There is a gap between policy-makers and technology development. This gap leads to risks concerning nontechnical system properties and ineffective interactions between technical and social components. The study investigates co-creation between government, industry, and academia and how nontechnical system properties and interactions between technical and social components are considered in the early phase design of systems for security and defense. Co-creation is here understood as a specific form of research collaboration facilitating results that would not have been possible without a joint approach between policy-makers and technology development. Throughout the analysis, an example of AI and air defense is used as a case to exemplify the challenges and solutions discussed. The study analyses how higher education institutions can create an arena for relevance, rigor and design joining the hard perspectives of the industry with the soft perspectives of policy, social and critical sciences. The study identifies that involved parties must acknowledge the need for a pragmatic relationship to traditional scientific traditions to capture the multitude of perspectives present. It is identified that the proposed co-creation can contribute to articulating societal challenges, conflicting values, and alternative design principles into the solution at early concept design phases. Co-creation could also be an arena for joint development of the more specific design approaches needed for later design steps. However, this contribution depends on an openness to the challenges and knowledge gaps and that higher education institutions maintain their autonomy.