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EP 99 — AI Strategy Corporation's David Mroczka On Cutting U.S. Army Tech Scouting From 12 Months To 2 Weeks

Written by Jon Forisha | May 28, 2026

What does it take to scout 150 dual-use companies for the U.S. Army in six months when the existing process takes 10 to 12 months for a fraction of that volume? David Mroczka built the platform that did it, and the numbers are hard to argue with. 94% acceleration, 96% cost savings, and an eightfold lift on a process that fails 80 to 90 percent of the time.

David Mroczka, Founder and CEO of AI Strategy Corporation, tells Dave how his time running the country's largest privately-owned test lab, where his team ran over 15,000 programs in seven years, taught him exactly how technologies die in the valley of death. The fix became 9-HI™, a human-first AI platform that profiles a company across three dimensions of risk, the product, the team, and the market application. Most defense tech founders only understand one third of that problem set.

Topics discussed:

  • Six-month U.S. Army demonstration that scouted 150 companies with 94% acceleration and 96% cost savings
  • Cutting tech assessment cycles from 10-12 months down to under two weeks
  • Why technology is only one third of the risk in a defense startup
  • The three-axis 9-HI™ model of product, team of stakeholders, and market application
  • Lessons from running 15,000 defense test programs at the largest private test lab in the U.S.
  • Why 85-90% of corporate AI deployments fail to hit ROI
  • The "human intelligence" design choice behind not automating decisions away
  • Building a marketplace and lead-investor fund on top of 150 profiled companies
  • Working around government shutdowns, continuing resolutions, and OTAs not aligned to progress

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