DARPA Microsystems Technology Office
Funds advanced United States electronics, photonics, quantum, and sensing work for computing, communications, and security.
DARPA's Microsystems Technology Office is the agency's home for microelectronics, photonics, and quantum information science. It works on the hardware base that supports sensing, compute, and communications, and the notes place it in a roughly USD 700 million annual pool tied to semiconductor and microelectronics priorities. Awards run from USD 2 million to USD 50 million with a median actual award of USD 10 million, and the office runs on an annual cycle for US-based applicants. TRL 3 to 6 is the expected band, dual-use relevance is required, and the main constraint is not civilian utility alone but defense utility with foreign-component controls in play. Current attention is centered on the Electronics Resurgence Initiative and the Quantum Benchmarking Initiative, including QBI 2026 and its independent verification and validation topic. MTO is a strong fit for teams that can connect advanced device work to national-security use, because phase-gated evaluation and hardware credibility matter as much as novelty.
No upcoming rounds verified. Cadence: Annual.