Homeland Security Makes a Wish List

Unlike airplanes, buses and trains don't typically carry black boxes, the indestructible devices that record data while a vehicle is in motion. Visual Defence, a Canadian company working with the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, hopes to change that with its SecurEye system. The device consists of a camera and a small metal box that can store up to 250 hours of video, withstand C-4 explosions, and survive for eight minutes in a petroleum fire burning at 1,700F without losing a single frame of footage.

On Apr. 27 the device will become the first graduate of Secure. The DHS program is designed to help speed the development of national security products. It's structured similarly to private sector initiatives like Procter & Gamble's (PG) Connect + Develop website. The site lists products P&G hopes others will invent, in effect creating markets for products before they exist. It's a way of crowdsourcing innovation—and outsourcing research and development budgets. "The government thinks it needs to pay for everything" from prototype to production, says Tom Cellucci, DHS's first chief commercialization officer and the creator of Secure. Yet many businesses are willing to finance projects on their own if they believe there's a market for them, he says.