Brown tapped for Pentagon acquisition chief. (Inside Defense) “President Biden intends to nominate Michael Brown, the director of the Pentagon’s Defense Innovation Unit, to be under secretary of defense for acquisition and sustainment, according to a White House announcement.”
The US system created the world’s most advanced military. Can it maintain an edge? (Washington Post) “… the pace of military innovation slowed in the 1960s with the advent of a centralized procurement system that prioritized performance and predictability over speed. That didn’t matter much back then, because the Soviet Union was not moving fast either, as Bill Greenwalt, who worked on acquisition reform as a staffer to now-deceased Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), describes in a new research paper.“
The RQ-180 drone will emerge from the shadows as the centerpiece of an air combat revolution. (The Drive) “It’s important to note that while the reconnaissance side of its mission set gets all the attention, we believe the RQ-180’s potential ability to work as a high-flying networking node and information gateway is likely even more important… The sharing of critical information across huge areas in such a way that it does not give away the positions of those connected to the network and being able to fuse huge amounts of data from disparate platforms and send it all over the globe are the keys to winning the future fight.” Great long-form article, read the whole thing.
What government needs to know about accelerators. (FedScoop) “… when the government calls for an accelerator, it’s really calling for a way to work with emerging tech companies and accelerate their solutions onto contracts and into missions. Not synonymous with incubators, angel investors, or co-working spaces, typical accelerators provide education, mentorship, and financing to early-stage companies in cohorts… If the tech that the government needs already exists in the commercial market, government should work with those vetted, later-stage companies that can move fast.”
Nearly half of DoD employees got more productive when they started teleworking. (Military.com) “Of the more than 54,600 survey respondents who told the IG about their telework experience, 88% switched to full- or part-time telework between mid-March 2020 to last August… Nearly 79% of those who [answered questions on productivity] felt that their productivity increased and left a comment said they experienced fewer distractions and interruptions while teleworking.”
Rep Luria letter to President Biden on maritime-centric National Defense Strategy. (USNI News) “As we decreased our battleforce from 592 ships in 1989 to 375 in 1997 and dropping below the 300-ship barrier in 2003, we also reduced our daily global maritime presence from 150 ships to just over 100 across the same period… The looming naval crisis in the Pacific will be an all-hands-on deck effort and every available ship will be needed. We must quickly determine what manned and unmanned ships we can build and identify where within our shipbuilding industrial base they can be built—starting tomorrow.”
DoD concludes review of first CMMC certification organization. (Nextgov) “Among concerns the industry raised was that their data wouldn’t be safe with the companies licensed to conduct the audits—CMMC Third Party Assessment Organizations, or C3PAOs… To address this, CMMC requires all C3PAOs to themselves be audited for cybersecurity by the DIBCAC [DCMA’s Defense Industrial Base Cybersecurity Assessment Center]… The CMMC AB has so far reviewed 98 C3PAOs, which are queued up for DIBCAC assessments.”
Boeing KC-46 appears out of the running for Canadian tanker contract. (Puget Sound Business) “”It’s not over until it’s over, but it certainly looks like the KC-46 is not heading to the Northern territories,” according to an analyst. Canada said only Airbus’ A330 MRTT jet passed muster.”
AMC eyes self-defense for cargo, tanker planes. (Breaking Defense) “Tankers and cargo aircraft could in future carry their own counter-air missiles — or even launch missile-carrying drones — to help them survive ever-more sophisticated enemy air defenses, Air Mobility Command head Gen. Jacqueline Van Ovost says... “I like the Gremlins idea,” Van Ovost enthused… Van Ovost also is eager to explore how AMC can help — via new missions such as equipping tanker aircraft as communications nodes.”
Anduril buys tube-launched drone developer Area-I. (Defense News) “They have absolutely the best in capability for having a drone that can launch off any platform,” he [Anduril’s Brian Schimpf] said… Area-I was founded in 2009 by CEO Nick Alley, who once told an audience at Austin Startup Week that he had to borrow $10,000 from his parents to cover employee salaries while he waited for government funding to come through… “The practical advice that I gave was that even with this multimillion dollar company that is well-entrenched with the Department of Defense, we still haven’t made it,” Alley told Defense News in a March 31 interview.”
US Army to work with Microsoft on IVAS headset production phase. (Army Technology) That’s a $21.9B effort over ten years. “The IVAS headset is a heads-up display (HUD) body-worn computer and networked radio. It is structured as a middle tier of acquisition, two-year prototyping period… The army intends to deliver 2,550 IVAS prototype systems via this approach… The first capability set is Microsoft’s commercial HoloLens 2 with an integrated commercial, thermal sensor, and Tactical Assault Kit software and maps. It is augmented by the company’s Azure Cloud services.”
Bath shipyard looks for a new shipbuilding contract while awaiting the Navy’s next ship. (Press Herald) “Although planning is underway to transition to a new large surface combatant … that ship is not slated for construction until fiscal year 2027,” [BIW President] Lesko wrote… “The best way to keep our workforce thriving and capable of performing on that new ship class” is to maintain its rate of construction of Arleigh Burke-class destroyers until the new class of ship is designed and ready for production.”
With a second frigate yard competition on the horizon, Austal USA moves to add steel shipbuilding. (Defense News) “Adding steel shipbuilding capability, Austal puts itself in line to potentially become the second shipyard constructing the new Constellation-class frigate… The Navy’s 30-year plan calls for a “follow yard” in fiscal 2023 to increase production of the Constellation class [frigate] to three ships and to four ships by fiscal 2025… The expansion is at least in part funded by a $50 million government grant under the CARES Act, part of a Trump administration push to expand shipbuilding.”
Lockheed cites ‘great power competition’ with China in bid to consolidate engine market. (Responsible Statecraft) “Lockheed CEO James D. Taiclet spoke in unusually blunt terms about the company’s justification for why regulators should allow the acquisition to move forward: China’s weapons industry is vertically integrated — indeed much of it is state owned — so American weapons firms need to consolidate in the interest of national security.”
Northrop Grumman avoids Triton production pause. (Janes) ““[Northrop Grumman is] pleased to announce Congress reintroduced a production aircraft back in to the FY 2021 budget as part of LRIP Lot 5, which will prevent a production pause,” a company spokesperson said… [it is] expected funding of three further Tritons for Australia over this period could help fill the gap left by the USN.”
Status Report: Navy unmanned aerial, subsurface platforms. (USNI News) “The Navy wants to emphasize the development of enablers for unmanned systems – the common interfaces and control stations, the networks, the secure data formats, the autonomy behaviors – as it pursues a hybrid manned/unmanned fleet for the future.”
To rebuild manufacturing, the US needs to beef up the Small Business Innovation Research program. (Tech Crunch) “First, we need at least 10 times more SBIR funding. Even at $30 billion, SBIR’s funding would be a rounding error compared to many budgets in Washington… Second, we need to focus new SBIR funding on critical strategic areas, especially decarbonization and advanced manufacturing… Finally, the review and reward process needs to be fast. One great example is the innovative U.S. Air Force “pitch day” programs.”
Navy, Air Force team on new fighter as Navy aims for 50 percent robot jets. (Air Force Magazine) “NGAD will be a family of systems for both the Air Force and Navy… “The two will likely be different as far as outer mold line, just based on different services’ needs, but a lot of the internal mission systems will be similar,” and will have open mission architecture, Harris said. This will enable competition in industry and “enable us to use best of breed.” Open missions means that if a subsystem isn’t performing as the Navy needs it to, or is too costly to maintain, “you have an ability to replace it without ‘vendor lock,’” he noted, adding that’s an issue that has “created problems for us before.”… “In the ‘80s, … we typically had 90 aircraft up on the deck, now we’re more like 66,” Harris said.
Airbus, Dassault reach deal on European fighter jet prototype. (Tech Xplore) “… progress on the new delta-wing stealth jet has been plagued by fighting over the sharing of the industrial work as well as intellectual property for the cutting-edge technologies. France, Germany and Spain, the three countries involved in the program, “have received the offer from the companies for the construction of a demonstrator of the future combat jet,” a French defense ministry official said.”
ACC to align fighter squadron operations, maintenance. (US Air Force) “Air Combat Command is changing the aircraft maintenance organizational structure to improve synchronization between maintenance and fighter squadrons… Pairing fighter squadrons with a dedicated fighter generation squadron will foster unity of effort between maintenance and operations as well as provide a better view of readiness.”
DARPA’s NORMARS is an autonomous ship that couldn’t care less about humans. (Auto Evolution) “The acronym stands for No Manning Required Ship and, as per the official description, it should be designed with no consideration whatsoever for crew, but with the utmost respect for payload, weight and power. At the beginning of March, American defense contractor L3Harris announced it had been selected by DARPA for the Phase I of the NOMARS program, together with partner VARD Marine.”
Exercise reveals advantages artificial intelligence gives in all-domain ops. (DoD) “All 11 combatant commands participated in the exercise, which was based on a global scenario involving two peer competitors. “What we were looking to do is show the incredible value of information and how information can be used today,” he [VanHerck] said.”
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