Our Aim
In-Q-Tel identifies and partners with companies developing cutting-edge technologies to help deliver these solutions to the Central Intelligence Agency and the broader U.S. Intelligence Community (IC) to further their missions.
Launched by the CIA in 1999 as a private, independent, not-for-profit organization, IQT was created to bridge the gap between the technology needs of the Intelligence Community and new advances in commercial technology. With limited insight into fast-moving private sector innovation, the IC needed a way to find emerging companies, and, more importantly, to work with them. IQT, as a private company with deep ties to the commercial world, is able to attract and build relationships with technology entrepreneurs outside the reach of the IC. In fact, more than 75 percent of the companies that IQT works with had never done business with the government before partnering with IQT.
Similar to a corporate strategic fund like those found at Intel Corporation, Motorola and Disney, IQT operates for the strategic – rather than financial – benefits to its customers in the IC. IQT targets its technology engagements based on a deep understanding of the challenges of our Intelligence customers to deliver solutions that will provide strategic advantage to the mission of intelligence.
To best serve its customers, In-Q-Tel plays multiple roles:
- A technology accelerator, fostering development and introduction of technologies needed by the Intelligence Community
- A capabilities builder, helping nascent commercial technologies mature into commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS) products the government can buy
- An idea lab and forum for innovation, providing the Intelligence Community with insight and access to both new technologies and leading innovators and thinkers
- A strategic investment firm, investing in companies and helping build businesses into reliable providers for the Intelligence Community
