DARPA is the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, established in 1958 with a mission to prevent strategic surprise for the US. It has an annual budget of $2.9 billion and focuses on radical innovation through short term project teams with top talent. Suggestions are made to enhance DARPA's innovation, including improving commercialization to create alternative revenue streams, expanding its network and projects to social sciences, and establishing a knowledge management office to better capture and reuse learnings.

1. Innovation 'Audit' and Innovation Plan Based on 'Ten Types of Innovation'
AUEB / IMBA
INNOVATION, CREATIVITY & THE MANAGEMENT OF TECHNOLOGY
Chronopoulos Christoforos
Karakalos Athanasios
Markoulatos Zafeirios
Pitsikas Leonidas
Protopapadaki Evdokia
Roussou Athina

2. COMPANY PRESENTATION – 1/2
AUEB / IMBA / ICMT / 10 TYPES / DARPA 1
Property Value
Name Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency
Established 1958
Budget FY 2014 Thousands $ 2,865,087
Current Director Arati Prabhakar
Mission Creating & Preventing Strategic Surprise
Personnel 240 (140 technical).
Products Internet (1969), GPS (1959), UAV (1960s), Stealth
technology (1983), Motion-sensing micromachines
(1990s), Revolutionary Prosthetics (Current),
Carbon Composites (1970s), da Vinci telepresence
surgical system (2000).

3. COMPANY PRESENTATION – 2/2
AUEB / IMBA / ICMT / 10 TYPES / DARPA 2
Property Value
Client U.S. Department of Defense
Idea generation • Recognize that a scientific field has emerged or
reached an inflection point, and that it can solve,
often in a new way, a practical problem of
importance.
• Uncover an emerging user need that existing
technologies cannot address.
Client involvement Through liaisons, field trips and assigned officers.
Project duration Typically 3-5 years.
Project description Fast iterations with go / no-go milestones.
Owns research labs No. Research is outsourced. DARPA manages the
Project teams.

4. CURRENT INNOVATIONS
ASSESSMENT – 1/3: CONFIGURATION
AUEB / IMBA / ICMT / 10 TYPES / DARPA 3
Profit Model
Not for Profit
Government agency.
Not selling directly to its
clients.
Government funds held
until project teams pass
go/no-go milestones.
Assessment: N/A
Network
Military, Academia
and Industry
University researchers and
technology firms from not
relevant sectors.
Operational Liaisons:
Military officers keep
DARPA well connected with
the problems of the
agencies.
Assessment: STRONG
Structure
Flat, Agile, Top
talents
Outsources all R&D.
Interdisciplinary temporary
teams with role rotation.
Only 3 layers of hierarchy.
Attracts top talents with
short term contracts.
Assessment: STRONG
Process
End Game
Approach
Differentiation against the
traditional way research
(basic / applied) is
conducted.
Not open-ended, early exit
in the absence of progress
is part of the strategy, huge
budgets, high-risk projects /
deliverables.
Assessment: STRONG

5. CURRENT INNOVATIONS
ASSESSMENT – 2/3: OFFERING
AUEB / IMBA / ICMT / 10 TYPES / DARPA 4
Product
Performance
Technological Surprise
DARPA focuses on radical innovation, not
incremental.
However, DARPA moves from fundamental
technological advances to prototyping, and
then hands off the system development and
production to the military services or the
commercial sector.
Assessment: STRONG
Product System
Different Technologies
Complement
DARPA uses interdisciplinary
teams to create and combine
different technologies from different
disciplines in order to meet the
strategic objective of each
program.
Assessment: NORMAL

6. CURRENT INNOVATIONS
ASSESSMENT – 3/3: EXPERIENCE
AUEB / IMBA / ICMT / 10 TYPES / DARPA 5
Service
Proactive
Personalized service
(DoD example: meeting
with military individuals
who bring problems in
and take solutions out)
DARPA management
team visits to the field
(practical use of
innovation and on-site
identification of possible
problems).
Assessment: STRONG
Channel
Distributing
innovation
The channel is
distributing innovation to
its customer (DoD) and
between the companies.
The Small Business
Technology Transfer
fosters small business
teaming.
Assessment: NORMAL
Brand
“Elite organization
with a storied
history”
DARPA has multiple
attractions in order to
attract top talents:
Performing service to
your country, the honor
of being asked to work
for an elite organization
with a storied history,
and the opportunity to
pursue something
amazing, often
countercultural.
Assessment: STRONG
Customer
Engagement
Operational Liaisons
Operational Liaisons -
Military officers that keep
DARPA well connected
with the problems of the
agencies.
However, because of its
role in the DoD, DARPA
has only one customer
and its one customer
only chooses DARPA for
strategic innovation.
Assessment: NORMAL

7. SUGGESTIONS FOR
ENHANCING INNOVATION – 1/4
AUEB / IMBA / ICMT / 10 TYPES / DARPA 6
Profit Model Enhancement – Commercialization.
Funded by the US government, DARPA returns value through R&D. By improving its
commercialization activities, DARPA will create alternative sources of revenue.
• Value created will be commercialized through:
• Licensing.
• Ventures.
• New Product Spinoffs.
• As a nonprofit research agency, DARPA is driven by stakeholder value, not shareholder
value. The revenue generated by the new commercialization activities, and marketplace
solutions is reinvested in DARPA capabilities and staff to advance its mission.
• Alternative revenue streams will improve DARPA independence and autonomy, while
private investments will further fuel R&D.

8. SUGGESTIONS FOR
ENHANCING INNOVATION – 2/4
AUEB / IMBA / ICMT / 10 TYPES / DARPA 7
Product Performance, Profit Model and Service – Innovation Management Consulting,
Intangible assets capitalization attitude.
• Diffuse knowledge about innovation / consulting services both in private and public sector.
• Product System and Product Performance:
• Unique product features (prototype innovation model).
• Integrated and Interconnected with firm’s business as usual activities.
• Profit model:
• New Revenue stream (consulting fees).
• Risk free Revenues (capital requirements are zero).

9. SUGGESTIONS FOR
ENHANCING INNOVATION – 3/4
AUEB / IMBA / ICMT / 10 TYPES / DARPA 8
Network, Product Performance and Product System – Expansion to Social Sciences.
DARPA can use its unique structure, process and brand to offer Strategic Advantage to the
U.S. in expanded fields of modern warfare. The recent economic crisis calls for an advance in
the social sciences, especially in the field of economics.
• DARPA clientele can expand to the Federal Reserve System (Fed) and its network can
expand to the credit rating agencies (S&P, Moody’s, Fitch) and investment firms.
• The DARPA network can bring together advanced computer companies and AI specialists
with Social Network Scientists and Economists.
• The product system can be a set of theories, algorithms along with the respective
software and hardware that will be able to predict and prevent (or smooth-out) future
economic or social crises.
• The finalized products can lead to a new era of mankind – much like the Atomic bomb and
the Internet (along with their inherent disadvantages) created our modern world.

10. SUGGESTIONS FOR
ENHANCING INNOVATION – 4/4
AUEB / IMBA / ICMT / 10 TYPES / DARPA 9
Process – Knowledge Management Application.
Given that DARPA is also a learning organization we propose that a KNOWLEDGE OFFICE
could also be established.
• Structure and Process Enhancement: KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT OFFICE
• Application of special Knowledge Management Programs guided by Knowledge and
Intellectual Property Managers. Collaboration between Project Managers and
Knowledge Managers or training of the Project Managers for the Knowledge
Management Principles and Practices.
• Applying the Knowledge Circle (learning before, whilst, after) in every single project
should result in:
• Creativity enhancement (greater ideas).
• Control and capturing of the new knowledge, created during projects of limited
duration and by constantly rotating scientists, for future exploitation.
• Increased rate of successful projects.

11. CONCLUSION
AUEB / IMBA / ICMT / 10 TYPES / DARPA 10
DARPA is the company responsible for the most ground-breaking innovations.
However our proposals may:
• Shield the company from political games (alternative revenue streams-consulting).
• Ventures and funds will further fuel the innovation race (spin-offs).
• Stakeholder value will increase (society will benefit from the expanding to social sciences).
• Synergy between parallel ongoing programs (knowledge management).

12. REFERENCES
AUEB / IMBA / ICMT / 10 TYPES / DARPA 11
• DARPA Official site: www.darpa.mil
• Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DARPA
• “Special Forces” Innovation: How DARPAAttacks Problems – HBR, October 2013
• DARPA's Approach to Innovation and Its Reflection in Industry:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK36337/
• Statement by Dr. Tony Tether (Director of Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency) to
Subcommittee on Terrorism, Unconventional Threats and Capabilities (House Armed
Services Committee – United States House of Representatives) on March 13, 2008:
http://web.archive.org/web/20080802030708/http://www.darpa.mil/body/news/2008/hasc3-
13-08.pdf