A new partnership between San Diego State University and The National Security Innovation Network gives students and faculty opportunities to solve real-world national security problems at startup speed. The partnership also strengthens the talent and startup pipeline for government and industry.

San Diego State University and the U.S. Department of Defense’s (DoD) National Security Innovation Network (NSIN) will work together to initiate collaboration between DoD end-users, SDSU students and faculty, and San Diego’s early stage venture community to develop innovative solutions to critical national security problems in a variety of topics including healthcare, smart cities, autonomous systems, and cybersecurity. NSIN was developed by the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Research and Engineering to create new communities of innovators to solve national security problems with non-traditional partners.  

"NSIN is thrilled to have formalized our partnership with San Diego State University," said Jesse Gipe, NSIN Pacific-South regional director. "SDSU will strengthen our thriving national security problem ecosystem as a foundational institution in San Diego and throughout the Pac-South Region with a deep commitment to students and a demonstrated willingness to work collaboratively with the Department of Defense."   

NSIN’s SDSU University Program Director will closely with the Lavin Entrepreneurship Center to expand NSIN’s network across the SDSU campus and with startup founders in San Diego. SDSU and NSIN are already off to a great start having recently collaborated on solving several critical DoD problems. NSIN’s Hacking for Defense program allowed one student team to help Marine Corps Systems Command, the acquisition authority for the US Marine Corps, to quickly validate a mission critical problem, identify requirements to solve that problem and start to build a coalition on bringing that solution to adoption.

To support the NSIN program, SDSU is offering the following course, MGT 496 Lean Startup Applications to National Security Challenges , taught by David Turner and assisted by Dan Hendricks.