Boeing to Tap Employee Ideas for Defense Unit Accelerator

Boeing will launch a business accelerator with the goal of finding employees that have ideas for technology products that the company could commercialize, the St. Louis Business Journal reported Thursday.

Brian Feldt writes the accelerator will fall within the company’s Defense, Space & Security segment and be based in St. Louis.

“It’s essentially a method for driving entrepreneurship and commercializing technology within Boeing,” Robert Sterling, a spokesman for Boeing’s Ventures program, told the Business Journal.

The company is searching for a senior manager to head the program, Feldt reports.

Northrop Grumman is another contractor that has looked to accelerators in an effort to identify future innovations, with the company having partnered with DreamIt Ventures to search for new ideas in the healthcare space.

“Advances in healthcare are particularly dependent on advances in information technology,” said Amy Caro, vice president of health IT programs at Northrop.

Click here to read our previous story on Northrop’s role in that program.