Technology companies shouldn’t snub the military: Here’s why

If technology companies are reluctant to work with the military, the United States will not be able to maintain its’ global dominance, Anduril Industries Chairman Trae Stephens, told FOX Business on Friday.

“I believe that the United States is a serious competition right now with countries like Russia, China, Iran, North Korea to develop some of the most significant technologies for defense for the next century and this is something that we really have to win,” Stephens told Maria Bartiromo.

Stephens added there’s a marginal number of tech employees opposed to working with the defense community.

Because of this, technology companies have begun pushing back against the U.S. government. Google recently cancelled its contract with the Pentagon for an AI program because of pushback from its employees. Amazon and Microsoft also faced internal and external pressure for providing tools for law enforcement including border agents.

However, there is still a majority of workers that would be willing to pitch in if their leaders step up.

“I think that there is a very vocal minority that has a tendency to shout down people that believe different policy kind of ideas that they do,” he said. “Maybe not all but certainly a large number of engineers in Silicon Valley, in the tech community, would be happy to work with the government on problems of national significance if they believe that they have the support to do it.”