Empowering Innovation in Defence
We work hard to make our armed forces digitally innovative and prepare our country for a digital future. We see ourselves as the agile dinghy accompanying the Bundeswehr on its mission.
As the world sees increasingly severe upheaval at an ever-accelerating pace and nothing stays stable or even plannable, we need forces that are prepared to face a modern enemy.
That is exactly what our vision is all about: Empowering Innovation in Defence.
It is the reason we get up every morning, the North Star that guides us in everything we do. Everyone at the Cyber Innovation Hub is passionate about this cause. We work hard to make our armed forces digitally innovative and prepare our country for a digital future.
The Bundeswehr's agile dinghy
We are the agile dinghy that accompanies the Bundeswehr on its mission. We speed ahead to explore the new, digital territory in front of us. And what we find there, we take right back to the tanker. Diverse, digital, connected.
This ‘dual transformation’ is a tried-and-trusted concept. The US military has established several innovation units at once: NAVALX for the US Navy, AFWERX for the US Air Force, SOFWERX for the US Special Forces and more. In the non-military sphere, every DAX-listed company has got at least one innovation unit.
We are a pioneer in the German public sector. As the first digital-innovation unit of a German federal ministry, we prove that digital innovation at the governmental level can work.
Innovative pressure requires new processes
Innovations spread faster and faster nowadays. It took 50 years for the telephone to be used by more than 70 per cent of the population. Mobile phones achieved the same level of adoption in about five years.
Innovative pressure increases constantly, and we need faster processes to keep up with it. Unfortunately, the structures and processes that exist in many organisations are not made for innovation.
Clayton Christensen, a professor at Harvard University, took it upon himself to solve this problem. He examined why even successful, large corporations – even seemingly uncontested global market leaders! – fail. Christensen published his findings in his 1997 book ‘The Innovator's Dilemma’. It has become a must-read for everyone interested in innovation.
According to the book, large organisations struggle to innovate beyond their routine day-to-day business. People who are busy keeping their business running are not good at establishing a new business at the same time. „Run the Business“ und „Change the Business“ at the same time is difficult.
The solution: large organisations should establish small units which can test and advance innovations for them. A fast, agile dinghy accompanying a large, heavy tanker. Such a dinghy can test new ideas quickly; the things that work are then transferred to the main company. And when an innovation fails, it fails at an early stage before too many resources were wasted.
That’s why we are here: the agile dinghy accompanying the Bundeswehr on its mission.
