New Defense Tech Cos. Must Prioritize Anti-Fraud Compliance
- Erik Swabb, Elizabeth D'Aunno
- 9.12.2022
Partner Erik Swabb and counsel Elizabeth D’Aunno discussed procurement fraud and other compliance challenges facing technology companies entering the defense business in an Expert Analysis article published by Law360.
Excerpt: In some ways, the prospects for a technology company entering the defense business have never looked better. Last year saw record global military spending exceeding $2 trillion for the first time, while the U.S. spent $801 billion on the military.[1]
New defense technology companies, such as Anduril Industries Inc.[2] and Epirus Inc.[3], have raised hundreds of millions of dollars at valuations surpassing a billion dollars. They are also starting to win major government contracts.[4]
The war in Ukraine is spurring greater interest in technology with defense applications, such as artificial intelligence,[5] drones[6] and commercial space systems.[7] In June, NATO launched an innovation fund that will invest €1 billion in early-stage startups and other venture capital funds.[8]
That said, defense contracting is not for the fainthearted. Companies face many challenges from the so-called Valley of Death,[9] a term referring to the difficulty of transitioning promising technology from the research-and-development phase into large-scale procurement, to sweeping government data rights claims[10] to other bureaucratic obstacles.[11]
