 All right, everyone. Good afternoon. I'm Nick Rofi, your host and director of DAV Patriot Boot Camp. Welcome back to DAV Patriot Boot Camp Caffeine Connect, a webinar series designed for the modern entrepreneur seeking to fuel their passion and drive for success. Just as a shot of caffeine boost synergy, this series aims to stimulate your entrepreneurial spirit with practical insights and on key topics shaping the business landscape. And today we have a great program for you brought to us by Kristen Sargent, an Army veteran and President and CEO of Sargent Initiatives Inc., a defense tech company focused on driving execution excellence for commercial technology companies broadening their U.S. defense business. With over 20 years of experience helping companies and organizations bring innovation solutions to the market, Kristen has led business development efforts to expand sales to government customers, led corporate strategic alliances with large software vendors and startups in cybersecurity, and has an expertise in data and information security, identifying and engaging sales channels and accelerating go-to market strategies. Kristen has also led Rebellion Defense's partner business, an AI software startup that scaled to one billion in valuation. She's also a fearless adventurer, which I really admire. She volunteered in Nepal after the 2015 earthquake and also has ridden her bike across the U.S. in 2019. Her experiences have taught her how to think critically and take intentional steps toward having a big impact. She's here today to teach all of us about opportunities in the tech defense space on a segment we call Building a Tech Defense Company. I know you all fall in love with her energy and charisma, so at this time I'd love to introduce Ms. Kristen Sargent. Kristen? Oh, my gosh, Nick. That was such an unbelievable introduction. Thank you so much. I'm so honored to be here. This organization means a lot to me, both as a veteran and an entrepreneur, and I take regular advantage of the resources. So I'm happy to give back during today's presentation. So with that, let me get started. All right, today, like Nick mentioned, we're going to talk about how to build a defense company. And I'm going to walk you through some basics, but first let's just get into what our agenda is really going to cover. So I'm going to give you a bit of an introduction and really just explain what's bringing us here together today. And then I'm going to go into just really a defense market overview. And really how to look at the defense sector with a business mindset. It's in a way that candidly, when I was a veteran, I didn't know how to do. And so I want to share some basic ways to think about it and look at it from a business perspective. Third, I want to share with you some examples of successful company profiles. And then we're really going to get into the meat of today's presentation, which are 10 basic steps or building blocks for building a defense company. We'll then go into the key takeaways and of course at the end have time for questions and answers. So just a little bit more on my background, like Nick said, I was in the army, I was actually an air defense artillery officer. My last role was as an information management officer. And so from that point forward, both as a corporate executive and throughout my career, I've always been at the very intersection of defense and technology. I've also been helping companies of all sizes and worked at companies of all sizes. So I've spanned the gamut between large businesses and then done partnering work with mid size companies. And then most recently with startups. The focus of my company is helping technology companies expand across the defense sector and technology companies in my view can be either product or service companies, but who generally are applying a technology first approach to delivering across the defense sector. And I'm also building my own defense company in this process. So a lot of what I'm briefing today are based on lessons learned that I myself and living. So this is a very real presentation for me in the business that I'm building and also in how I'm helping my own customers. And then my mission is very, very important both to me and the company. It's it often seems like the US defense sector is really hard to do business with, but candidly it can be less daunting than it looks. And so we really believe that we need well built optimized companies to deliver in the sector and that's with this presentation. And what I hope to share with everyone today is really meant to help. So let's talk about the defense market. First, I just want to share some recent headlines that have stood out to me in terms of what's happening across the defense sector. So let me give everyone a moment here to read three through these and really digest them. So what stands out to me and what I hope stands out to you from reading through these headlines is that number one. The defense sector is absolutely committed to bringing small businesses and new companies in. And that's because number two, right now what we're seeing is that our greatest threat is the People's Republic of China. And so we need new ways of facing what that reality brings. And then third Silicon Valley and especially venture capital are becoming far more active in the sector. And that's bringing with with the opportunities, a much better richer environment to get resources that can help us do bigger things. And so I'm going to go into that throughout today's presentation. So first, let's just look at the defense budget and the defense sector by numbers. So this first diagram is really just meant to reiterate that the defense budget is generally big and increases over time. The second diagram is really meant to show you how the budget is shifting as we start looking ahead towards a potential Indo pay com type posture. So what we're seeing right now is a slight uptick in the Navy and how the Navy is getting funded, a slight down tick in the Army. And like I said, this just generally makes sense with preparing for where we need to be present and how we might need to address something that were to happen between us and future threats. In these diagrams, you'll see daft pass through that just represents more sensitive programs. And then defense agencies are all of the organizations such as the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency or DARPA, the Defense Counterintelligence and Security Agency, or DCSA. That's actually who processes all of our security clearances, Defense Information Systems Agency, and there are others. And so really the opportunities span not just the military but the agencies that support the military in how we need to prepare for the future. So it's a big market. There's a lot of opportunity. It's really well funded. And I've actually heard some business executives call the defense sector the Fortune One. So if you think of banks, pharmaceutical companies, everything that you might trade stock with on the stock market, those might be Fortune 500 companies, the defense sector, working with the government, that's the Fortune One. So now let's talk about the small business environment. So there are lots of things happening across encouraging small businesses to come into the defense sector. And so on the left you see here the Small Business Innovation Research, or SBIR, and Small Business Technology Transfer Programs, or STTR. And what these are are highly competitive programs that encourage domestic, so U.S. owned, small businesses to engage in federal research and research and development. And this is always with the potential for commercialization. And so what this program does is it offers competitive awards based opportunities and tries to find not just solutions that are going to be great within the defense sector, but also those that have a potential incentive to profit from its commercialization. So actually having applicability within the commercial sector. In other words, the government wants to award contracts to ideas that are going to help them and the commercial sector, or what's called dual use. So this is a great opportunity for getting funding that can help build not just a defense business, but a far broader business. And the important, the important takeaway from this chart here is that the SBIR and STT awards increased from 2.8 billion to 3.7 billion from 2018 to 2022. So again, tremendous opportunity within what this program represents. And that's not just, that's not all. So in the middle, you see the other transaction authority. So what is an OTA? Well, an OTA is a procurement authority that allows federal agencies to enter into agreements with non-traditional defense contractors, such as small businesses, research institutions, and nonprofit organizations. Well, what's a non-traditional? What's a non-traditional contractor? A non-traditional is an entity not currently performing and not performing within the last year a contract or subcontract for defense subject to full coverage under the cost accounting standards. And really what that formal definition is just a way of saying is it's someone who hasn't done traditional business with DOD in the last year. And so for most small businesses, that's you. And so what this chart is representing are millions of dollars being spent across a variety of technology areas, all of which the government is investing in because they see the importance of having these capabilities as we face the future. And then finally, right, there are the standard small business opportunities available to small businesses doing work within the Department of Defense. And so if you look at this chart on the right hand side, I just want to highlight that last government fiscal year, the Defense Department spent $85.2 billion on small business prime contracts. And so nearly 25% of the department's prime contracts go to small businesses. Well, that's happening inclusive of the Defense Department needing to meet these percentage goals. And so as you can see, small disadvantage veteran owned small businesses, there's a 3% contracting dollar award goal that defense customers are measured on to make sure that that's how much business is flowing through that type of small business. So there's tremendous opportunity here across other opportunities within the defense sector outside of just OTAs and SBIRs and STTRs. And so really hopefully this paints for you a better picture of different points of entry, different opportunities, all that exist for newer entrants or people looking to really grow their business in this sector. Now that was just looking at defense. Let's now look at Silicon Valley, venture capital and defense. So between 2021 and 2023 investors actually funneled $108 billion into defense technology companies. And so I want that to just resonate with you, $108 billion. That's additional funding on top of what the Department of Defense is already spending, that these venture capital and investors are adding to the opportunities to really solve for some of these capability gaps and to identify new technologies and companies that can get us into the future. And so on the left hand side, you'll see a chart that Squadra Ventures, there are an investor in the space that they actually assembled just providing a basic map of many of these different venture capital and investor companies and where those companies fall as you might grow out a business that requires seed and funding raises. So there are a lot of them, they come in at different points, and they all come with different resources and networks to help your business be successful so that they can really make out on their investment in you. Now what's happening is there is acknowledgement that Silicon Valley needs to have a closer relationship with the Department of Defense. And so there is a nonprofit organization called Silicon Valley Defense Group. That's really been active in this shape or in this capacity. And so they've had a really important role helping the voice of investors and startups and new entrants really getting the ear of what's needed to change for newer technologies to have a better chance of success within the space. What SVDG did this year is they sent a letter with 60 signatories, encouraging congressional leaders to maintain support for the Defense Innovation Unit which you see a logo there on the bottom of the slide. DIU is really who's charged within the department to come up with a better and more direct way of channeling and funneling newer capabilities in and across Department of Defense customers who need them. And so what's important is that this year DIU was actually elevated to report directly to the Secretary of Defense. And now they have representatives embedded across all of the combatant combatant commands to work directly with the department on identifying needs and then put out solicitations that are easier for industry to respond to. So, right, this is a much tighter coupling that you're seeing between VC communities, investors, the Silicon Valley Defense Group helping them gain a much better voice and then DIU actually becoming an arm within which the Department of Defense can kind of gain value from what all of these different entities represent. So, right, I've tried to paint for you the broader picture of what's happening in the department, what is happening across small businesses and what is happening across the venture community. What is the key takeaway here, and that is simply that defense is open for business. It is literally that simple defense is open for business. So, now let's talk about some successful company profiles of companies that have taken advantage of several of the different opportunities relevant within the market. So, first is MetalOps. This is a really impressive business. This is an example of a services company that was launched in 2013 and now holds $52 million in contracts that focus on materials and solutions for soldier survivability. What you'll see is both that they are an 8A and SDVOSB and woman owned small business, and that they cover these different categories or scope areas with the support that they provide. But Katie Bigelow, their founder is quite impressive herself. She was in the Army for 10 years as an aviator, piloted missions in Korea and Iraq and was even a medical evacuation pilot carrying injured Americans to safety. What I think is even more impressive about Katie is she has eight kids. So she is building her business and having a mission impact while also sustaining her family and really balancing all of her responsibilities. So to say it can't be done, I just I use Katie as a she's an incredible example that I would hold up to all of us to be inspired by to say absolutely you can build business and defense. The second example I want to highlight is Shield AI. And this is an example of a product company. They were founded in 2015 and as of December 20, 2023 had conducted a series F funding round right so that they're one of the venture capital backed companies out there. They conducted a series F funding round of $500 million and this company is currently valued at $2.8 billion, often in the same category as Palantir and SpaceX. And really they were founded with the trying to answer the question, what does the military of 2030 look like, and what does the role of autonomy play. And that question came with came about because of their co founder and president, Brandon saying, who's a former seal and surface warfare officer. And so Brandon and this company are absolutely building capabilities like hive mind and VBAT that meet the needs of a future force. So okay, now we've taken a look at metal ops, and we've looked at shield AI. What's a key takeaway we have from looking at these companies. Well, it's that veterans have an advantage. Right, we are personally invested in solving problems that we might have seen or experienced in the service. And so why not start a company that helps start addressing some of those. And so now I'm going to walk you through the 10 steps on how to really build that company. And so, for the remainder of this presentation, the 10 steps I'm going to walk you through are my best effort to distill the process down to 10 simple steps. They're intended generally to be in order but certainly run concurrently and are interrelated. So this is right hopefully 10 easy bite size pieces to building a defense business. So number one is you want to decide generally what type of company you want to build. Do you want to have a services company. Do you want to have a product company. And let's be clear, it can evolve over time as your business matures or as you make privates, but this gives you a general sense of where you might begin. A services company can generally be lower investment. A product company might require you to seek out VC or other types of funding to just get yourself started. And so those are different things that you want to consider. A non traditional contractor, like I had mentioned before in, in the discussion is still a business that has never done any traditional contracting with the fence so as a services or a product company, you can be a non traditional contractor either way you go. But in general you just want to have a general sense of what type of business you're going to build that's going to affect how you then look for opportunities and shape your actions moving forward. Now, from this what you generally want to do next is just research and select your NAICS code. NAICS stands for North American Industry Classification System, and it's just a category or a scope area of the services or product that you are providing. And so what's going to happen is as the government releases contracts, it'll specify what NAICS codes are affiliated with those opportunities. And so those NAICS codes that you self identify as having will generally be what maps you to different opportunities. So for example, my NAICS code for my business currently is 541-990. And that just buckets me as providing professional scientific and technical services for the Department of Defense and it allows me to look for opportunities that have that NAICS code affiliated with it. So you can search on SAM.gov, which I'll explain what that is in a moment, in order to find different opportunities and generally get a sense of what your NAICS code should be but you want to have a sense at this point. So step two, you want to register with SAM.gov and the SBA, if that makes sense. SAM.gov is the best website where RFPs and opportunities and requests for information are released about capabilities the government's looking to procure. And they have a checklist available that makes sure that when you are registering, you know what you need to have in advance. And I'm just highlighting the need for a tax identification number, which is the unique identifier issued to your business by the IRS and definitely have a bank account by the time you're doing, you're going through the registration process. You need that information. This process is not that hard. It's, it does not take long. But in the process of registering on SAM.gov, you're actually asserting your defense representatives and certifications or what's colloquially called reps and certs. And every time you do, you are agreeing to abiding by the federal acquisition regulation and the defense federal acquisition regulation supplement, the FAR and the DFARS. And so really what you want to do is as you're registering through SAM.gov, go slowly and read all of the FAR and DFARS clauses that you are agreeing to so that you can get more familiar and comfortable with those regulations, which ultimately determine how and what rules you have to play by to do business with DoD. For the small business administration registration, right, there are all different contracting assistance programs or designations that you can register for. Small disadvantage are for minorities. Veteran owned service disabled veteran owned are pretty straightforward. You do have to have your VA disability assessed already in order to get that service disabled veteran owned status. And then hub zone just means that your principal office and a good portion of your employees are living in a historically underutilized business zone or, you know, an economically less developed area of the country. I will tell you time long timelines differ here. So my business currently I am an SDV OSB. I got that designation in 30 days. Women owned small business designation, it takes six to nine months. So you want to apply early and just be prepared for the timelines to be different for each of the designations. So then what do you do right you've got some of the basics of your business built well you want to get out and start interacting directly with customers you want to do this immediately. Network get on LinkedIn but the goal is to really network with both mission customers and contracting professionals. And mission customers are the ones whose problem you're solving contracting professionals or contracting officers are who are actually have the ability to write contracts and apply funding to them. Usually different people. Today is a massive army conference. FCA is an organization that hat host events all throughout the year. West 2025 is the massive Navy conference that takes place out in San Diego. Techna Indo paycom a big conference takes place in Hawaii each year kind of focus more on that region. But South by Southwest is an event that takes place in Austin and allows more direct engagement with DIU. And then there's our even opportunities like gov mates and what gov mates is is a free platform that allows you to connect with other companies that might allow you to partner, especially on other transaction companies, OTAs. And so the goal here is really to get comfortable with understanding your customers. And then second, kind of get a feel as you do Sam dot gov research, we're looking to the variety of OTAs that are available across the offense, or even sign up for the cyber and STTR lists serve, but you want to get comfortable for where the customers that you're talking to might be procuring where the procurements that you're looking at that you're interested might match up to the customers and just kind of start connecting the dots. And this is ultimately through connecting the dots how you identify your contract opportunities. And finally, identifying your contract opportunities comes in one of two flavors. It's either with direct defense customer engagement or with indirect defense customer engagement. I will tell you, one of the customers I've supported recently had a defense customer that got a demo demo of their technology and recognized the mission critical problem that that technology was solves lately, and essentially got to work telling that company where to go get on contract. The customer literally said I need you to go talk to this person and figure out how to get on this contract. And so it can work that fast when you're solving that critical problem. And all you have to do is really make sure that you can accept the terms and conditions of an existing contract, primarily ensuring that that existing contract has scope ceiling in a period of performance that accommodate what the government wants you to do sometimes when you have direct defense customer engagement, they might actually have an RFP that's coming out in the future that they say because of what you offer you should consider bidding on. So, you know, direct customer engagement is a fabulous faster way to get your foot in the door, but there's also ways to do it if you don't. And so let's look at the indirect ways. Right, you can go on Sam.gov you can actually create searches and save them such that you get an email alert that tells you what types of opportunities are coming out that are in the ballpark of what you would be interested in bidding on. What I like to tell people is really look at RFIs, unsolicited proposals or contracts that are set to expire in say the next six months to a year what why do that. Well, those opportunities are in what's called the pre solicitation phase. And it's in that phase that you can try to connect the dots and have a conversation to gain better context about what the government needs and what is actually going to put your company in a better position for success in responding. And so if you wait until after the RFP is released or post solicitation the government cannot talk to you at that phase based on fair acquisition practices. So the goal here is always to try to find a way to kind of get into conversations or learn about opportunities that are in the pre solicitation phase. For OTAs you want to join a consortium potentially consortiums are what manage the various OTAs and to join can be free or is a really low annual fee. So look for you know an OTA that meets your scope areas and join that and start getting a feel for how to interact and engage with the defense customers that use that OTA and even the partners that are on it through the GovMates platform. And then of course you know prepare to submit a cyber that's always an option for what you might be interested in pursuing. Of course after you've identified your contract opportunities let's assume it's coming your way. Well so now you've got to submit a compliant proposal. So let me let you read the 10 steps here on the left hand side. So these 10 simple steps are adapted from how enterprises do large scale proposals, which is what you see on the right hand side. So on the right hand side is really sort of an industry best practice for how to develop a compelling winning price competitive proposal for the government. And so at this phase in your business, you just want to generally adapt these steps in a more simplified fashion. And so the number one thing that you see in bold here is that you want to think before you bid. So number two, let me give you a tangible example. There was an RFP that I was looking at bidding with my company. And when the final RFP was released, I read through it and one of the requirements in the RFP stated that upon day one, the contractor must have an active top secret clearance. My business does not have that yet. So automatically, I know my business is not going to be compliant for that proposal. I know not to bid on that RFP at all, it would be a waste of time and resources, because I cannot meet all of the stated requirements in the RFP. And so when that happens, right, don't waste your time and energy. Those are the opportunities for improving, reflecting what could you have done differently. Perhaps upon award, there would be an opportunity to subcontract to whoever is awarded the actual contract. But I would never waste my time and energy bidding on a contract that I cannot meet the state stated requirements for either by myself or with businesses that I'm partnered with. So you really, really, really want to read that final proposal and do a true assessment on, is this worth my time and energy? Can I meet all the requirements? And then per number five's bold statement, you want to think before you write. I cannot tell you how many man hours of time I have seen completely wasted, because people start writing immediately when their response to an RFP. What you really want to do is look at the instructions of it and develop an outline for your response such that all of what you want to say, and all of what is relevant to say to optimally position you fits within the structure and instructions of that RFP. That's how you actually write a compliant winning proposal. So focus on the outline first, think about what you're going to write. Think about how you're going to put those pieces together and then write it. It will save you a ton of time, and I assure you it will increase your chances of winning. And then of course, submit on time and per the instructions. The government does not have to read a proposal that you submitly. So don't do it. But follow these basics and this will absolutely increase your chances for winning that hard earned opportunity that you've done all of this work to figure out for your business across all the things we've discussed so far. Finally, let's assume you're going to win. Well, a lot can change between when you actually bid on the contract and when you're awarded the contract and expected to start. So you really want to make sure that the awarded contract makes sense and is now based in reality and the real is based on the realities of delivery. So just really level set on what that is. Again, you're going to make your name and reputation on this first contract. So you've got to deliver what is stated in the contract on time. And what that really requires is communicating frequently. You want to you want to really monitor your contract burn rate or how much funding is being used against your period of performance. Since your contract comes with scope ceiling, which is the maximum amount of funding that it can that that contract can accommodate and then period of performance. So you want to always just sort of make sure that if you're coming close to contract expiration or meeting that ceiling that you're working proactively to communicate that and help the government make their lives easier on addressing it with you. And then you also really want to be mindful of scope creep. Right. Things get murky as you are delivering. And you just want to be very careful that if you're asked or expected to do something that you weren't initially contracted to do that you kind of use that contract as the way to go back to hey this is these are the bounds that we have. You know, I know that you're looking to do this. How can we make this work, but really stick to that scope creep really really be mindful of scope creep. It's really important. Okay, so now, right, you've gone. You've done the hard work of being awarded your contract and you're now delivering. What's another key step in this process. Well, it's absolutely managing your own corporate cybersecurity. So, before this kind of used to be implied that companies doing business with the Department of Defense were expected to have high higher cybersecurity postures, but now it's really becoming mandatory. And so, by the end of 2024 or early 2025 the exact date has not yet been set. Companies doing business with the Department of Defense will be expected to meet what is called cyber cybersecurity maturity model certification level one. And all CMMC level one is is a self certified is that you have self certified that your business meets NIST SP 800-171 security controls. And then that you upload that self certification in the portal you see highlighted here. CMMC level two is only required if and when defense controlled on classified information is actually going to be processed or to transmitted on your corporate infrastructure. So the likelihood of that in the early stages of starting your own defense business is really low. So focus on CMMC level one make sure that you're paying attention to getting this done. So that you aren't out of compliance for being able to deliver on your existing and then any future contracts. So now we've done that right now is the opportunity to protect and grow your defense footprint. So in this diagram that you see here to the left the basic intersection for sales. When you're awarded a contract you actually have generated the star in this diagram you've intersected a government customer or a mission customer with their acquisition acquisition office and your company. And so that star is your footprint and it becomes the foot footprint from which you can grow your business either by enlarging that star or by actually finding other intersections that make sense for you to sell. And so let's take a look now at the diagram on the right. And I just want you to kind of digest the basics of this diagram, which ultimately helps you protect and grow this initial contract that you have won. So what you want to do is you want to maximize your awarded contract. It's got like like I've said scope ceiling and period of performance. So how do you make sure that that contract is used to the fullest extent that is you staying in this green box and maximizing that green box of just making sure that that existing capability is being sold to the maximum extent to your existing customer. But when you look listen and look adjacently, that's when these yellow boxes of growth become possibility. So what other contracts are being executed in the same government space next to you who is delivering on those companies are there partnering opportunities for you to work together. So ways to grow if the customer is more satisfied with your performance and could use it in other places of the organization, right just listening and looking adjacently helps you better understand the ways in which you can really protect and grow into those yellow boxes. You want to constantly be proposing recommendations in your white papers so aligning your recommendations to your contract or to future contracts where you might be accessible. And that's what allows you to take any of your new capabilities and move them into an existing customer or take your existing capabilities and move them to new customers. It goes without saying really that you are going to build a relationship with the defense customer the mission customer that you're supporting, but don't forget to build a relationship with the acquisition office that is managing your contract. You want to propose recommendations to them to improve future procurements. You want to stay connected so you can learn about any RFPs that are coming up that you might be excited to work on. But that's really where you have an opportunity to broaden your business as well. And ultimately doing all of this together is what secures and grows your your follow on contract as well as other future contracts in the space. So everything I just described, you want to just be very, very cognizant and intentional with doing so that you can stay in these green and yellow boxes of growing your business because that's really what allows you to grow with the least amount of effort and risk. But how do you scale right your defense business over time well there's actually a ton of resources. The SBA offers loans, they have development centers they have women's business development centers and just so many, so many different resources that you can take advantage of. There are also several companies out there that provide you up. So cyber advisors will actually write cybers for you they'll help you qualify and make sure you're a good fit and actually help help you develop your cyber response. Nooks is actually a company that offers rentable cleared office space. So if you need a skiff in the future. It's probably really expensive to build your own facility. This would allow you to rent space, and then they also offer facility security officer services. And so someone to help you manage your facilities clearance, maintain any security clearances for any of your staff that you might need. Deepwater point and associates does anything from market intelligence to business development to capture and proposal support. So if you need more of a BD arm to proactively grow your contract portfolio, they can really provide support there and even offer murders and acquisitions advisory services. And then if you become super sophisticated, perhaps at some point you want to have a government affairs or policy or strategic communications play. That's all something that M2 defense strategies offers. So there are all these different companies and resources that are surrounding you to help you scale in the defense sector, and allow you to do more that you're not just solely responsible for you can you can have these companies be an extension of you. And then of course, there's always opportunities to even scale more broadly. Right. And so I like to highlight second front. Second front is a company that has a platform called Game Warden. They help product companies inherit accreditation and security requirements so that if you have software that is doing well in the Air Force. If you partner with second front, they're going to help you do well and the Navy and Army in terms of just meeting security requirements. Red Horse is a services company. Yerts is a product company. So they announced a strategic partnership. Yerts AI is deploys secure generative AI solutions. They're working together. They're going to go after opportunities that maybe either of them might not have been able to to pursue without each other support. And then SMX is a great example of a long time federal contractor big in the C5 ISR space with a very successful cloud business. It's been a long term partner of Amazon web services and that actually strategic culminated into a strategic collaboration agreement, which allows both businesses to really invest in each other and again do more together for customers. So there's, you know, as you walk down this path ways to grow even more broadly across the sector. So right, we've walked through now the 10 steps on how to build a defense company. So what are those key takeaways? Well, so number one is you can do it. You can do it. Others are doing it. You can do it. And two, you are not alone. There are tons of resources, tons of other companies there to help you tons of people ready to provide support. And so now is a fantastic opportunity to really pursue the defense sector and that's because as we come to the end of our time here. Defense is truly open for business. Veterans have an advantage. You can do it and you are not alone. So with that, I'll just wrap up by saying I did a lot of research to compile all of the data that I presented in this presentation, and to just make sure I give proper credit to all of the different outlets and sources that provide such important information to help people like us be successful in the defense sector. And I'm happy to provide this presentation and the resources here to anyone who sends me an email or reaches out on LinkedIn. So feel free to do that so that you can also have these references or get some questions answered after this presentation is over. And with that, this has been a joy and I'll turn it over for some questions and we can start the Q&A period. Yes. Thank you, Kristen. As you can see everybody that she did a deep dive on that research and you know you mentioned you're willing to share that. It looks like there's a lot of great resources for entrepreneurs aspiring entrepreneurs out there to kind of dig in themselves and learn a little even a little bit more about what might be more applicable to them. But as you can see, Kristen knows her stuff about the defense sector and I hope everyone's enlightened by how much there is on that Fortune One out there as far as accessing the capital. So thank you, Kristen, for that. And we do have a couple of questions and even if y'all out there don't have questions, I'll ask some questions. We do have one and I bet a lot of the people out there do have the same question and it's from social media and it is what is 8A? You spoke about that or you had it listed on a couple of slides. What is 8A? Sure. 8A is a designation for companies that it's just another special designation that gets you a sole source opportunity with the government. And I can give you the exact definition after this presentation but it gives you favorable treatment for winning contracts. Perfect. Okay. See if we have any more messages here. So Norman on LinkedIn and I apologize I'm looking at my other screen. There's a lot to look at here. Says from LinkedIn says what does VSR do? VSR. Where was he highlighting VSR in my presentation? I guess he asks is it the same thing as DAV? I'm not sure in particular. If you're listening, Norman, give us a little more info and we'll go down the path of answering that question. So I have a couple of questions that I've prepared just in the event that there wasn't anything out there and I think a lot of these will resonate with folks. And this is personal for you a little bit too, Kristen, because some of these questions that, you know, what kind of unique challenges do you face as an entrepreneur in the defense industry compared to other sectors? I mean, you had a transition period, you spent time in the private sector. What challenges did you face as when you transitioned into a tech entrepreneur, defense entrepreneur? It's a great question. You know, the hardest question or the hardest part about transitioning is figuring out how to spend your time, right, figuring out how to allocate your day so that you actually can maximize your time, maximize the progress that you're trying to make moving forward. And so candidly, there are days when I wonder, you know, was me attending this conference really a value to my business? Did I meet anyone or learn anything that was going to be really fruitful for me? And in some cases it is and in some cases it's not. And so moving forward, just having those lessons learned in the rear and taking some risks, that's for me what's been hardest, is just trusting my gut, figuring out and taking some risks on how I spend my time and then taking a look back at what I did to maximize how I spend my time moving forward. But other than that, you know, I find customers are incredibly willing to talk, they're incredibly open to conversations when they can be, right? Obviously, like I said, they can't be after an RFP has been released. And so a lot of, I think, in the past what might have been difficult to learn or understand, culturally the department has come a long way in opening itself up to players like us. And so I find them to be open arms and so that to me keeps me energized and fueled to keep going. Yeah, kind of going back to your takeaways, you know, you're not alone, you can do it, not alone. Sometimes you just need to need that pillar of strength to kind of reach out and connect with somebody who understands your experience. So that's, thank you for sharing that. I know it's a little personal, but we always appreciate it. And I think I got some clarity on Norman's question. He says, the VSR is what are you referring to as veteran service representative? Oh, I'm not quite sure which slide that might have pertained to, was that related to some of the resources available through the Small Business Administration? It sounds like it to me. Maybe we can address it on LinkedIn specifically. Yeah. Since we're nearing our time here, we got another question from, it looks like Robert, at what step can you request a security clearance for your company? That's a great question. It's such a great question. You can request security clearance only when you've been awarded a contract that comes with a DD-254 that specifies that you are required to have one. So it's pending, it's based on the government's award and then the government's assessment that for you to perform the stated work that you will need to get a facilities clearance. So you can't, for example, proactively contact nooks and get one started or initiated. They need that DD-254 that you've already been awarded by the government to even start the process for you in the first place. So just part of those checklist items you would need to have an order to apply to some of the RFPs that are out there. Does that apply to every RFP or a good majority of them in your experience? Yeah, no, there's plenty of opportunities out there that do not require a facilities clearance. Yeah, I'm really glad actually that you asked this question just to clarify my talking point in the example I gave. I thought it was actually really quite strange that they included that in the RFP that I was tracking. And so to me that just suggests that there became some type of classified aspect to the work being performed that was not evident for me being a little bit farther outside and not having an understanding of what the defense customer needs in that specific instance. So hopefully that answers the question. Good. One last question and then we'll wrap up with some announcements. This is from Mario inside the Zoom and Mario by all means you're welcome to come on and present your question or I can always do it for you. So, you know, I'll give you a second. If you want to come on, if not, proceed. I'll say anything. So I'll take it. I'll take it Mario. Okay, here we go. Where do you find out what restrictions exist if we are recently retired from military or DoD civilian? Ah, so meaning you. I think what you're saying is right similar to how there's kind of a cooling off period between retiring and joining a company that might be pursuing defense or other government contracting work. I don't exactly know what the cooling off period is. I could do some research on that though, because I'd be interested in the answer myself. But I would bet that if you were to start your own company, you would not be allowed to bid on opportunities within whatever the specified timeframe is back to wherever you worked, but you would be eligible to elsewhere. Kind of like an NDA or a non-compete type of thing. Yeah, I mean, essentially what the government's, what the regulations are trying to do in spirit is make sure that you don't get unfair advantage because of the federal job you had before. But that doesn't mean that they don't want you to use the gifts and the ideas that you have to benefit the government at large. Right, and so let's say you were retiring from the Army, but you have an idea that's relevant to the Navy. Depending on your position in the Army would I think dictate whether or not you can pursue work with the Navy, but I would be willing to bet, you know, you would be eligible to in most cases. I just don't know the specific regulation and would want to give you an exact definition. All right, great. Well, listen, there's probably a few more questions on social media. And for those of you who are listening, we haven't addressed your question. We'll do our best to address that on social media for you after we conclude. But I want to take a moment to make sure I thank Kristin for being here with us today. And we've been, we've been talking about this for several months now. It's exciting to have you. It's exciting to bring a topic to our community that we really haven't done before. So we hope that all of you out there who've watched have learned something that can get you started in the tech defense industry because it looks like there's tremendous opportunity out there. So Kristin, thank you for your time today. So make sure I get that out there. Thank you so much, Nick. It's been a joy. And then we have a couple other announcements. But before I get to those announcements, I want to thank everybody out there on social media and live who's tuning in in that method. And for those of you who are in Zoom with us, even though we haven't seen your face or heard your voice, we're happy that you're here. Part of our DAD Patriot Boot Camp family. So if you're still, for a couple announcements in the future, our next cohort for May, our Patriot Boot Camp May cohort, excuse me, cohort is still, applications are still open. And those applications closed on April 29th. So we have seats open. It is competitive in a sense that there's limited seats. So please get out to www.patriotbootcamp.org and apply for our program there. And if May isn't good, or if you don't get into that particular cohort, based on availability, our October cohort, which is going to be held in Washington, D.C., will be posted here soon. So you'll be able to get in there and apply to that as well, say www.patriotbootcamp.org. We're always on the lookout. If you're listening and you have something that you want to present or that you want to give back in a way, mentorship or volunteerism in some way, we're always looking for more mentors for our program. Very important component of our program. And as you can see, Kristen's on that list as well, and we're happy to have her as part of that list. There's so much value that that core brings to our community. So if you're looking to get involved in that, you can also visit our website and there's an application process. It's pretty basic. Fill out and we'll try to get you on the mailing list for future opportunities with regard to mentorship. Our next capping connect is going to be on April 4th. It's being held, the presenter is Mitchell Kiefer, an Air Force veteran. And we're going to be talking about how you can fund your business by establishing some foundational business credit. An interesting twist on funding your business. So tune in on April 4th at 2 p.m. eastern time for that, for our next capping connect. And of course, if you're always interested in, if you're ever interested in giving back to DAV Patriot Bootcamp, or if you have questions or if you want to coordinate some activities or get in touch with us, you can do so at PatriotBootCamp at DAV.org. And lastly, please follow us on LinkedIn or Facebook or Instagram at DAV Patriot Bootcamp, or you can also find replay of these videos on our DAV YouTube page. So everybody, thank you so much. Kristin, thank you again. So for everybody out there, until next time, activate, mentor, create and grow Patriot 6 out.