"Building the Base" - an in-depth series of conversations with top entrepreneurs, innovators, and leaders from tech, financial, industrial, and public sectors.
Our special guests provide their unique perspectives on a broad selection of topics such as: shaping our future national security industrial base, the impact of disruptive technologies, how new startups can increasingly contribute to national security, and practical tips on leadership and personal development whether in government or the private sector.
Building the Base is hosted by Lauren Bedula, is Managing Director and National Security Technology Practice Lead at Beacon Global Strategies, and the Honorable Jim "Hondo" Geurts who retired from performing the duties of the Under Secretary of the Navy and was the former Assistant Secretary of the Navy for Research, Development & Acquisition and Acquisition Executive at United States Special Operations Command.
Lauren Bedula 00:47
Welcome back to Building the Base. Hondo Geurts and Lauren Bedula here, and as part of our series with DoD Research and Engineering team, we're really excited to dig into the Office of SIBR and sitters, which we'll define, I promise, Hondo and we have with us today the director of that office, Miss Regina, Sims, who goes by Gina. Gina, we're so excited to have you here today and talk about all the issues you're working on.
Gina Sims 01:10
Yeah, thank you for having me. I love bragging about this, this program, so any opportunity to do so.
Hondo Geurts 01:15
Awesome. So, before we get started, Gina, I were doing the old been in DOD for a while trying to figure out where we crossed paths and I think we, we, we landed on drone work in the early 2000s when you were an intern. But yeah, what give us a little sense of your background, how you got into the defense world, and which brought you all the way to the small business innovative research area, absolutely.
Gina Sims 01:40
So, really, part of it was luck. I did my undergrad in Dayton, Ohio, so Wright State University, which is a big kind of feeder into Wright Patterson Air Force Base and that civilian workforce, I did well in a marketing class, and my professor recommended I do the summer internship for marketing the Air Force marathon. So that is in Dayton, Ohio. So, I did a summer internship, and then just kind of kept weaseling my way into different offices. So, I was hired as a little baby GS three, and did some marketing work, and then logistics work, and then they said, I think you're a program manager. Got me into program management, and so I did some stuff with ISR, SOF, MQ, nine presidential aircraft. I spent a lot of time in F 15 doing the radar and the electronic warfare systems on the F 15 Eagle. And so I spent about seven years there, and I worked with Boeing St Louis, so my, basically, my entire acquisition experience was negotiating a sole source environment contract supporting the war fighter through that lens, which became, after several years, a little frustrating, if you will, I would visit the war fighters often and what they need, and just we couldn't get it fast enough. We couldn't get it to them fast enough. And I guess the relationship side of it drove me to want to go do something different. And then the opportunity at AFWERX and the SBIR STTR program came up, and I thought, Man, if I could get to know the small business side of acquisition, you know, maybe that would kind of regenerate me. Give me some fuel, a new spark, if you will. And that's here we are. I was, you know, fortunate enough to work in a specific topic branch under a venture, which is in F, works under Jason Rathje, so some of my new colleagues at R & E and then threw my name in the hat for this director role, and just super happy to be able to be here and make the impact that I can now.
Lauren Bedula 03:49
How cool. Well, congratulations. It's important work, and I was wondering if you could start by breaking it down. Tell us about the office, the acronyms, you name it,
Gina Sims 03:59
Absolutely so the SBIR STTR office, so small business, innovative research, small business technology transfer. So, we are under Shu so for Research and Engineering, and then under that, we're under science and technology, and even a little bit further down the foundation's office. And so, under the Research and Engineering corporate structure, we also have, you know, Office of Strategic capital. I get to have my colleagues under mission capabilities and trying to really focus on those transition and innovation programs and how we can make sure small businesses are part of that ecosystem. So just at its core, SBIR STTR is congressionally mandated funds set aside for small businesses to keep us like technologically savvy and have technological superiority. And it's $3 billion a year for the Department of Defense that's. Yes, I was 3 billion with a B a year for small businesses to help us successfully get new things to the warfighter to, you know, stay on top of our game.
Hondo Geurts 05:12
And so, Gina, if I'm a small business, or, you know, entrepreneur or something, how to, you know, explain a little bit of the mechanics. Yeah, if I'm interested in doing some work, and then maybe later, we'll talk about if I'm in a program, how do I leverage the program more effectively? But let's start with the I've heard this. Somebody listened to the podcast. It sounds interesting. How do I learn more? Can you give us a little more?
Gina Sims 05:40
Absolutely, I think that's been my biggest priority. So, I've only been in this role for 11 months, so I still claim some newness to the role, but within that, I've really been focusing on breaking down barriers to entry. So, it shouldn't be this complicated to feel like you have to know someone to get into this line of work. That shouldn't be the case. So, there's several different avenues that I recommend to small businesses to try to get a hold of us. One is definitely outreach and social media. So, since I've been in the office, we have really Vamped up our LinkedIn program to really spotlight not only the SBI or STTR world, but R and E in general, so we're constantly sharing training events, success stories, how to’s. So, I try to point folks to LinkedIn, first and foremost, to learn a little bit about our office, because all of the resources are on there. It links to my profile so you can get a hold of me. I tell folks, I literally exist to help them understand this process and make sure that they have access to these non-dilutive funds. It's there for them. So, I would recommend starting a Google search and going to LinkedIn, reaching out to my office, and talking about the technology areas and where to kind of start and how this process works. We have a great kind of so I'm an acquisition person by nature. I have a life cycle on our website right, showing from almost requirement to, you know, prototype delivery and then that transition, transfer. So, starting there and really understanding your niche of work and who your customer is. It's easy to say most technology areas cover our key services, right? So, most things cover Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines. But if you even have a niche into one of the DoD components, I help you match make with them and get to know their mission and how to get involved with them. But we also point folks to our DCIP portal, so that's the defense SBI or STTR innovation portal, so folks can literally just Google, D, S, i, p, and we have funding opportunities posted there the first Wednesday of every month. So, if you want to try to get in the game. That's your day to go do it.
Hondo Geurts 08:02
Can you help a little bit with the structure. Because I'm sure people may have heard of phases and all that. Can you help a little bit illuminate that?
Gina Sims 08:11
Yea So, generally speaking, SBIR and STTR, it goes through a phase one, phase two, phase three. So, phase one is a feasibility study, so it's when a company comes to us and says, I can fix a problem that the Department of Defense has through this solution. Here's my idea. It's a study across the department the like nuances of how long or the length or whatever, what's included. It varies, but generally speaking, that's what you're looking for. Phase two, then takes that feasibility study and we make it a prototype, and say, yeah, not only do I have a really good idea, but I can also make it a thing. And then phase three is really the cool part about SBI or STTR. So that's transition commercialization. It's buying the thing under SBI or STTR acquisition officers have sole source authority to do a sole source direct contract to that small business. If you've ever done a phase one or a phase two. So, you could do a phase one, and the users say, oh my gosh, I love that. They can do a sole source contract right to them and buy that thing.
Hondo Geurts 09:21
So, for those out there who are not acquisition geeks, sole source means you don't have to compete. It like generally, you have to do many other jobs.
Gina Sims 09:29
Drastically cuts down that acquisition timeline.
Lauren Bedula 09:32
Speaking of acquisition geeks, and sitting here with two of them, you know, on our show Gina, we're approaching three years of having these conversations, and so much of what we end up talking about is culture, like, how do you change culture? And ultimately, around acquisition, there are a lot of conversations around town, think tanks, problem solvers, trying to weigh in about what needs to be done, but I often feel the acquisition community is not well represented in those, so I want to ask, How do you think. Think about this issue in terms of changing culture and acquisition and incentivizing more risk, or just generally speaking, you.
Gina Sims 10:08
just like, hit my spark. So, excuse me. So, I really think that in acquisition in general, there is a disconnect between buying the thing and seeing the thing right. So, I personally think the reason I'm so passionate about this role is because I was able to, in an acquisition position, go to the warfighter and talk to them, and I was young and naive enough to not realize I shouldn't have been asking them the questions I was asking, right? Like, you don't go to the war fighter and you're like, so what do you think about that radar, like, what do you want changed, hypothetically, right? And I did because I was curious. I really wanted to know, well, how is this impacting your life? What can I do to fix it? And then I took that thought process and fought the funding, right? And so, there's an acquisition, there's all kinds of rules for the colors of money, especially in acquisition. So, we would sit down and say, how do we fit the money to the requirement? Not kind of vice versa? And that training just doesn't necessarily exist through a classroom, except doing the program right and being in it and asking those questions. So, from culture perspective, I just footstool to everybody, like ask those questions. Someone else is thinking it. And I know it sounds really simplistic, but acquisition can be that simplistic. Just ask those questions and act like you're using that thing and figure out how to do it better.
Lauren Bedula 11:36
So, breaking down silos, and something Hondo talks a lot about, too, just that curiosity. What a difference it can make to have those conversations.
Gina Sims 11:44
Yeah, and don't be afraid of having those kind like, it's okay to be vulnerable and say, Okay, that was a silly question, my bad. But just ask it.
Lauren Bedula 11:51
You mentioned colors of money. And this might be an unfair one, but is there any way you could do a color of money for dummy dummies or 101?
Gina Sims 11:57
Gosh. So, I haven't used anything but 3600 which is research funding for a while. So, some of the key dollars is, there's milk con, which is really paying for Department of Defense, like facilities, and standing up facilities, which is important when you're acquiring, like new aircraft or something, you have to fix the hanger to get the new aircraft in it right. Then there's three, 600 funds, which is already T and E, so research, development, tests, and engineering, and that goes through EMD, which is really the crux of an acquisition program and research. So that's where we are, right. And then there's, it's like two-year money. So, when you get into the DOD, it's like, not only are there different kinds of money, but they last for different periods of time. Then you get to production funds, which are 3010 funds, and that gets broken down into equipment sparing, I mean, all kinds of things. And then you go on to the sustainment side of it. So, there are these chunks, again, a life cycle that you look at and SBI or STTR. Our biggest challenge is going from that, RD T and E to production.
Hondo Geurts 13:03
So, I'll pull it back a little bit from acquisition. So, you know, Gene there was a pretty big food fight two years ago. I'm losing track of time now about SBIR funding and super authorities and a lot of questions on is this an entitlement that's delivering capability? Is it just an entitlement? Is there? Should we, you know, think of it more as a VC funding. And a lot of what you did earlier, before this job was really, I would say, trying to increase a mission. Impact of this funding. It's there. It's, you know, a shame on us if we don't use it effectively. How have you seen the department more effectively use this funding, and where are these opportunities to continue to maximize the impact of this funding towards delivering technology to the warfighter?
Gina Sims 13:59
I love that. So, the beauty, but also pain point, if you will, of SBI or STTR, is how small of dollars these contracting actions are. So, we went through kind of the phase one, phase two to phase three. So, phase ones are under 200k each. Phase two are under 2.5 million each. And then a phase three can be any dollar value you want. But when you have a budget of $3 billion broken into that, it's hundreds of 1000s of contracting actions, right? And sometimes you could kind of get into a bad habit, if you will, of not necessarily looking at what you're investing in. So, the Department of the Air Force has the largest SBI or CTR portfolio within the Department of Defense. So, the Department of Defense has the largest portfolio under the Small Business Administration. And then the Department of the Air Force has the largest within the DOD. So, you know, annually, a couple billion dollars, right? And when I took over. The So some folks call it conventional topic, traditional topic. We call it specific topic. And the Air Force, we hired some folks from industry to do portfolio management and look at, well, what are we investing in? Is that what the leaders of the Air Force wanted to so the folks who write the requirements for the Air Force at futures, is that organization. They helped me create a selection process to look at the operational imperatives which tie to critical technologies, so that we could confidently go back to Congress and say, you told us that these technology areas are what you wanted us to invest in. And we deliberately looked at the portfolio and spread that across that way, with intent, proactive intent, to invest into these areas and watch it manifest.
Hondo Geurts 15:45
Yeah, so I think it's important for listeners thinking about this. It's technology, but technology with a focus. You may have an awesome technology that might change the world, but if it can't be tied in some manner, maybe not directly, to things that the department is interested in, then it's probably not as interesting. How about how you have reshaped performers and tried to open up the aperture to get more performers, at least proposing into this area? Absolutely
Gina Sims 16:20
So, several years ago, speaking of AFWERX several years ago, AFWERX introduced what they call the open topic process. So, under SBIR STTR, you have two avenues that you can go down, this conventional Avenue where there's a clear defense need, absolutely clear defense need. There's a war fighter named end user. This technology will assist these humans. Over here, the open topic does exactly what you just mentioned. The open topic program says, Hey, we don't necessarily know what we need, but we know that this technology area is important. What do your industry have going on in the commercial sector that we could utilize in the DoD that we're almost blinded to. So that open topic process is that front door for small businesses to come to us and say, Hey, I have something pretty cool you should look at. And what we're finding is a lot of those are new entrants, nontraditional contractors. So, it's really broadened our, you know, defense base of the small businesses participating, which just helps competition, helps the economy. Win, win.
Lauren Bedula 17:22
Awesome. How are you thinking about success in the longer term? I'm sure you talk about valley of death often. And there are several programs that are created, and one of our other guests, Jason, and Browning, will talk about apt and others. But how are you thinking about that move to production, or the valley of death?
Gina Sims 17:40
So, the valley of death. I've heard that term since I've been, you know, in the in the Department of Defense. So obviously I could sit here and tell you phase three transition commercialization. We definitely have found some holes in the data collection to show that that is as promising or as accomplishing as it really is. And then we have also found whole showing that the training is just not there to have the acquisition inside of the community, understand the sole source authority of phase three, but that's the easy answer. I think it's the connections at the department level, especially within R and E and those collaborations that we should be doing to show you know this progress of idea. Hey, I know I need this technology area, either to defeat a bad guy, or, say, ahead of a bad guy, and then these programs already exist to place that into the portfolio. So, my main objection objective in the next couple of years is to form better collaborations like officially, right? Not just say it officially have charters that says these types of, you know, programs are sitting down together with the common objective, and we have projects that we are actually showing that this is going to work. So having the Defense Innovation Board, you know, advise us on who should be sitting at that table, from a transition perspective, DIA should be there, Office of Small Business, SBIR STTR, C Dao, like all of these really cool, innovative offices, but sitting down and pinpointing projects and saying, let's see if this works instead. I hope that that's going to make a big difference.
Lauren Bedula 19:26
How can the industry side help? I see so many companies that are part of the process and so worried about what the future looks like. How can they help or not get in the way? Like, what are some best practices for them?
Gina Sims 19:38
Absolutely. So, I tell them, and I think they think I'm kidding, but I'm not like reach out to me and tell me what's going on. I have been supporting the warfighter since you know, it's my only big girl job. I've been a taxpayer as long as they make me. I've never owned a small business. I've never worked for a small business. I've never been a research institute. So, I just don't know. What issues they have, unless, if they come and show me and tell me. So, when I first took this job, the very first big event I did was like, three months into the job, and I said that, like, no, come tell me. And several companies came up and they go, Hey, your solicitation schedule is like, all over the place. We have no idea when you're releasing topics. And then we miss it, and then we miss it for like, six months, like, I can fix that, right? We can fix that. So now we have that reoccurring solicitation cycle once a month. There's no guessing. You know, when the DoD wants to see your proposals and we want to give you money, that's really the best thing they could do for me, is tell me and show me examples of where it prohibited them from supporting warfighter.
Hondo Geurts 20:43
So how, how is the relationship with the venture community going in this? Because there are some eligibility criteria to work in shippers. You might want to explain a little bit of who's eligible, you know, yeah, us, entity or not, and then, you know, there was a lot of friction. Of, you know, it would be much better just handing this money to the VCs. They could allocate it better. How are there bridging maneuvers to do with that community to better leverage them? And I'm
Gina Sims 21:12
going to give you the program manager answer. Of, it depends. No, it does depend. And there are some companies that this is great for them. They they're looking for that help to get to the next thing. So, to take a step back, there are criteria to participate in. SBIR STTR, and I should have foot stomped a long time ago. I'm sorry, STTR, the key difference is that the primary investor, so the small business, has to collaborate with a research institution. But most of the time we see that like the academic world, but they have to partner with what we call our eyes. So that's STTR. SBIR is the small business on their own, but they could sub if they wish. So, there are within the policy directed that SBA, the Small Business Administration, sets for us. There are criteria, and then it depends on if your server sitter, phase one, phase two, but it's a percentage of like the ownership, right? And then the VC kind of plays into that as well venture capital. So, it when we have companies come to us and ask the services, Army, Navy, Air Force, they definitely have programs where they almost like help match make because they're so large, right? And so, they have opportunities where they have that connection. For you, I am trying to build a collaboration with the Office of Strategic capital, with my colleagues over there, on when that's also appropriate, and kind of a checklist, if you will, like, I'm a company looking for X, Y and Z. Here's the path that you could take to talk to that partnership if you would like. And I but I just caution folks like it again, depends on your technology area and stuff, because if you lean towards the venture capital, there's a different kind of takeaway that you may get with your company. So that non-dilutive funding opportunity that maybe drew you here, that end goal might end up being different. So just do your research. But I think that it's just a great way to enhance these small businesses that want to make a difference. If that fits their portfolio and their goals.
Lauren Bedula 23:16
What stands out the most to you when you're talking to these small businesses? I'm sure you talk to so many, it'll all blur together. But What? What? What is it about those that you end up remembering or really being eager to help?
Gina Sims 23:29
I would say the small businesses that they come up and you can just tell that they are just so excited to share with me their technology. And I always have to kind of giggle because I am 0% scientist or engineer 0% and so I kind of have to be like, hey, I can tell that, like, you're really into this technology. It's going to go over my head. So how can I help you, from like, a portfolio management perspective, right? But that I always walk away with, because while it makes no sense to me whatsoever, I can see that tie in, like, how they can see that tie to the war fighter, and that's why I wanted to come work for small business, right? It's getting away from the defense primes and seeing this, where they they're like, I have this thing in my hand to show you that I could go save lives. And it's just because it's not easy. What they're doing is not easy. So, they're definitely motivated.
Lauren Bedula 24:24
And just to repeat what I'm hearing you say is, don't just talk about the technology, talk about the problem you're solving related.
Gina Sims 24:31
So, if you're doing anything with me, you guys know this. Anything within the department's about requirements, right? The Department has requirements, so you have to tie it back to the department needs this, and I'm here to fix that for you.
Hondo Geurts 24:47
It's, uh, it's really interesting to watch. And again, having my past life come from the Navy and then Air Force. First, the Navy focuses on phase threes. They're good at it. Yeah, they're gonna be. Because the Navy views the super program as a way to scale, they should performers, Air Force. Other words, do you see across the department the now talking to our government program teams who are listening, what are some best examples of government folks leveraging the SIBIR program effectively, and where are these opportunities, maybe, to continue to improve that, given that it's going to happen, whether we use it effectively or not, at least right now in law, what are you seeing there? And how can government program managers better leverage these opportunities?
Gina Sims 25:40
So right now, I see most of the government folks come to me because Congress tells them to come to me, right? It's in the NDAA that they shall have a server phase three or something like that. But then I can usually get them into my ecosystem and be like, No, look at how cool this is, right? So, it's really on my ecosystem, though, my team, my professionals, my SBI or STTR professionals, to be out there pushing onto the acquisition workforce. Like, hey, we're a tool, right? You guys know what you guys are. You guys know what IDIQ’s are. We're a tool too, and it's actually going to be super helpful for you. So, we need to own that a little bit more and voicing that. But I would say for the acquisition professionals, it's getting involved in your risk management plan, looking at your risk management plan within your portfolio, and saying, that's a problem, and this contractor hasn't solved it for a while. I wonder if a small business could help us, and then reaching out to your service, or components, SVR, CTR program, and saying, I would like help with this risk I have. And if it's a risk, it's in your program, office estimate. So, then we're going to be able to start palming for some money, and then we can do that phase three, yeah,
Hondo Geurts 26:53
I would say, having watched it from the other side, and I'll call out, the Submarine Force in the Navy does a tremendous job of actually integrating the SBIR program into their overall program plan, and for new entrants out there, or folks who want to get into submarines, it becomes a pathway to get into, so it becomes a little bit of a mutually supportive activity. Do you have a sense that Congress is comfortable now with the program I got reauthorized for. I can't remember how many years.
Gina Sims 27:26
So, we got reauthorized in FY 22 we're up this year. So, this is my last year. So, this is, this is go time for my office. We are bragging about this program as much as we can. I am trying to see what is out there that I could fix as fast as I can and what I can do now collaborating with the Small Business Administration to make sure that we have one voice, and that voice says, this is absolutely worth it. We're getting great, you know, vibes so far, and everybody, I think, is really excited to see where this program is going to go in the collaboration. So, in the last just 10 months or so, the amount of time that the SBIR STTR directors sit down together now and talk back and forth on our transition pathways and what we can do, we are seeing a huge influx of better partnerships across like the department, and making sure we're utilizing those funds better, and R and E has been a huge help in that. So, we've been seeing, like, for example, the Air Force going with some type of phase two enhancement that the department at that level is like, hey, we actually should take that under our transition program, because it impacts more than the Air Force, and then that frees up the Air Force to go, you know, do something else too. So, we're seeing a lot of collaboration that way, and we're really trying to brag about that to Congress.
Lauren Bedula 28:46
To that end, do you have any good examples of success or where you were able to enable getting that best tech there is to offer into the hands of the warfighter? Yeah.
Gina Sims 28:56
So, there's one I'm working right now under R and E, where it was an Air Force SBIR that SOCOM did a little bit with, and now the joint hypersonics office under R and E would like to take over and do some stuff. So that collaboration took a lot of humans to sit down and talk about the pathway and then being up front with the small business though, like, Hey, we're not putting you off. We're going to put you over here, because this is a better pathway for what we need, and asking them to kind of adapt to that strategy too, and having those conversations, we saw a lot of miscommunication and gap, and that, more than anything, has been the biggest success, right? It's seeing where we failed in the past of helping the small businesses see the bigger picture we're seeing. And so, we're about to award that enhancement, and there's a there's a phase three just sitting there waiting, and it's going to help hypersonics, which is a huge priority right now.
Lauren Bedula 29:53
That's awesome. It's amazing to hear how often you come back to just like the human networking collaboration. Aspect of it all, it's really not processing the way it's going across those silos to find ways to work together. And to that end, when you talk about all these different communities, including the tech or small business community, VCs, and, of course, the US government side, I think one thing that they all have in common is the interest in solving very hard problems, and I can tell that that's a strong interest of yours, yeah, just from a kind of career or mentor perspective, how do you stay fresh? Or how do you say, stay so excited about what you're working on?
Gina Sims 30:31
Oh, wow. A lot of coffee. No, I have I surround myself with great teammates, and they I asked them to buy into a strategy and say, hang out with me. It's gonna be bumpy for a little bit, but I promise. I think it's gonna be worth it. And then, you know, kind of feed off of them. When I need to go left or right a little bit, I try to stay very vulnerable. I have been in the department again. It's like my only job. But there's so much I don't know, so much I don't know. So, because of that, I'm always learning any human I meet, I learn something new, and then that just kind of sparks me for another day.
Hondo Geurts 31:11
So, another thing that stands out to me June is normally you would think, Oh, wow, running the Small Business innovative research program, yeah, okay. I expected a, you know, 75-year-old PhD, 10 times over. What's your advice for folks coming up the chain of command, to have the confidence to put yourself out there for something that you yourself may not even be sure you're qualified for what? What's any tricks for those coming up through the ranks to you know, hey, give it a give it a go.
Gina Sims 31:51
I can't help but laugh, because I actually get asked that question all the time, do a good job at your job, right? And it sounds again, so easy, but I have just tried to do a very good job at whatever position I was in, and it I'm again, some of its luck. It was recognized, and then I had advocates that, you know, pushed back on me when I said, Oh, I can't do that. So, taking this job, I, you know, wasn't an expert at writing policy. But I had folks in my corner that was like, Well, maybe you haven't actually done it, but you do it in your head every day, right? You're you can talk it, I promise, just try. And I was like, Okay, what happens? They tell me no. And then I go mentor with someone else and learn. Okay, I just try to really learn whenever I can and do a good job at your job.
Lauren Bedula 32:45
Love it well, you're again. Excitement about these issues is contagious. So, thank you for coming on and sharing not only what your office is doing, but a little bit about your career path with our listeners. And you've said it several times, so I think you mean it, but folks should reach out to Gina, if they have questions or navigating this process.
Gina Sims 33:02
It is why I exist. Awesome. I exist to help well. Thank you again.
Lauren Bedula 33:05
Thanks Gina
Gina Sims 33:06
Bye.