In a modern, connected military, software is crucial to every step of every operation, from planning to coordination and logistics to target engagement. But as threats and requirements change, software needs to change too. If requirements change faster than developers can deploy new code, the entire system can break down.
Rise8, a Service-Disabled Veteran-Owned Small Business (SDVOSB), was founded to change that paradigm.
Founder and CEO Bryon Kroger, a U.S. Air Force Veteran, is spearheading initiatives to deliver software solutions up to 25 times faster than traditional methods. Rise8’s approach aims to overcome the bureaucratic delays and cumbersome process hurdles that hamper conventional software development contracts.
“We’re really focused on the mission first,” said Kroger at AFA’s Air, Space & Cyber Conference in September. “What are these Airmen and Guardians actually trying to do? Then we work backwards from that.”
Continuously delivering software updates enables Airmen and Guardians to provide real-time feedback to developers, allowing a continuous conversation that Kroger says is key to creating software that genuinely serves the needs of the Service Members employing those tools in the field.
Rise8 achieves faster delivery by establishing a continuous path between the developers and the production environment—regardless of classification levels. Software is developed, tested, and deployed into operational use continuously and without delay, achieving Continuous Authority to Operate (cATO) after obtaining the initial Authorization to Operate (ATO). As an output of the Risk Management Framework, an ATO is a formal declaration that a system meets the necessary security and privacy standards for deployment on a network.
Under legacy approaches, the exercise repeats for major updates or when the authorization expires, adding weeks, months, or even years between the time a requirement is established, and a software solution obtains an ATO to deploy. By integrating development, security, testing, and operations, however, Rise8 can “ship” new code into production in hours or even minutes, enabling continuous, rapid improvement through a direct feedback loop with users.
“That gives you the feedback that you need to create beautifully designed software for Airmen and Guardians,” Kroger said.
Modernizing software is only part of the solution. To make rapid modernization possible, Kroger said, one must take the time to understand the bureaucracy and processes that slow software development.
“Just like computer systems, you can’t hack a system you don’t understand,” Kroger explained. “Take the time to understand the bureaucracy … It’s really figuring out how to navigate that.”
Just as an “ethical hacker” must understand a system’s flaws to identify and eliminate them, Kroger has found that learning the software acquisition system inside and out has proven invaluable in seeing how to use it to deliver effective software more quickly.
Rise8’s agile software development approach is like the processes used by modern commercial software developers but adapted to provide the assurance needed for secure, sensitive government applications. Yet overcoming entrenched approaches is never easy, especially for users who have been told in the past that rapid development is not possible in the government context.
To help potential customers understand how that can be achieved, Kroger created Prodacity for the GovTech community where air, space, and other military and government professionals can learn from tested playbooks, real-world solutions, and a relentless commitment to action inside cautious, slow-moving organizations—without sales pitches and related theatrics.
Prodacity will bring together program managers, contracting specialists, CTOs, and CIOs from the Air Force, Space Force, and other Federal agencies, along with established systems integrators, to learn the modern alternative techniques to accelerating software development—without compromising security, reliability, or anything else.
Prodacity will expose participants to the secrets of rapid and continuous software development, deployment, and improvement in high-stakes environments, according to Rise8.
“Our purpose is to make the world work better,” Kroger said. “We envision a future where fewer bad things happen because of bad software.” And where good things happen continuously because users who know their field best are tightly integrated into the process of making software more efficient, useful, and effective every day.