J.R. MullisThe Defense Innovation Unit’s Bridge Program, established in August 2026, includes Classified Infrastructure as a Service: shared, accredited space and networks where cleared people can do classified work, recently expanded through a Nooks contract with a $146.8 million ceiling. CLASS ACT is something else: a Bridge pilot solicitation, due October 13, that awards prototype agreements to eligible nontraditional companies in maritime counter-unmanned systems so they can enter the facility clearance process. The first gives you a place to work. The second gives you a sponsor. Neither one is a clearance, and DCSA still decides who receives one.
The question arrives in a few different forms, but it is always the same question. “We saw DIU is giving startups access to classified facilities. Does that mean we can get cleared now?”
The honest answer is: maybe, but not because of the facilities. Two different things were announced within weeks of each other, and they address two different gaps. Understanding which gap you actually have is the whole decision.
Why are these two separate problems?
The federal rules treat them separately, and so should you.
A facility clearance is an eligibility determination. It says a company can be trusted with access to classified information at a given level. Under 32 CFR Part 117, the National Industrial Security Program rule, a company cannot apply for its own. It must be sponsored by a government contracting activity or a cleared contractor, and the sponsorship must be tied to a legitimate government requirement. DCSA makes the determination.
A safeguarding capability is separate. The same rule says facility clearance eligibility is distinct from the determination that a company can store and protect classified material on its own premises. Many cleared companies never build that capability. They do the classified part of their work somewhere else.
So a small company trying to do classified work usually faces two gaps at once: nobody has sponsored it, and it has nowhere to work. The two DIU efforts each address one of them.
What is the Bridge Program?
DIU established the Bridge Program by director’s memo on August 17, 2026. It has three lines of effort:
- Classified Infrastructure as a Service. Shared, accredited classified space and networks available to companies, with a stated goal of opening co-use classified facilities nationwide.
- Commercial technology accreditation. Help getting commercial products through cybersecurity authorization, with a goal of cutting those timelines in half.
- An integrated test team.
One detail matters before anything else: DIU states that Bridge services are currently offered only to DIU portfolio companies. If you do not have a DIU award, the program is not yet available to you.
What the Nooks award adds
On September 10, Nooks announced a four-year DIU contract under the Bridge Program with a ceiling of $146.8 million. According to the company, it covers accredited private suites, secure networks, and secure video, plus managed security and facility security officer support for up to 100 selected DIU portfolio companies, and funds new sites in Austin, Boston, Chicago, New York, the San Francisco Bay Area, and Honolulu.
Two cautions. A ceiling is the most that can be ordered, not what will be spent. And the facility security support is offered to selected portfolio companies, not to everyone.
What it gives you: a place to do classified work and help managing the security program around it.
What it cannot do: clear your company or your people. You still need a sponsor, an eligibility determination, and personnel clearances.
What is CLASS ACT?
CLASS ACT, short for Classified Access to Address Critical Technology, is a pilot run under the Bridge Program with a stated aim of expanding the number of top secret cleared nontraditional companies. It is a solicitation, not a service, and it is narrow.
- Scope. Maritime counter-unmanned systems. There are two postings: one for companies offering sensors and effectors (PROJ00718) and one for investors enabling that area (PROJ00719).
- Instrument. Prototype other transaction agreements, which may lead to a follow-on production award without further competition.
- Who is eligible. Nontraditional defense contractors with no current or previous facility clearance, U.S. citizen key management, no adversarial capital, a mature technology, and minimum revenue and financing thresholds. Read the exact thresholds in the posting.
- Deadline. October 13, 2026, at 11:59:59 p.m. Eastern.
What it gives you: a real government requirement and a sponsor, which is exactly what a company cannot create for itself.
What it cannot do: guarantee a clearance. DCSA still determines whether the company and its key people are eligible. And it does not give you a place to work.
The Bridge Program’s infrastructure is a place to work. CLASS ACT is a reason to be cleared. A company needs both a reason and a place, and most companies that ask about one actually need the other.
Which one do you actually need?
If you already have a facility clearance but no approved space, shared infrastructure is your gap. Bridge access requires DIU portfolio status today; other shared facilities exist, including the shared classified facility DIU co-funded in Pittsburgh this summer.
If you have no clearance and your technology sits in maritime counter-unmanned systems, CLASS ACT is worth a serious look before October 13, provided you meet every eligibility condition. Read them carefully; several are absolute.
If you have no clearance and your technology is elsewhere, neither effort solves your problem today. The path is still the ordinary one: a government customer or cleared prime with a legitimate requirement that needs you cleared.
What should you not assume?
Do not assume shared classified space means a shared clearance. It does not. Every person working in that space needs their own clearance and a need to know.
Do not use “SCIF” and “facility clearance” as if they mean the same thing. A SCIF is accredited space for sensitive compartmented information under intelligence community standards. A facility clearance is an eligibility determination for a company. Program offices notice when those are used interchangeably.
And do not assume a pilot is a program. CLASS ACT is a first round, in one technology area, with a deadline. If it works, it may expand. If your plan depends on it expanding, you are planning on a decision nobody has made.
The honest summary is that access to classified work is still earned the old way: a real requirement, from a real customer, who needs you inside. These efforts make the path shorter for some companies. They do not change where it starts.
Sources: DIU Bridge Program page and August 17, 2026 director’s memo as reported by DefenseScoop (August 20, 2026); Nooks press release, September 10, 2026; DIU open solicitations PROJ00718 and PROJ00719 (SAM.gov notice HQ084526SC002); 32 CFR 117.9.