The effort is being spearheaded by a private organization, the World Wide Consortium for Grid, or W2COG, which is operating on a US$1.7 million government-funded budget. The Reston, Va.-based group, which marked its first anniversary last month, has already helped develop new ways to deliver emergency communications in disaster-stricken areas.

But its main goal is to help defense and intelligence agencies meet broad 'netcentric' operation goals by fostering problem-solving efforts by private-sector firms and finding new ways to assemble commercial technologies.

Chris Gunderson, executive director of the Reston, Va.-based W2COG, said many private-sector companies have figured out how best to find collaborators across the globe, teaming up 'very quickly and loosely' to address needs, he said. But that has not been the case for the military's technology development efforts.

Instead, it can take as long as 10 years for the military to adopt technologies already in use by the private sector, he said.

The W2COG recently deployed a mobile Internet service to help emergency workers in parts of the Gulf Coast hard hit by Hurricane Katrina. The need for a mobile 'Hastily Formed Network' that could provide Internet connectivity and collaboration tools in disaster zones was presented as a problem to the 40 vendors participating in the W2COG.