There should definitely be a fund and top organization, and every startup should be able to apply to use. But what I am talking about is not a open deposit box, So I am not advocating opening the purse strings to every startup. There should be evaluation committees composed of experienced personnel from the technical units of the TAF, and the clear and consistent objectives of the technological demonstrations under evaluation should be determined by the sub-committees of the relevant mechanism.
Like 'we are evaluating your project and we will support it (infrastructure support, support for project development, testing and verification, technical consultancy and contacts, etc.), but you will have the match these requirements'... Or better yet, this institution will call for support for a certain number of projects in a large number of fields each year in order to mature the technological readiness phases needed for the future needs of the Turkish Armed Forces. For example, it will announce a support program for the development of fixed-wing UAVs for frigates. Let's say 10 startups will apply for this program. The committee will evaluate these applications, either continue with 2 of them or group some of these startups together to work together.
Each of these does not need to turn into an end system or a purchase. However, as a whole, it will both pull startups up and start to create technological capability accumulation. In the future, the force will be able to benefit from adapting these ready-made capability sets extended to the end system it needs, and will be provided with experience supported by many test-evaluation phases.
Of course, there are various funding sources and procedures for supporting projects. I wish that the part of this fragmented structure related to the defense industry and aerospace will have a stronger and more disciplined structure.
One of the things we are constantly discussing is limited resources and prioritization. The second is the subsystem procurement problems encountered in many end-system development processes. We need to use not only money but also other sources more efficiently. With limited resources, maybe a project that has been waiting for years finally gets implemented, but even then, development processes can be prolonged due to other problems. Maybe not in every program, but in a significant number of some. The authority in need is the Ministry of Defense and the Turkish army. Then we need to work on models that will use these resources much more effectively and deepen capabilities in areas of need.
