Covid-19 is an accelerator, not disruptor, says former NSA Director

“Covid-19 is less a disruptive event, and more an accelerator event,” said Michael S. Rogers when speaking at Mind The Tech New York 2020. The former Director of the NSA joined Team8 Capital as an investment advisor right when the world was stopped in its tracks due to the coronavirus (Covid-19) pandemic.

“It’s less ‘it has totally changed everything’, and more ‘it is serving as an accelerant to speed up trends that were already present in the marketplace’,” he clarified. His comments come in line with many startups and industries that have previously told CTech that their enterprise is witnessing ‘five years of acceleration in the course of five months’.

Rogers, who served as 2nd Commander of the United States Cyber Command, was joined by Sarit Firon, Managing Director of Team8 Capital. She agreed that during Covid-19, certain industries received a boost and she spoke with companies who transitioned to a digital or remote workforce in six weeks - three years faster than their initial plans.

Michael S. Rogers is a former United States Navy admiral who served as the second commander of the United States Cyber Command. He retired from active duty in 2018 and is now an advisor for venture capital firm Team8 Capital. As a subsidiary of Team8, it invests in companies that focus on cyber, data, cloud infrastructure, and fintech.

You can watch their entire exchange in the video above.