing, and navigating the compliance requirements that gate access to classified work. Topics discussed: How publicly accessible SCIF spaces enable small manufacturers to bid on defense contracts without building their own secure facilities. The evolution from 40-hour print times on early desktop 3D printers to machines that are 5-7 times faster, enabling true rapid prototyping. Why Ultimaker is the only Army-adopted 3D printing solution with no internet connectivity or camera capability for classified manufacturing. How Ferrari's entirely 3D printed F80 suspension demonstrates the shift from prototyping-only applications to final production aerospace-grade parts. Why CMMC compliance creates a bigger barrier than technical capability for small defense suppliers who can't receive 3D models without proper certifications. Material selection challenges among thousands of 3D printing options and why using the wrong material with expensive equipment leads to complete project failure. Listen to more episodes:  Apple  Spotify  YouTube Website

    35 min
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About

The DIB Innovators podcast celebrates the brilliant minds behind innovation within the Defense Industrial Base. In each episode, host and co-founder of RADICL, David Graff will speak with DIB leaders who are driving technological advancements, championing our nation’s security, and shaping the future of defense technology. Brought to you by RADICL — Cybersecurity-as-a-Service purpose-built for small and mid-sized businesses in the Defense Industrial Base. Starting your CMMC journey? RADICL guides and accelerates your compliance—while reducing ransomware and other cyber risks—with a transparent, turn-key solution. www.radicl.com/cmmc_solved

Information

  • Creator
    RADICL
  • Years Active
    2023 - 2026
  • Episodes
    88
  • Rating
    Clean
  • Copyright
    © RADICL
  • Show Website
    DIB Innovators