The Department of the Air Force is currently undertaking multiple artificial intelligence-related initiatives, one of which is a generative AI chatbot called NIPRGPT. During her keynote address at the Potomac Officers Club’s 2024 Air Defense Summit, DAF Chief Information Officer Venice Goodwine shared how she’s approaching AI and gave an update on early NIPRGPT progress.
“What I’m thinking about AI from my perspective is how do I use AI for productivity use cases that give time back to airmen and guardians so they can do other things? It’s just that simple,” the 2024 Wash100 Award winner said to the McLean, Virginia audience.
The Air Force launched NIPRGPT in partnership with the Air Force Research Laboratory in June. The chatbot can converse with Air Force personnel and provide assistance with certain tasks. Goodwine said the first phases of getting the tool into the hands of warfighters are already underway.
“First we need to give a tool to our airmen and guardians so they can learn how to interact and understand the tool. So this is that digital literacy that we’re increasing. So we’re providing training, we’re providing webinars, and we provide them a tool and a capability on a limited scale so they can play with that tool for a period of time,” she explained.
Goodwine also held roundtable AI discussions with small and large businesses to better understand how organizations used large language models within their organizations.
“The goal is now we need to figure out what are the use cases that we actually need in the Air Force, and then how do we want to govern it? How do I choose to fund it and then scale it? And then how do I ensure that I have the skill for that as well?” Goodwine said.
Ultimately, AFRL will eventually release a request for proposals that can help the Air Force solve the use cases they’ve determined.
“Some of the things that we are looking at is what is the fully burdened cost of getting into the AI business?” the Air Force CIO shared.
Goodwine said she and her team are working to identify all of the possible ways forward with AI tools and LLMs, and the eventual RFP may help the Air Force decide which route to take.
“I’ve asked the team to think big picture, wide scale. If I just go straight to public, get a contract and say every airman and guardian can now just have a license to use LLMs and put the governance around it. Or if I go to the other scale, which now at AFRL I have my own GPUs, if I go that route, how do I create that model? So we are in the midst of doing all of that,” she said.
Goodwine said there is currently no timeline on when the experimentation phases will end or when an RFP may be issued.
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