Data intel startup Obviant taps Mike Madsen as first VP for national security

It’s no coincidence that decorated military pilot and former Defense Department executive and legislative liaison Mike Madsen is joining Obviant as the data intelligence startup’s first vice president for national security at a time when the government is moving to modernize the services’ approach to buying weapons and technology. 

“There’s a humongous appetite for acquisition reform,” Madsen told DefenseScoop in an exclusive interview Tuesday. “So, the time is right with this disruptive mindset right now to improve things and to digitize things. But a key element to that — it really is foundational — is doing these things with trust, transparency and accountability. And that’s one of the things that really resonated with me that Obviant brings to this broader effort.”

Obviant runs an artificial intelligence platform that injects and integrates data from thousands of disparate sources and provides DOD users with tools that enable role-based decision support, deeper transparency into funding pathways, the ability to map capability gaps to available solutions, and more.

Launched in 2021, the Arlington, Virginia, data intel firm markets products and services that are designed to simplify historically complex defense acquisition and go-to-market processes for companies that work with the military, and stakeholders in DOD.

“For Obviant, the special sauce is the data, but it’s really the fusion of the data and it’s the analytics. So we’re able to scrape publicly available information — whether it’s J-Books, appropriations tables, even news articles and press releases — and you can start to draw lines between all of those things, and start to find the intersections of that data, and then put it through the analysis, the analytics, and get a clear, nearly real-time site picture on what’s happening, from execution data, to budgeting data and programmatic information,” Madsen explained.

He pointed to several recent congressional proposals and policy moves, including Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth’s new acquisition transformation strategy, as evidence of new momentum around military procurement revamps. 

“All of these acquisition reform efforts are doable,” Madsen said. “They’re all tenable, but it has to be an environment of trust, transparency and accountability — and a big key to that is immediate access to information, new systems built on data-sharing and portfolio management, modern data architecture, interoperability and real-time access to execution information.” 

In early November, Obviant announced a new prototype award funded by the Defense Innovation Unit to supply “an operating platform for the team and an authoritative data source of truth for defense acquisition data.”

Madsen steered a number of initiatives to accelerate the delivery of emerging and existing technology to the forces as a leader of DIU, before exiting as acting director in 2023. Before that, he also served for years as the unit’s deputy director and director of strategic engagement.

Madsen joined the U.S. military in 1994. As an Air Force pilot, he flew the C-17 strategic transport aircraft.

“I spent most of my formative years in the Air Force as an operator, but then [also with] other things the last half of my career — focusing on legislative Affairs, programming, and [Cost Assessment and Program Evaluation, or CAPE] between command positions in the Air Force. And then I went on to the 809 Congressional Advisory Panel that was focused on streamlining defense acquisition,” he noted.

Reflecting back on his time at CAPE about a decade ago, Madsen pointed out that the team back then had to use “sharp pencils and spreadsheets,” and lead weekslong data calls to compile all the information needed for proper analyses from often sprawling and disconnected sources.

“And now we can do it with the push of a button — in two minutes — to get that real-time execution data that gives a clear picture of what the funding landscape looks like and what the programmatic landscape looks like,” he said. 

With technology like Obviant’s, in his view, the government and its stakeholders are now in a position where they can also start evaluating cost tradeoffs across different new and disruptive technologies the military is prioritizing, like AI, autonomy, directed energy and hypersonics.

“It’s a very exciting time, and that’s one of the things that really excites me — it’s the technology — and the true impact that it’s going to have for increasing the efficiency and effectiveness,” Madsen told DefenseScoop. “And look, this is all about getting the best technology in the hands of the warfighter.”