Ministry of Defence

Case Study

Ministry of Defence

The Ministry of Defence is the United Kingdom’s government department responsible for the implementation of government defence policy and innovation and is also the headquarters for the British Armed Forces. The MOD’s principal objectives are to defend the United Kingdom and its interests and to strengthen international peace and stability.

The MoD Centre of Defence Enterprise (CDE) is the first point of contact for inventors with a new process or innovation that has a potential defence application. They are the gateway between the MoD and the outside world, ensuring that front line forces have the very best battle-winning technologies for the future.

Innovation is an important part of the MoD’s work; innovation is a key drive for responding quickly to new threats as they emerge and evolve. The timely execution of new initiatives is of imperative importance.

The Challenge

The Centre for Defence Enterprise (CDE) collaborates with a community that allows them to deliver cutting edge equipment and technologies for the front line. It was recognised internally that the process of dealing with ideas to production was a lengthy and inefficient process. The CDE decided that it needed to improve its supplier collaboration process, so that it did not miss opportunities to provide the front line with that much needed competitive advantage, through cutting edge equipment and technologies.

The MoD operates from a number of global bases therefore they needed a flexible multi-territory service platform to connect, communicate and collaborate with people and organisations across the world. The MoD had to be certain the company that would implement their new system be up to their high security standards.

Quantiv Solution

We started by focussing on the CDE’s experiences, mapping their complex supplier interaction processes. We then created a secure and robust commerce platform to substantially improve their innovation capabilities.

We modelled these processes onto the Quantiv Commerce platform developing a service portal which is their secure online submission system. The portal has been designed to enable the inventor community to draw out the key aspects of the ideas that they were submitting so that the MOD’s assessors will be looking for. A ‘traffic light system’ then allows critical information to be processed quickly and efficiently on a global scale both at GCHQ and at ‘front line’ locations, accelerating the delivery of the best inventions.

The Result

The application of Quantiv’s commerce platform allows the MoD to connect and collaborate with the ‘inventor’ community of individuals and organisations over the globe, allowing timely development of new technology- ultimately saving lives on the front line.

Centre for Defence Enterprise

See the CDE’s website here