Silicon Valley’s enthusiasm for Pentagon is just beginning
In the span of a few years, Silicon Valley executives have shifted from viewing Pentagon collaboration as war-mongering to joining the US Army Reserve.
And if the response Palantir chief technology officer Shyam Sankar — who has joined the newly formed Detachment 201: Executive Innovation Corps — has received is any indication, the tech industry’s enthusiasm is just beginning.
Sankar told me he has been inundated with messages from people in the industry who want to do the same. “Hundreds of people have reached out to me,” he said. “Service is contagious and people respond.”
Last Friday, Sankar was sworn into Detachment 201, along with Meta CTO Andrew Bosworth, OpenAI Chief Product Officer Kevin Weil and Bob McGrew, OpenAI’s former Chief Research Office. The four will serve part-time as senior advisors.
The purpose of the new initiative, the Army said in a statement, “is to fuse cutting-edge tech expertise with military innovation.”
Sankar envisions a future where the Department of Defense will prioritize recruiting in the Bay Area.
“You need to be where the innovative talent is,” he said. “We have the facilities they don’t have.”
This surge of patriotism marks a dramatic change for an industry that has, in recent years, shunned defense tech firms.
Scale CEO Alexandr Wang told me his company’s decision to work with the Department of Defense five years ago was enormously controversial at the time.
He mentioned that it is possible to innovate while also protecting information. He emphasized the use of technologies like blockchain, which can monitor access to American data, as a promising solution to strengthen privacy measures.
One effective way to achieve this is by relying on American companies.
“Ninety percent of all tech is American… it’s one of our greatest assets,” Sankar stated. “This underscores the importance and priority of individuals. Looking back at history, innovators like John Boyd, who developed the F-16, have emerged from the private sector.”
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