Category Archives: Technology

Forbes

How Technology Is Changing The Way Millennials Name Their Babies Forbes What is it with computer programmers and their apparent allergy to plain English? Cartoon by Shannon Wheeler. See more cartoons: No Good Ever Comes From Engaging Internet Trolls · Gallery ...

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How Technology Is Changing The Way Millennials Name Their Babies - Forbes

BBC News

RBS cuts hundreds of technology jobs BBC News RBS is shedding nearly 250 posts, as part of an overhaul of its back-office operations. The bank said a net 92 full-time staff would be affected, while 154 contractor roles will be lost later this year. It is understood that most of the posts are ... and more »

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RBS cuts hundreds of technology jobs - BBC News

RIO GRANDE VALLEY, Texas - The U.S. Mexico border spans nearly 1,954 miles. Although many agents try to prevent people or drugs from crossing. Agents may not be able to stop all crossings at all times, that's when they turn to technology.

This past month, many vendors expecting to sell something to the federal government. From the latest weapons, surveillance, drones, etc. some get together to discuss the future of protecting the border. Thats what brought us to the 2017 Border Security Expo. Its a place where industry professionals meet to see the latest in keeping our borders safe.

Event Organizer John Moriarty says theres a renewed sense of interest in the border security. Oftentimes, border communities like the Rio Grande Valley may never know what technology is being used today. At this expo, the public is not allowed only buyers and sellers. We got special access. This is glimpse what we found.

A camera specifically designed to look for residue of explosive narcotics and chemical warfare agents. An autonomous drone that will film/livestream people trespassing into an area. Rubber weapons used for practicing purposes. Surveillance systems such as cameras, radars, lighting equipment.

Theres nearly 160 vendors here border agents and local law enforcement. Many of these items will not be sold and will likely remain as prototypes. Some are already used today and they are here to remind their customers that their systems are still the best.

Well wed like to assist the border in doing security and surveillance, says Doug Carey from IEC Infrared Systems.

Theres some interest in D.C. in using our products adding our products to the mix, comments David Schnell from LRAD.

Traditionally youd expect this type of event near the border. Its the only one dedicated specifically for the US. Mexico Border. Its taking place hundreds of miles away from the actual border.

San Antonio is the closest we could get to a sizable venue and a city that is easy enough to travel to for people from around the country, says Moriarty.

But its not just about the technology. Border agents discuss their latest statistics. Those with proposals for a border wall show up not sure if the same leaders would see their wall proposals first.

There are visitors making sure that people remember that despite the latest technology, human lives are at stake.

Such is the case with Erica Aguilar. Her husband lost his life protecting the border. She believes, the industry believes in protecting America or our borders. That is why they create the equipment they create.

There are those fighting for what they believe and there are those trying to keep the border safe. Either way they unite to make a difference.

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Technology on the Border, Pt. 1 - RGVProud

KING 5's Ryan Takeo reports

Ryan Takeo, KING 11:12 PM. PDT May 08, 2017

T-Mobile pledged to have5Gnationwide by 2020. (Photo: KING)

This is the future, Grant Castle said, beaming while showing a large bay station thats about waist-high.

The bay is Bellevue-based telecom company T-Mobiles 5G testing. 5G is the next generation of wireless speeds. This month T-Mobile pledged to have 5G nationwide by 2020.

Dont be fooled by the large size of the bay, warned Castle, vice president of engineering services and QA at T-Mobile.

We also have a phone, but the test phone is currently the same size as the bay station, he said. It shrinks in half about every year, so were getting close.

5G has been the industry buzzword for the past few years. Developers say speeds could reach anywhere from 100 to 1,000 times faster than 4G speeds.

T-Mobile competitors like giants AT&T and Verizon have claimed theyll be in the 5G field as early as 2018.

The 5G standard doesn't exist yet there are some companies out there trying to push that and get out ahead for the standards are written, said Castle. Our goal is to work with the industry get the right standards to find and then we're going to roll out in the 2019, 2020 timeframe.

Castle admits the possible applications are difficult to picture because they havent been created yet, like instant translation and live virtual reality working in real-time. Other applications include improving augmented reality and virtual reality. He added 5G could help preserve battery life and help latency issues related to virtual reality headsets.

In today's world, it's way more than you'll ever need, right? But for tomorrow's world when everybody has something as augmented reality when everyone else heads up displays that's got to be something that's important, said Castle.

But technology expert Charlie Amadeus of GeekServ warned of the 5G hype.

There's been no determinate policy for what the protocol looks like, he said.

Those industry protocols could be in place in the next couple of years, said Castle.

Amadeus said once the protocols are established, it normally takes five years for a new generation of technology to be ready for the masses.

Thats just how it is with technology early adoption and then that mainstream wave finally picks it up, and then your grandma uses it, he said.

Castle feels confident in his companys timetable.

I've no doubt about that, he said.

2017 KING-TV

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T-Mobile in race for 5G technology - KING5.com

As real estate professionals, we are constantly inundated with webinars, Facebook ads and emails promoting the latest technologies designed to betterour business.

As a licensed real estate instructor and educator, I strongly encourage agents to stay current with industry trends and advancements in technology, and Im an advocate of technology designed to help with business efficiency; work smarter, not harder, as the mantra states.

While I agree that technology is essential to our success, its time to get back to basics.

Despite the countless tools we have at our disposal, there seems to be something inherently missing from our industry these days: great people skills.

We have created an entirely new language consisting of emojis and hashtags; texting and private messaging has become the expected mode of communication, and people rarely seem to actually answer phone calls.

People become oddly bold behind the safety of their keyboard, and they hide behind avatars and caricatures. Weve all read inappropriate and disrespectful posts and comments on social media that incite anger and hurt feelings, often created by people who would not dare verbalize those same words to the recipients face.

Common courtesy and excellent customer service seem to be virtues of the past, andthe speed with which one can post a negative review on social media, Yelp! or Google should be a new category in the Guinness Book of World Records.

Sadly, people arent as quick to write a positive review or give props to a fellow colleague for doing more than the expected.

We may market and sell one of the biggest products available, but a listing is worthless without buyers. Without practicing proper etiquette and communication with these buyers, we fail.

Without buyers, we are simply out of business.

As a real estate professional, you must have the mindset of a small business owner. Twenty percentof small business owners fail within the first year, and 50 percentfail within the first five years; this is usually due to lack of focus, lack of passion and poor marketing.

What you really need to know is that 19 percentfailed because they were out-competed, and 14percent failed because they ignored their customers.

In an industry that currently boasts over two million professionals, the competition is strong. According to the most recent NAR member profile report, 20 percent of members had less than one year of experience in 2016; 22 percent of members with less than two years of experience earned a gross income of less than $10,000 in 2015 and 26 percent of those were under the age of 30.

In fact, gross member income in 2015 was only $39,200, regardless of age.

If you want to stay away from becoming another underwhelming statistic, I propose that you incorporate the following key ingredients into your business model:

1. Common courtesy.While I should not have to spell out what this entails, it bears mentioning. If you are going to be late to an appointment, text or call the person waiting; if you are not going to show a listing that was scheduled, call the listing agent to cancel.

The homeowner may have had to leave with her toddler and the dog after spending two hours preparing for your tour, or maybe the sellers are an elderly couple with health issues. The point is that you must return all calls, texts and emails in a timely fashion.

If you are going to be unavailable for an extended period of time, utilize your outgoing voicemail and autoresponders to let folks know when they can expect to hear from you.

Communicate using correct grammar and punctuation, do not send texts or emails in haste or anger and most importantly always be kind.

Rememberthat everyone youencounter is a potential client.

2. Send thank you notes.Handwritten notes are a lost art, and folks barely know what their own handwriting looks like these days.

Send a thank you note to your customers after the listing or buyer agreement is signed; hand one to the other agent at the closing table; send one to every person that sends you a referral, whether or not it results in business for you.

Did the contractor do some extra work? Did a colleague cover for you while you were sick? Those people went the extra mile for you, so send them a card and follow up with a thankful shout out on social media.

Thank you notes should definitely be part of your daily prospecting.

3. Listen more than you speak. This a common mistake made by those who arenew to the business; eager to prove their worth and knowledge, they chatter endlessly. Instead, they should ask a question and patiently wait for the answer.

What is the clients true goal and motivation? Additional questions can help peel back layers and get necessary answers.

Taking notes and making eye contact are also important.

4. Be authentic.Only relate in personal ways if youve found a common thread; be empathetic only if you can truly share in their emotions.

Be honest and admit when you do not know an answer. Assure your customer that youwill research their concern and follow up with an answer.

No matter how amazing the latest technology is, old-fashioned courtesy and communication is what willget you ahead in this business.

Longevity in this industry is derived from a healthy blend of technological tools, punctuality, honesty and excellent interpersonal communication skills.

Christine Williams, CRS, is a real estate instructor and coach with Accredited Real Estate Institute. Connect with her on LinkedIn.

Email Christine.

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What technology can't do for your real estate business - Inman.com

Halstead CEO: Technology Can't Replace A Great Real Estate Agent Forbes Tech enabled real estate brokerages like Redfin and Compass may be very hot these days, however, back in 1984, Diane M. Ramirez and Clark Halstead had already pitched and raised VC funding to The Halstead Property Company from investors like ...

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Halstead CEO: Technology Can't Replace A Great Real Estate Agent - Forbes

Everywhere you turn, businesses are reinventing themselves around new apps, new digital processes and new ways of reaching customers with 21st-century products and services.

At the end of last year, CIO Magazine ran this article listing eight top digital transformation stories, which included household names like JetBlue, Target, Wal-Mart, Subway and Domino's. Heres an excerpt:

CIOs are spending 18 percent of their budget in support of digitalization, a figure expected to increase to 28 percent by 2018, Gartner analyst Andy Rowsell-Jones told CIO.com in October after surveying 2,600 CIOs worldwide. Going digital often means significant challenges and consequences, says Rowsell-Jones, adding that companies are overhauling their business models and allocating more of their IT budgets to catch digital disruptors.

Living in Michigan, I find the Domino's story to be especially compelling. Watch this video to see how the pizza-making business has become so much more than baking cheese, dough and tomato sauce by using technology to grow the number of customers, improve service and increase revenue.

At the same time, time technology is being applied to virtually every global industry in new innovative ways. For example, the global construction industry is using mobile technology to save hundreds of millions of dollars on changes to construction designs and the building process. This Market Watch story explains how.

Exclusive Interview With Andrew Haggard

In order to dig deeper into this topic and learn how more about how these changes are actually occurring behind the curtain, I turned to Andrew Haggard, who is a leading business transformation expert from PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC).

Mr. Haggard is a PwC director based in Boston who specializes in IT strategy and business transformation all across the USA. Prior to joining PwC, Andrews experience includes over three years as a senior manager at EMC consulting, helping clients build out technology infrastructure in the public and private sectors. Earlier in his career, he was the founder of White Mountain Strategy.

Dan Lohrmann (DL): What are the biggest obstacles you see for businesses transforming and becoming more innovative using technology?

Andrew Haggard (AH): One of the biggest obstacles for companies looking to leverage technology to innovate their business is a gap in the investment necessary by business and technology leaders to prioritize scarce time in structured strategy and planning process. Without this thoughtful coordination and prioritization, it is challenging for teams to create the capacity for piloting innovative capabilities and building into a technology blueprint that will deliver both near-term and long-term business results. With continuous pressure to deliver new projects, maintain the existing technology platforms, and address emerging enhancement and reporting requirements, tasks will always fill up the available capacity. Therefore it is critical to shape demand for technology resources, limit or eliminate low-value add work, and create accountability to focus to deliver on the foundational improvements and new business technology capabilities that have the highest probability to generate a return on investment and move the business forward.

DL: What are the main impediments to successfully changing the way business and IT collaborate to deliver value?

The biggest business and IT collaboration challenge faced by our clients is a lack of a clear alignment across business stakeholders and between business and IT teams of what capabilities are a true enterprise priority. Without a blueprint of the future, and a clear roadmap to sequence new capabilities there will be ongoing pressure to address the squeaky wheel, spin off shadow IT projects, and generally sub-optimize a companys technology investments.

Another issue arises when the roles of business and IT team members in business technology delivery are not clear. We recently were conducting an IT capability assessment at a mid-sized pharmaceutical company and we interviewed over two dozen business leaders to gain perspective on how they interacted with IT and what were the gaps in IT capability delivery. Over half the issues and pain points that were raised when about how technology capability is delivered were business process, policy or requirements issues.

Business Stakeholder: We dont get the reports and data that we need from our systems.

Interviewer: What reports and data are the highest priority to track and manage your business operations?

Business Stakeholder: There is not a lot of agreement on that across the leadership team. I would say it varies.

So here is a company that is moving fast, with significant gaps in their ability to track business performance in their core systems, yet the leadership team has not fully articulated what are their priority metrics and how they want to measure their business. This was a clear example of the need to invest the time to gain alignment and clearly define what the priority data needs for the business are before trying to craft a technical solution. The technical solution, in this one instance a standard financial dashboard, is technically solvable. But the requirements needed to be prioritized, clearly written and testable before beginning to patch together a solution.

DL: What are the biggest challenges to change the way companies use technology in the traditional areas of people, process and technology?

AH: For people, the biggest challenge to deliver leading business technology capabilities is that the needs of a modern IT delivery model are evolving, and the people with the skills required to operate in the emerging landscape are scarce and challenging to hire and retain. As companies shift to more modern platforms, invest heavily in Web and digital capabilities, and elevate the maturity of the planning and collaboration processes between IT and business leaders, a new set of both hard and soft skills are required. Skills required by companies modernizing the way they deliver new capabilities requires more than just converting Test Analysts positions to Test Engineers as one example, or simply growing your Web developer teams. Successful transformation also needs to be a more comprehensive change effort that includes both business and IT stakeholders. Skills that future IT organizations will need to invest in more heavily include architect roles, digital skill sets, data scientists, test automation expertise, developers adept at agile operations, business analyst with platform specialties, and technology vendor management, to name a few.

The biggest challenge in the area of process design, both business processes that are integrated with system design and configuration as well as IT delivery processes, is to make effective change that is connected to a broader design. The most successful companies start with a macro, high-level vision of how all the processes should fit together in the end state, then prioritize the levers of change that will make the biggest impact and create the most value. Companies that do detailed process design incrementally and use the do learn do iterative approach to process improvements have the ability to course-correct and also see incremental value that creates more momentum for more constructive change.

One issue is that we often see in addressing technology is teams drilling down quickly into a discussion on the merits of various tools, SaaS solutions, and software packages before investing in a clear definition of what the priority business requirements are. Or business stakeholders will come to IT with a request to deploy a specific solution. Technology investments should be evaluated based on the most efficient way to deliver the required business capability. This requires involvement of the enterprise and solution architecture teams to evaluate design options, make / buy assessments, and potential for re-use of existing code or to apply the solution more broadly to meet similar business demands. Skipping straight to a tool solution does not provide the latitude to evaluate the solution options in the broader context of the entire business technology portfolio.

DL: What are common characteristics of leadership teams of companies that have successfully undertaken significant change to the way business technology is delivered?

AH: Companies that are successful share a few traits:

DL: What trends do you see in 2017 that are different than five years ago?

AH: Emerging technology delivery trends we see now include:

DL: What are the challenges looking forward?

AH: The first movers in technology transformation are getting evaluating and getting ahead of the following trends:

DL: I want to thank Andrew for taking the time to provide us answers and a glimpse into what it takes to successfully build innovation and cutting-edge technology in business transformation.

Closing Thoughts

You may be asking: Where are the government examples?

While I firmly believe that these same business transformations principles apply to the public and the private sector, I deliberately focused on the private-sector digital transformation examples in this piece. Later this summer, I plan to come back to this topic with compelling government examples from around the world.

One more resource to help. This MIT Sloan School of Management article offers nine elements of digital transformation. I urge you to think through these important elements as you move forward.

Finally, I really like this CNBC.com article which describes why Malcolm Gladwell thinks we all should slow down and do less, in order to be great at what we do.

I think Gladwells insights apply to this business transformation process using technology. We need to take the needed time to engage the business as Andrew Haggard describes in his answers.

If you do, what will be the result? You will see more effective digital transformation and the business benefits displayed by the leading companies who keep reinventing their customer service.

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How to Transform Business Using Technology - Government Technology (blog)

by Reyna Harvey, Eyewitness News

A group of local seniors learn about new technologies to better communicate with their friends and family. (KBAK/KBFX/Reyna Harvey)

Seniors can have a pretty big learning curve when it comes to using technology.

The residents at Brookdale Senior Living are shortening the gap on that curve with the swipe of an iPad screen.

The workshop is taught by Technical instructor Brenda Malin.

Residents are shown how to use everything from iPads, social media and mobile devices .

They also meet in small groups and take monthly trips to the Apple Store to have their tech questions answered by experts.

The goal of the workshop is to help improve their quality of life.

The seniors plan to use their new found tech skills to help one another.

"I can depend on the other residents, if they know the answer to be able to lean over and show the person besides them how to do it," says Malin.

If you would like more information about the program you can visit brookdale.com.

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Local seniors take on new technology - Bakersfield Now

Jennifer Jolly, Special for USA Today Published 11:54 a.m. ET May 7, 2017 | Updated 11 hours ago

Columnist Jennifer Jolly shows you the coolest tech for Mother's Day. Jennifer Jolly, Special for USA Today

From unicorn roses to selfie drones, here are unusual gadget gifts for mom.(Photo: James Nickerson for USA TODAY)

Hey! Mothers Dayis right around the corner (May 14th). From Unicorn roses to selfie drones, here are all the gadget gifts no one else would ever think of except a mom who covers tech for a living.

Moms like me love to capture every moment of our familys lives. But were never in the photos because were always taking them! Heres a hands-free hack to take snapshots and selfies to new heights: the Rova Selfie Drone ($299.00). Just launch this frisbee-sized flyer into the air and its built-in obstacle avoidance technology keeps it from crashing down on the kitchen table while it catches all the best angles. She can even share the photos straight to social media right from the app, because if it didnt happen on Instagram, it didnt really happen, right?

LifePrint is an augmented reality photo printer that creates great still shots.(Photo: LifePrint)

Moms a family photo nut but I bet shes never printed a video before. LifePrint ($129.95) is an augmented reality photo printer that creates great still shots, but when viewed through the LifePrint app, the images come alive into animated videos like magic. It prints videos from Facebook, Instagram, Apple Live Photos, and more.

Rainbow roses from F-T-D.(Photo: Jennifer Jolly special for USA Today)

Wait, flowers? Arent flowers pretty standard for Mothers Day? Not the rainbow roses from FTD making headlines as the newest must-have in the whole unicorn craze. How do you get the petals to be so different? Magic. Duh.

ProFlowers has a pretty enchanting take on fresh flowers this year too. They partnered with All Across Africa to offer handwoven basket vases ($29.99 and up), created by artists in Rwanda. No two are ever the same, and by giving one to mom youre also providing clothes, shoes, healthcare, school supplies, and all kinds of other support for the talented creators who made them.

Heres another great go-to for matching your one-of-a-kind mom with a one-of-a-kind gift from some of the worlds most talented artists like her own child! Grab a piece of your own childhood art, pick out a gorgeous frame and setting, and give her the most personalized, meaningful piece of wall art shes ever seen. Or use your own likeness for a stunning custom print ($29.99 and up at Minted.com).

For the gadget-loving mom who covets her smartphone (guilty!), check out these beautifully bold new Symmetry cases from Otterbox ($39.95). Theyre built to protect and impress, just like mom, and theyre designed by some of the top fashionistas on the planet, so mom can keep her digital lifeline safe and secure and sport some sexy style at the same time.

Mom might have rocked a fanny pack in the glory days of the 1990s, but today, Mobovidas Bristol Belt Bags ($85.00 and up) are the hip, fashionable, modern version of on-the-go carry-alls. Its made of luxurious leather and has pockets for all the things mom totes along, like her keys, phone, and even a built-in phone charger in case she runs out of juice but still needs to check in.

Okay, so your guitar or drums lessons mom paid for didnt amount to much of a music career, but you can still serenade her with a personalized tune all her own with Songfinch ($200). You fill out a Mad Lib-style questionnaire to give the artists some inspiration, and Songfinchs professional songwriters will craft the ballad just for her. You can even pick the genre, and after its made, mom can download, share, and show it off to whoever she wants, scoring you big points along the way.

For moms with musical aspirations of their own, the One light keyboard is the fast-track to success.(Photo: Smartpiano)

For moms with musical aspirations of their own, the One light keyboard ($269.99) is the fast-track to success. This app-enabled instrument guides her through lessons in no time, and before you know it shell be keying her way through some seriously impressive tunes. The keys light up to teach each skill in the most intuitive way possible, and it includes built-in speakers and works with both iOS and Android phones.

It goes without saying, but everyone once in awhile mom needs to unwind with a nice glass of wine, so what better way to help her enjoy her me time than with monthly deliveries of the best wine the world has to offer? Wincs monthly wine boxes (starting at $13 per bottle) are hand-picked by top wine tasters and are sourced from as close as California or as far away as France, South Africa, and even New Zealand.

Nimb , a stylish smart ring that instantly notifies you, and even emergency responders, if shes ever in trouble.(Photo: Nimb Inc.)

Give mom a gift that will let her know that she really does mean the world to you with Nimb ($129), a stylish smart ring that instantly notifies you, and even emergency responders, if shes ever in trouble. The ring works hand-and-hand with an app to send out instant alerts if an emergency strikes, and shows you exactly where she is. Its a little peace of mind in a crazy world, and mom will definitely appreciate that.

Jennifer Jollyis an Emmy Award-winning consumer tech contributor and host of USA TODAY's digital video show TECH NOW. E-mail her at jj@techish.com. Follow her on Twitter@JenniferJolly.

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Mother's Day: The best gifts for the mom who loves technology - USA TODAY

WRIGHT-PATTERSON AIR FORCE BASE

When the Air Forces most advanced F-22 stealth fighters lost their cockpit displays crossing the international dateline over the Pacific, the phone of C. Douglas Ebersole began to ring.

Ebersole was an aerospace engineer at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, which at the time in February 2007 was in the middle of a major snowstorm.

I got the call at home and they said, Hey, youve got to got to get into the office right away, he remembered.

Ebersole, 58, of Beavercreek, was the point man at the Air Force Research Laboratory, ending his 35-year career late last month, the last two years as the civilian executive director of the agency. His successor hasnt been announced.

Brig. Gen. William T. Cooley became AFRLs military commander last Tuesday.

Ebersole has had a front row seat watching technology AFRL has worked on show up on the front lines.

In January 1991, when F-117 Nighthawk stealth attack jets bombed Baghdad at night and escaped unscathed in a barrage of anti-aircraft fire, Ebersole watched the campaign unfold on television. He had more than a passing interest in the once secret jet: He was the lead flight technology engineer on the program at AFRL.

Those kinds of groundbreaking projects are what AFRL has focused on in its labs and directorates at Wright-Patterson and in Florida, New Mexico, New York and Virginia, according to scientists.

He was on the hook a decade ago to find out what was wrong with the F-22 and fix it. Working with engineers and aerospace giant Lockheed Martin, they found a fix within a week and the planes continued to Japan, he said.

Sometimes, you learn from your mistakes, right? he said

The Wayne High School alumnus has Purdue University and University of Dayton engineering degrees, a Massachusetts Institute of Technology masters of business administration degree and was a senior executive fellow at Harvard University.

From his former vantage point as the highest-ranking civilian leader and assistant to the AFRL commander, he helped oversee a $4.9 billion budget and 6,300 scientists and engineers.

More than half the AFRL budget is derived from customers such as contractors and government agencies to fund lab research.

C. Douglas Ebersole was recently named the Air Force Research Lab executive director. Staff Writer

Outside funding rose to $2.7 billion last year, compared to about $2 billion in 2014, he said. The demand is particularly strong at the Information Directorate at Rome, N.Y., he said.

Hopefully, the trend will continue, Ebersole said. That brings a lot of work into AFRL and I think it demonstrates the value that maybe these external customers see, which might be tied to telling our story a little bit better.

In recent years, stop gap funding measures in the absence of a fiscal year budget for months have caused turbulence in steering the future of the agency, he noted.

Theres some areas we want to place some big bets and its just hard to do that if you dont have that solid five-year budget plan coming out of Capitol Hill, he said. Thats probably the biggest part is just not knowing the future.

Wright-Patterson is headquarters to AFRL and has four of nine directorates: Aerospace Systems, Materials and Manufacturing, Sensors, the 711th Human Performance Wing.

AFRL has placed big bets on future hypersonic and directed-energy research and autonomous systems, resulting in remotely piloted drones to fly in tandem with manned aircraft.

Among its marque programs, the agency has tested hypersonic vehicles for a future high-speed strike weapon and has focused on creating a laser weapon that can fit on a fighter jet by the next decade.

AFRL has urged researchers to pursue more patents. The push was started after a high-level Air Force leader thought AFRL wasnt producing as many patents compared to their counterparts in Army and Navy research labs, according to Ebersole.

Thats something I was the champion for here in AFRL, and weve made progress there, and weve really tried to decompose what is the problem, he said.

Since then, AFRL recognized researchers with a wall of fame of sorts inside the agency, taking note of patented research work.

The first thing that became evident was we werent celebrating it, he said.

The agency hired tech scouts to comb the laboratories and work with researchers to discover what work coming out of the lab might lead to patents and invention disclosures, the first step to a years-long process to obtain a patent.

Sometimes a researcher doesnt see novel, he said. He or she doesnt really realize the work that theyre doing is patent-able.

Along with tech scouts, the agency hired paralegals to work on the paperwork for invention disclosures and patents.

One thing about researchers (is) they may not want to write a patent, write an invention disclosure, but they love talking about their work, he said. And thats been the game changer is to just do the work a Ph.D. white coat researcher doesnt want to do because he or she just wants to do his work.

In fiscal year 2015, the agency recorded 108 invention disclosures, and 101 the following year, figures show. So far this fiscal year, which started Oct. 1, the agency has reported 84.

Last fiscal year, AFRL had 49 patents, the most recent numbers available.

The science and technology agency also has pushed taking technology developed in the lab and putting it on the commercial market to lower costs and build the defense industrial base.

AFRL has an entrepreneurship program for scientists and engineers who may leave the agency and set up small businesses for work started in the laboratory.

During Ebersoles tenure, AFRL also opened a satellite office in downtown Dayton this spring to put researchers outside the fence into collaboration with technical experts. This month, nearly 40 academic and industry researchers around the world will explore challenges in autonomy with AFRL scientists inside the Dayton office for three months.

The next project will explore augmented reality, joining virtual reality with a real-world environment.

Top leaders interest in AFRL

The agencys research has interest among the highest-ranking Air Forces leaders. In February, AFRL representatives met with Gen. David L. Goldfein, the four-star commander of the military branch, and Acting Secretary of the Air Force Lisa S. Disbrow.

AFRL leaders have met with the top two Air Force leaders every six months or so since the first session in August 2014.

It really has been able to communicate the value of AFRL to the most senior leadership in the Air Force, Ebersole said. The fact that we have that communication loop with them, it does allow us to get re-vectored. It allows us to get aligned with the warfighter.

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AFRL leader had front row seat to world's best technology - Dayton Daily News