The Maryland Department of Commerce offers a free online network/search tool, the Maryland Defense Network (MDN) , to help visualize the impact of defense spending in Maryland, and to help Maryland defense companies see and be seen for contractor and subcontractor opportunities. MDN also offers a custom dashboard with saved filters, charts, and tables.

The Maryland Defense Cybersecurity Assistance Program  provides funding and assistance for defense contractors to comply with the DFARS and NIST 800-171 Standards for cybersecurity. In its first 18 months of operation , the program assisted 46 companies with cybersecurity compliance assessments and provided 33 companies with cybersecurity mitigation services, leading to $385M in retained sales (i.e., DoD contracts); 2,318 in retained jobs; $142M in new sales; and 101 new jobs.The program is funded by the DoD’s Office of Economic Adjustment through the Maryland Department of Commerce and is coordinated by the Maryland Manufacturing Extension Partnership.

Maryland is home to many research, development, testing, and evaluation institutions associated with the federal government, including 74 federal labs. Innovative products, like the smartphone, grew out of research conducted by the DoD and the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA). The Maryland Defense Patent Database  is a tool entrepreneurs can use to explore innovations poised for commercialization.