The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) is an agency of the United States Department of Defense responsible for the development of new technology for use by the military. DARPA was responsible for funding development of many technologies which have had a major impact on the world, including computer networking (starting with the ARPANET, which eventually grew into the Internet), as well as NLS, which was both the first hypertext system, and an important precursor to the contemporary ubiquitous graphical user interface.
Its original name was simply Advanced Research Projects Agency (ARPA), but it was renamed DARPA (for Defense) on March 23, 1972, then back to ARPA on February 22, 1993, and then back to DARPA again on March 11, 1996.
DARPA was established in 1958 in response to the Soviet launching of Sputnik, with the mission of keeping the US's military technology ahead of its enemies. DARPA is independent from other more conventional military R&D and reports directly to senior Department of Defense management. DARPA has around 240 personnel (about 140 technical) directly managing a $2 billion budget.
Source: Wikipedia - en.wikipedia.org
