An Interview with Molly Donohue Magee
Executive Director, Southeastern New England Defense Industry Alliance (SENEDIA)/Undersea Technology Innovation Consortium (UTIC)
SENEDIA is a regional alliance of companies primarily based in Southeastern New England that do business with the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD). This geographic focus is due to the presence of the Naval Undersea Warfare Center (NUWC) in Middletown, Rhode Island, and the Electric Boat (EB) facilities in New London, in southeastern Connecticut, and North Kingstown, Rhode Island. NUWC is a billion-dollar-plus organization and they contract out over half of that amount. NUWC is really the DoD crown jewel for undersea technology. EB, meanwhile, has been building submarines for the U.S. Navy for decades and received the largest contract that the Department of the Navy has ever put out to build the Virginia-class and the new Columbia-class submarines.
While the majority of companies that make up SENEDIA’s membership come from Rhode Island, Connecticut and Massachusetts, we also have membership nationwide from companies interested in doing business in this region because of NUWC and EB. We like to say that this is the hub of submarine shipbuilding and undersea technology innovation.
We see SENEDIA’s role as creating an alliance of defense industry companies to support NUWC and their work, while also supporting the EB supply chain. EB has work demand that is growing almost exponentially.
From a SENEDIA perspective, we have a DoD contract to facilitate submarine shipbuilding workforce development specifically focused on trade and industrial skill workers, which obviously are critical to building submarines. SENEDIA has over 120 member companies. Both small and large companies are represented. In this area, the major technical thrust is undersea technology driven by NUWC.
You could look at it this way: Rhode Island and the broader Southern New England region have submarine shipbuilding and underwater technology and SENEDIA has companies that support both of those. We as an organization help our member companies in two ways.
The first is workforce development. We have a very strong internship program that covers cybersecurity, IT, undersea technology engineering, science, backroom functions, supply chain management, etc., as well as a special focus on veterans. We also go into the classroom, even in the elementary grades, and talk about careers in undersea technology.
The second way we support our members is with economic development. We do that by convening opportunities to network. These include monthly tech talks with technology thought leaders, as well as an annual event that has become national and is called Defense Innovation Days.
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When SENEDIA looked at the strong technical thrust of undersea technology, we created a strategic partner organization called the Undersea Technology Innovation Consortium (UTIC) and I’m also the executive director of that organization. In June of 2018, UTIC was awarded a Department of the Navy’s special type of contract (called “Other Transaction”). It’s focused on prototyping, but it doesn’t have all the federal acquisition regulations so it’s streamlined contracting. Companies can negotiate their intellectual property rights. The focus is on the Navy being able to get technology, see how it can fit their needs and get it fielded as quickly as possible. There is a specific push in going after what the Navy calls “non-traditional” contractors. These are companies that have great technology property in the commercial environment and may have never gone into the government side. UTIC can help them do that. UTIC is a national organization with over 300 member companies from 36 states, but we are hubbed here in Middletown, Rhode Island. To date, we have put out $300 million in prototype projects to a variety of companies, so it really is a very strong economic engine.
The way this works is that the government contracts with the consortium. If the government has a technology need, they come to us. We share that need with only our consortium members. If they’re able to put together a white paper saying how they are able to support that technology, then that happens. You can call us a facilitator, a collaborator, a convener—connecting technology companies with the government and facilitating that process for prototyping.
It’s really focused on small companies and with a special lookout for those who have not ventured into the DoD arena before. Contracting with DoD is not for the faint of heart. We have a streamlined process and we work with the companies to step them through what they need to do.
The mantra I always give for what we do with UTIC is: “We communicate, we collaborate, we innovate, we demonstrate with a laser focus on providing innovative technology as quickly as possible to the Department of the Navy.”
While SENEDIA and UTIC work to bring new technology to use quickly, we also recognize that developing the Blue Economy is a long-term effort as well. Workforce development will be critical in this effort. I mentioned the EB submarine building contract earlier. To put that effort into perspective, students who today are in third grade will be trade skill workers for EB at the peak of their demand. It’s an amazing thing to think about it.
