DoD seeks $100M for valley of death bridge fund. (Defense News) ““The $100 million I am asking for is to help multiple small companies, especially if they need to finish a prototype,” Under Secretary of Defense for Research and Engineering Heidi Shyu [said] … For fiscal 2022, Congress included $100 million in procurement money for the “Mission Management Pilot Program,” as part of the $1.5 trillion federal spending package signed into law last month. According to FY22 defense policy law, the fund is for technologies that apply across the armed services. Shyu spearheaded this tranche of funding, which she said would continue supporting promising recipients of Phase II Small Business Innovation Research grants that are not quite ready for Phase III, which is aimed at commercialization.”
Pentagon’s glaring weakness: bureaucracy hampering commercial tech adoption. (Breaking Defense) “Brown said DoD should more broadly adopt Other Transaction Authorities and establish dedicated organizations, or “homes,” for commercial technologies that can focus its expertise and which are not service-specific. “Paired with a stable budget, this becomes a capability of record, not a program of record, where the need for the capability is ongoing,” he said. “DoD can then assess vendors on a more continuous basis and refresh with a frequency that matches commercial cycles. In doing so, DoD can furnish these capabilities to warfighters in a year rather than a decade.” In terms of budget reform, Brown said Congress should allow for more flexibility in the appropriations process beyond programs to budget for capabilities, including small drones and satellite imagery, “which we know we’ll need for decades to come.” The requirements process for commercial technologies should also be eliminated and replaced with “a rapid validation of needs.” [#PPBE Reform 2022]
DoD seeks huge jump in budget for hypersonic test facilities. (Defense News) “The Biden administration hasn’t yet released detailed budget tables, but Shyu said one thing in the request is an expansion of facilities at the Arnold Engineering Development Complex in Tullahoma, Tennessee, among other similar proposals… Lawmakers boosted funding for Defense Department laboratory and testing infrastructure by $800 million in the $1.5 trillion federal spending package for fiscal 2022, which was signed into law last month… “Industry would like to have their own test infrastructure, for them to do their own [testing], and what I’m investing in is for the government to do the testing. And there’s also funding for universities to do research and testing.””
US Space Command releases commercial integration strategy. (C4ISRNET) “According to an overview of the strategy, the goal is to develop a framework for better integrating commercial capabilities in a way that helps fill capability gaps. The overview outlines three “ways” or lines of effort SPACECOM will pursue: accelerating acquisition and technology refresh timelines, exploring integration as a service and leveraging industry expertise to strengthen partnerships.” … The role of commercial satellite imagery in the ongoing conflict in Ukraine has demonstrated the capabilities these companies can provide, Dickinson said — especially when integrated with military intelligence.”
Reboot the Defense innovation ecosystem. (War on the Rocks) “The venture capital model of investment is predicated on a high failure rate, justified by massive returns on a small number of successes. Yet prestigious, venture-capital-backed defense tech startups are failing more than even this model can tolerate… Though these are limited and anecdotal data points, I see that companies have four primary paths: become a Palantir, exit by acquisition, leave the public sector market, or languish as a zombie company. Let’s review each of these…” [Read the whole thing!]
US Army readies request for prototype designs of optionally manned fighting vehicle. (Defense News) “The first phase, now in full swing, is for an initial design. Next is a full and open competition for a detailed design phase, executed over fiscal 2023 and fiscal 2024. Awards for up to three contractors are expected in the second quarter of FY23. The prototyping phase will begin in FY25, and the Army is expected to select in the fourth quarter of FY27 one company to build low-rate production vehicles. Full-rate production is expected to begin in FY30. “We’re heavily focused on this use of model-based systems engineering, digital engineering. So it’s built a little more flexibly than our traditional development programs would be.” … “You don’t set a requirement upfront until you have to, [that’s] never been done,” he added.
Electrification sparks new shipbuilding. (Breaking Defense) T-AGOS 25 ocean surveillance ships for anti-submarine warfare: “In December 2021, for example, the Navy issued a final RFP for the design and build of the T-AGOS 25 class, which will include electric propulsion for more silent operations and greater speed to quickly reach hot spots across vast ocean distances in order to gather undersea acoustic data from its towed-array sensor system.” And on possible electrification of DDG(X): “The primary driver is definitely electric weapons, whether they be lasers, more powerful radar, and other weapon systems down the road.”
US hypersonic missile successful in flight tests, DARPA says. (Breaking Defense) “According to DARPA, in the new test the missile was released from a “carrier aircraft,” was boosted by a scramjet engine and then “quickly accelerated to and maintained cruise faster than Mach 5 (five times the speed of sound) for an extended period of time. The vehicle reached altitudes greater than 65,000 feet and flew for more than 300 nautical miles.”… Scramjets take in oxygen from the atmosphere, rather carrying bulky oxygen tanks — as boost-glide rocket boosters do. Thus, air-breathing hypersonic missiles can be made smaller, to be carried by fighter jets rather than big, heavy bombers.”
Textron drone deploys on US Navy destroyer as contractor-operated ISR node. (Defense News) “The Aerosonde [UAV] system had been operating off the Navy expeditionary sea base Hershel “Woody” Williams for three years, with the system carrying an intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) payload and a wide-area search payload to support maritime operations in the Atlantic… Textron employees are deployed on the destroyer today, operating the UAV as a contractor-owned/contractor-operated asset. The Navy essentially pays for the data the UAV obtains, which is piped directly into the combat information center on the ship and used by the crew to understand the environment and plan their missions… Whereas the Navy often falls in the trap of buying something with a lengthy service life, meaning the technology eventually becomes obsolete and the service has to pay to keep modernizing the system, the CO/CO model being used with Textron allows the Navy to get the data it needs while allowing Textron to appropriately balance upgrades and technology insertion.”
Operating at scale: manufacturing at Anduril. (Medium) “Across 6 locations in Southern California, Massachusetts, and Georgia totaling nearly 150,000 sq ft, Anduril’s manufacturing team turns the models and designs of their fellow engineers into tangible reality… “When I started here, we had two hardware products — our Sentry Towers and Ghost drones — and we were shipping a couple dozen of them,” said Lopas, who left SpaceX to join Anduril in May 2020. “The manufacturing challenge wasn’t as steep. Since then, we’ve built several variants of our Towers, our interceptor drone Anvil, WISP passive sensors, ALTIUS air-launched effects, and much more. We’re shipping our Towers, Anvils, WISPs, air-launched effects, and Ghosts at production quantities — hundreds of units, for some items — to fulfill major task orders from our customers. This year, we’ll build over 1000 Anvils and almost double the size of the team, from 36 today to 60 by the end of the year.”… “An engineer can test a new part on Monday, update their CAD model that evening, have us build a new part overnight, and be back out in the field testing as early as Tuesday morning,” said Lopas. “
Army eyes thousands of IVAS systems with FY23 budget. (C4ISRNET) “Some $400 million is marked for procurement, Director of Force Development Brig. Gen. Michael McCurry told reporters March 29, enough for “just over 7,000 IVAS systems for” three brigade combat teams, pending successful testing. The sum is about half of a prior request.”
Airmen are using velcro to fix the emergency doors in the air force’s problem-prone new tanker. (Task and Purpose) “And now the latest trouble: the tanker’s over-wing emergency exit doors can’t open without crews installing a makeshift modification. Those doors have a trim that prevents the door from opening inward, which can make it hard to get out of the plane during an emergency… Air Force engineers worked quickly with Boeing to develop a temporary fix: stick some Velcro on it… Boeing said it did not have a cost estimate for making a permanent fix and retrofitting the 57 tankers flown by the U.S. military and two flown by Japan… The over-wing emergency exit doors are not essential to the KC-46’s main mission: aerial refueling.”
Pentagon says its billion-dollar deliveries of military aid to Ukraine have never been done that fast. (Business Insider) “In total, the US has provided $1.7 billion in security assistance to Ukraine since Russia’s invasion began on February 24… For the recent aid packages, Kirby said, “from the time the president signs it to it actually arriving in the region it can be as little as four days, and then it’s not like it’s sitting in storage for a week or two.”
Lockheed Martin pushes USB-like universal plug-in for satellites. (Breaking Defense) “Lockheed Martin is not only building a new interface and docking system for upgrading payloads or shifting a satellite’s mission on orbit, but it’s also seeking to influence industry-wide standardization around their approach, according to company officials… The company’s new satellite adapter kit, called the Augmentation System Port Interface (ASPIN), provides both an electric and data interface as well as a docking mechanism that fits onto a host satellite. That interface would then allow the owner/operator to later contract for a servicing spacecraft to fly and mate upgraded payloads to the old sat on orbit, or even to switch out old for new ones with different missions… He compared it to a USB port on modern computers, allowing multiple types of devices and applications to be connected and uploaded.”
Hill AFB’s 388th OSS exploring agile communications options for F-35A. (Air Force) “Current military satellite internet capability requires a longer lead time, and its fastest speeds are not sufficient for the amount of data required for remote F-35 operations, Cover said… Using a Flyaway Communications Terminal developed by the ABL team, the group harnessed speeds up to 30 times faster during the week-long test. It was more than enough to support ALIS as well as individual NIPR and SIPR connections… All of this is small enough to fit inside of an F-35’s travel pod, and virtually any Airman can be trained to set it up in less than 10 minutes.”
ULA expects Amazon deal to drive down Space Force’s Vulcan launch costs. (C4ISRNET) “ULA announced this week its Vulcan rocket has been selected to fly 38 launches for Amazon’s Project Kuiper — a constellation of 3,236 satellites aimed at expanding broadband access in underserved regions. Those 38 missions are on top of nine Atlas V rockets Amazon has already ordered from ULA. Arianespace and Blue Origin will also launch a portion of the missions. ULA CEO Tory Bruno told reporters Tuesday the deal will translate to lower prices for future government launches and will drive infrastructure investments that will have benefits across its portfolio, which is now split 50-50 between government and commercial customers. He wouldn’t offer details on the price reduction other than to say the impact would be significant and in the “double digits” percentage wise.” … In the meantime, ULA’s Vulcan rocket is in the final stages of development and is slated for first flight later this year.”
HII, known as a shipbuilder, pursues pivot to global defense tech company. (Defense News) “Huntington Ingalls Industries will no longer go by its full name; it is now known as HII. The company also renamed its technology division, updated its logo, launched a new website and moved away from its Navy-centric color palette, as it tries to highlight its already significant and growing work in fields like autonomy and big data management… Kastner said the newly renamed mission technologies division, which includes the company’s non-shipbuilding work, is on pace to generate about $2.6 billion in sales this year. That puts the unit on par with the company’s Ingalls Shipbuilding yard in Mississippi.
Lockheed: work with forge coming through on Aegis baseline 9, 10. (Breaking Defense) “As the prime contractor for Aegis, Lockheed is deeply involved with the Forge, a Navy software factory aiming to establish the infrastructure necessary to bring updates to the fleet in as quickly as a single day… “Our baseline nine ships and baseline 10 ships … will have the same exact software baseline. It’ll have the [same] touch and feel even though one ship has a SPY-6, and one ship has a SPY-1,” Joe DePietro.. It is “really a separation of the software and hardware baselines as part of the development effort that we’re putting in place,” he added… The Navy’s aspirational goal is the so-called “Integrated Combat System,” or ICS, a uniform fighting environment that would allow a sailor to switch between a cruiser and a destroyer with virtually no additional training.
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