 The U.S. Army is on the hunt for innovative science and technology solutions. Small and nontraditional businesses have begun pitching new ideas to panels of Army scientists and engineers in five cities across the country, all with the hope of winning cash prizes and building a working relationship with the Army S&T community. Well, there's a lot of things in it for these companies. First is obviously the award and the prize money that comes with it. Total prize is $200,000, but there's various stages from the initial $1,000 white paper award to a $5,000 award to come to AUSA, followed by a $125,000 award at AUSA to compete in the capstone challenge for $200,000. The Association of the United States Army Annual Meeting and Exhibition, or AUSA, is the largest land warfare trade show in North America. This year's event is scheduled for October 8th through the 10th in Washington, D.C. That's where the Army will announce 12 finalists to compete in the future capstone event in April 2019. The Army Expeditionary Technology Search, or X-Tech Search, mirrors entrepreneurial pitch competitions, where aspiring entrepreneurs make innovative proposals to panels of investors who then choose whether or not to invest as business partners. They just have to give us great presentations, sort of like a shark tanky type thing, you know, give us an idea of that they have great technologies and opportunities that we can actually support the warfighter and just wow the panel and I think they'll do great. Army officials examined hundreds of white papers submitted from small businesses and startups that showcased how novel research and technology ideas might benefit the Army's modernization priorities. Well, I think it gives us potential for future capabilities, but I think probably the bigger impact, at least immediately, is getting people aware of the things we're interested in and then actually increasing our network of people in our ecosystem to try and think about how we solve Army problems. Businesses that made it through the first round received an invite to pitch their proposals in person to Army S&T leaders at the U.S. Army Research Laboratory in Adelphi, Maryland, or regional panels in Austin, Texas, Boston, Chicago and Playa Vista, California. What we're really looking for is those innovative solutions that traditionally come from communities we don't reach in order to have good relationships with. Judges said they've been impressed by the caliber of the presentation. I think one of the things that I'm looking for as a judge is, first of all, is this going to be applicable to the Army's modernization strategy and is it really something that we haven't seen before? I think everybody can be a winner in this and that, I think for us, just the conversation with some of these innovators to help shape their idea to make it more applicable to the Department of Defense, and a lot of people don't really know what our challenges are and there are reasons for that. We try to keep things close to the vest because modern warfare is a dangerous business and we want to protect our technology as well as protect our soldiers and so that makes it difficult to have a conversation with a lot of people in academia or industry. Looking to spur innovation, some organizations like the U.S. Army Research Laboratory have embraced an open campus business model. The open campus business model allows us to engage people in different regions that we haven't engaged with before. We're reaching out and we want to hire the talent in those regions. In other words, why should we hire somebody in California and make them come to the East Coast? Now we can hire them there and work with them there. These are all in the vein to reach out to companies and looking for disruptive technologies. We don't know when we talk to these people and they're there to tell us what their ideas are and we're there to help them grow those ideas. Oh, I think there's lots of SKT opportunities out there. I think the problem is many people don't really understand some of the requirements or needs that we actually have in the Army and it's not because of their aspects, it's ours. We don't necessarily advertise our needs very well and that's part of what ECTeX Search is about, trying to get to this non-traditional group of people, companies and individuals to have them start thinking about Army problems and the way they're solving maybe commercial problems and applying that to what the Army needs. I think there's a great opportunity for people today.