Carlos Del Toro, secretary of the Navy and a 2024 Wash100 awardee, shared that the Department of the Navy established a new council to help address adversarial foreign investment risks, coordinate and defend research efforts, advance supply chain integrity initiatives and safeguard innovation and technology.
He announced the formation of Maritime Economic Deterrence Executive Council, or MEDEC, at a panel discussion held Thursday in New York City, the Navy said Thursday.
“While the work to protect our defense industrial ecosystem by each organization is not new, bringing them together as a unified, focused council to address Maritime Economic Deterrence allows us to better synchronize our efforts and be leaders in the larger DoD Economic Deterrence initiative,” Del Toro told attendees.
The Navy secretary emphasized the risks posed by the compromise or loss of key technologies and products to businesses as well as data privacy risks.
“MEDEC is our Department’s acknowledgement of these risks, and represents our commitment to helping you identify and address them early, for the safety of our personnel, as well as the security of our allies and partners, depends on us getting this right,” Del Toro said.
He said MEDEC is co-chaired by Vice Adm. Francis Morley, principal military deputy to the assistant secretary of the Navy for research, development and acquisition, and Chief of Staff Chris Diaz.
