A company that specializes in artificial intelligence-driven software for the military has moved its headquarters from San Francisco to Chantilly, where it will offer defense clients a place to preview its technology.
Ahead of a ribbon-cutting ceremony yesterday (Wednesday), TurbineOne said the move was a reflection of its growth supporting national security missions.
As touted by the Fairfax County Economic Development Authority (FCEDA) and Virginia Gov. Abigail Spanberger’s office, the company’s relocation is expected to create 22 new jobs through a $424,000 investment.
“I am thrilled to welcome TurbineOne to the Commonwealth of Virginia and look forward to watching their progress in the years to come as they work to strengthen our national security,” Spanberger said in a press release. “With an unbeatable strategic location, a stable business environment, and access to world-class talent, Virginia is the natural destination for any company looking to expand and take their operations to the next level.”
The preview space inside the new headquarters at Sullyfield Circle is called “T1 EdgeWorks,” a nod to “edge” computing, or processing data near its source, rather than in the cloud.
That is one of the key features of TurbineOne’s software, which is designed for frontline members of the military to use AI to find targets without needing to be online, said CEO and co-founder Ian Kalin.
“The military calls it intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance, but it’s basically targeting, which is basically search, helping the good guys find the bad guys,” said Kalin, a former Navy lieutenant and first chief data officer at the U.S. Department of Commerce. “It’s that type of work, and the reason we launched this space here is to try and make this experience for real.”
Valued last year at $300 million, TurbineOne created the software — which it calls the “Frontline Perception System” — with the goal of bringing AI directly to the battlefield.
“Typically, the way models are done today, or before the Frontline Perception System, is that you’d have to somehow get data from the battlefield, get it all the way up to the cloud, then get it to a machine learning team someplace,” TurbineOne Chief Technology Officer and co-founder Matt Amacker explained.
“They try to make that model. Then somehow you’re supposed to get that all the way back down to the battlefield and a place where they can take advantage of it,” he continued. “And that process would take two weeks to six months to — fight’s over, we’ve all moved on.”
TurbineOne’s work has attracted the attention of the U.S. Army, which awarded the startup a $98.9 million contract last summer, the Wall Street Journal reported in September.
According to the Wall Street Journal, the military’s push for technology that can detect drones and other potential threats without an online connection stems from Russia’s war in Ukraine:
“In opting for software that processes all data on-device, the Army is taking note of a lesson from Ukraine: Wars will be fought in a communications blackout, without radio links and GPS, which have been rendered null by the proliferation of jammers.”
TurbineOne’s move to Chantilly also comes at a time when the Pentagon has said it wants the military to become “an AI-first fighting force.”
Last week, the Department of Defense announced it had signed agreements with eight AI companies — SpaceX, OpenAI, Google, NVIDIA, Reflection, Microsoft, Amazon Web Services, and Oracle — “to deploy their advanced AI capabilities on the Department’s classified networks for lawful operational use.”
