Lockheed Martin, a global security and aerospace company headquartered in Maryland, has become the first U.S. defense contractor to incorporate blockchain technology into its development processes.

The company announced last week that it has contracted Guardtime Federal, a leading cyber security provider, as a key supplier to integrate cyber-related elements into systems engineering processes, supply chain risk management, and software development efforts.

Using Guardtime Federal's Black Lantern appliances and the nationally distributed Guardtime Federal Core blockchain infrastructure, the defense giant intends to realize more efficient and secure software development and supply chain risk management.

"Guardtime Federal is excited about collaborating with such a high quality team for delivering capabilities to Lockheed Martin with whom we share a common vision regarding cyber and software development challenges," said David Hamilton, president of Guardtime Federal.

In September 2016, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) awarded a $1.8 million contract jointly to Galois and Guardtime Federal, to advance the state of formal verification tools and all blockchain-based integrity monitoring systems. Guardtime Federal has also crafted a consortium of some of the most advanced cyber-centric small businesses in the field, including Galois, ForAllSecure, and Trail of Bits.

Lockheed Martin and Gaurdtime Federal have been engaging in cybersecurity related assessments and initiatives for nearly two years now. The two companies are maturing a concept referred to as Cyber Aware Systems Engineering. Lockheed Martin is exploring new, non-traditional approaches, technologies, and processes to design cyber security into its business.

"These new cyber security approaches will enhance data integrity, speed problem discovery and mitigation, and reduce the volume of regression testing, which results in reduced schedule risk," said Ron Bessire, Lockheed Martin Aeronautics' Engineering and Technology vice president. "The faster our developers can discover issues, the faster we can deliver."