November 30, 2023 | Arlington, VA
The Chief Digital & Artificial Intelligence Office (CDAO) Procurement Forum took place on November 30, 2023 in Arlington, VA. Its purpose was to expand and strengthen CDAO's collaborative network with established and non-traditional partners in the rapidly evolving field of Artificial Intelligence (AI). With the office’s ambition and budget doubling in the past year, the CDAO is actively seeking ambitious and innovative organizations to learn about our mission, explore opportunities, and compete for a chance to contribute to cutting-edge AI standards development within the Department of Defense (DoD).
At the Forum, industry partners, key DoD initiative leaders, and the CDAO engaged in action-focused discussions facilitated by theDifference. The objectives of our discussions were to:
The Forum focused on key topics including the FY24 Procurement Forecast, Assisted Acquisition Procurement, Large Language Models, Data Mesh, AI Scaffolding, SBIR-STTR, and Acquisition Ecosystem Building. Additionally, there were specific discussions to enable an understanding of the needs of key government stakeholders, including Advana/Enterprise Platform Capabilities, CJADC2, Responsible AI, and Task Force Lima.
Overall, the Forum aimed to cater to participants' interests and needs, thus enabling a comprehensive learning experience. Each session was designed to foster knowledge-sharing, meaningful discussions, and collaboration to deepen the connection between industry partners and the CDAO.
Over 600 individuals from industry and academia expressed interest in the Forum. Space was limited and attendee selections were made to provide a diversity of small, large, traditional, and non-traditional organizations who are both currently engaged and have never been engaged with the CDAO.
The next CDAO Procurement Forum is planned for FY24Q2 or FY24Q3. Individuals who expressed interest are now part of the CDAOs’ Acquisition Ecosystem and have priority for attending the next Forum.
Hosted by the CDAO, Advantage DoD 2024: Defense Data & AI Symposium will be held on February 20-22, 2024, at the Washington Hilton in Washington, DC. Registration details for this marquee event are available here.