Maintaining Technology Advantage
Abstract
This program supports the Department's priorities to advance integrated deterrence, strengthen international cooperation with international Allies and partners, build sustainable and long-term technological advantage in critical technologies, and build a resilient Joint Force and Defense ecosystem. This program supports the implementation of the 2023 National Defense S&T Strategy to develop and implement effective technology protection to support military innovation. Technology protection is vital to achieving an enduring advantage. While we must accept some degree of risk to catalyze innovation, we must also protect sensitive technologies and military programs from theft, diversion, and exploitation by our strategic competitors. We will build our technological edge using carefully targeted controls and by working closely with our Allies and partners to jointly and effectively protect our collective research, development, and innovation efforts, including warfighting concepts and capabilities during joint experimentation. This Program Element provides funding to support efforts to maintain the Department of Defense's (DoD)'s technology advantage over strategic competitors in microelectronics, quantum computing, artificial intelligence, biotechnology, and other critical technology areas. Maturing and implementing the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Research and Engineering's (OUSD(R&E)) technology priorities requires a healthy and capable U.S. National Security Innovation Base (NSIB). The targeting of U.S. capabilities by our strategic competitors creates the potential to degrade core U.S. military technological advantages through unwanted technology transfer from the NSIB. This technology transfer includes exfiltration of unclassified technology, sensitive data, and of intellectual property, and could jeopardize DoD's ability to maintain the technology advantage required to support the lethality and survivability of the Joint Force. DoD's plan to maintain technology advantage includes programs and plans to: (1) Make strategic technology investments to promote the development of new and innovative technologies. These investments will establish and maintain a robust academic and industrial base capable of creating breakthroughs in key areas of basic research, bringing products to market, and leveraging technologies within the U.S. innovation ecosystem or with likeminded Allies. (2) Ensure the Department's strategic technology investments are protected against unwanted technology transfer by developing and maintaining the tools and techniques that enable the U.S. to engage in technology transfer at the time, place, and parties of our choosing. (3) Combat strategic competitors’ attempts to thwart the U.S. NSIB and implement unwanted technology transfer. The Department will support these three efforts by developing the appropriate suite of analytic tools, a data acquisition strategy, and protection activities across the science and technology (S&T) enterprise and programs to address the threat over the long term. S&T protection focuses on ensuring the integrity of the research enterprise through development of policy and execution of due diligence on technology development efforts. Program Protection Planning includes protection of critical program information, critical components, and mission functions, and integrates high level security policies and practical expertise to specific research, development, and acquisition practices, systems engineering activities, secure cyber resilient engineering activities, software assurance activities and risk reduction activities. Through this initiative the Department is maturing system security engineering methodologies to protect controlled unclassified information, to include controlled technical information on contractor networks; improving mitigation of supply chain risk management risks; enhancing software assurance; integrating secure cyber resilient engineering into the engineering process; maturing processes to identify Critical Program Information integration as part of the Defense Exportability Features initiative; expanding software assurance capabilities provided by the Joint Federated Assurance Center (JFAC), which was established in Sec 937 of the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) for FY 2014; and improving program protection planning.
Document Details
- Document Type
- R2 Budgetary Justification
- Publication Date
- Oct 01, 2025
- Source ID
- 0605797D8Z_6_0400_PB_2025
- Change Summary Explanation
- Decrease of $6.215 million in FY 2025 is due to the transfer of Project Code 043 in PE 0605797D8Z / Maintaining Technology Advantage to Project Code 681 in PE 0603680D8Z / Defense-Wide Manufacturing Science and Technology Program to better align The Technology Industrial Innovation Base (TIIB) efforts within OUSD(R&E) in support of implementing the 2023 National Defense S&T Strategy and the 2022 National Defense Strategy. A reduction of $0.319 million in FY 2025 was applied to meet DoD overall funding reductions, which were spread to mitigate impact. Funding increase of $0.063 million in FY 2025 for Economic Assumptions.
- Service Agency Name
- Office of the Secretary Of Defense
Entities
Organizations
- Office of the Secretary of Defense
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