UK Army and industry experts hack for the future.

As reported on its website, the British Army is teaming up with industry tech and data experts from Adarga for a 48-hour Hackathon event to brainstorm the battle-winning digital tools of the future. Teams will develop software and algorithm-driven solutions to address real-world challenges faced by the Field Army.
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Brigadier Matt Cansdale, the UK Army’s Head of Future Force Development, said: “What’s fantastic about the Hackathon is just to see how it’s really caught people’s imagination and they are really investing themselves in seizing advantage and realizing what they can do" (Picture source: UK Army)

Critically, the winning solutions will be developed and tested in the field within just a 3-month period, transforming the Army’s ability to procure innovative technology at the tempo required to remain competitive.

Solutions will be designed to address issues such as finding digital ways of understanding routes for military convoys, understanding the impact of environmental factors on future missions or deployments and the best ways of extracting casualties.

Brigadier Matt Cansdale, the Army’s Head of Future Force Development, said: “The Hackathon is a really exciting venture, it fits absolutely with what we are trying to do in the wider Army, of moving to a more tech-led leap into the information age. What’s fantastic about the Hackathon is just to see how it’s really caught people’s imagination and they are really investing themselves in seizing advantage and realizing what they can do. What it shows is the degree of critical thinking amongst our people who are ready to challenge the status quo and the norms of how things have been done and work with much wider organisations.”

Robert Bassett Cross, CEO and founder of Adarga, said: “Adarga is proud to be supporting such a forward-thinking approach and facilitating the collaborative innovation required not just for the Digital Readiness Experiment but to pave the way for a new era of modern defence capability. The Army’s rapid deployment of software to a real-world environment in line with realistic readiness timelines marks a hugely significant development that will shape the future of technology procurement for the whole of UK Defence.”

BattleLab, a £5.7 million collaboration between the MOD, Dorset Council and the Dorset Local Enterprise Partnership (LEP), will host the Hackathon 2021 on 15 to 17 September.

Set against the backdrop of the Integrated Review, Hackathon 2021 and the DRE represents the Army’s highly innovative approach to meeting the challenges of the rapidly evolving character of warfare and pace of technological change that requires a transformational shift in how data, software and algorithm-driven solutions are tested, developed and deployed within UK Defence.

The results of Hackathon 2021 will be livestreamed from the Army BattleLab to the industry tradeshow, Defence Security Equipment International, on Friday 17 September at which both the Army and Adarga are exhibiting.