Acquisition Headlines (9/27 – 10/3/2020)
US Army and USAF to jointly develop battlefield network, called CJADC2. Combines Army Project Convergence with Advanced Battle Management System. Navy have been less public. […]
Blog Posts
Proposals are defense contractors most important product
One point is the difference in overhead rates between defense and commercial-type business… First, perhaps, are the ways in which competitive bidding is often carried out. I […]
Podcast: An aviator’s perspective on AlphaDogfight, NGAD, and beyond with Ryan Fishel
Ryan “Stinger” Fishel joined me on the Acquisition Talk podcast to discuss the future of the fighter aircraft community. Ryan is an F-15E pilot for […]
Important decisions are not made the way economic textbooks teach us
Here’s a nice exchange between Agnes Callard and Russ Roberts on EconTalk. Remember — the defense resource allocation process, the PPBE, was explicitly created on […]
New defense policy released for Software Acquisition Pathway – DoDI 5000.87
Programs executing the software acquisition pathway are not subject to the Joint Capabilities Integration and Development System (JCIDS), and will be handled as specifically provided […]
The problem of metrics in defense programs
The development of accurate and meaningful metrics was challenging. It was often difficult to connect goals with statistics that were easily collected and calculated, especially […]
Could there be a SpaceX-style entrant in the world of fighter aircraft?
Such joint efforts and the use of digital engineering could allow smaller defense firms to focus on design work, whether for the whole aircraft of […]
When does a culture of decentralization make sense?
Erik: Let’s get into the lessons you learned from Uber that you find most interesting. Flo: I think the first one is decentralization that […]
Real time cross-domain kill webs — ACK and STITCHES
Two DARPA-developed technologies – a novel decision aid for mission commanders and a rapid software integration tool – played a critical role in the recent […]
Ratio of sustainment to acquisition costs — is modernization being crowded out?
The graph shows the four phases of a program’s cost over its lifetime: research and development (R&D), procurement, O&S, and disposal, with O&S considered the […]
Acquisition headlines (9/20 – 9/26/20)
Picking 1st ABMS capabilities to top issue. ““I’ve been waiting for the department’s equivalent of a Sputnik or Alpha-Go moment where AI did something that […]
Transcripts: Defense Budget Reform with Katharina McFarland, Bill Greenwalt, and Bob Daigle
Jerry McGinn: Welcome everyone I see everyone starting to join we’re really excited today to have assembled a very senior panel on a very niche […]
The Functionalist Takeover and the problem of organizational design in the DoD
[Secretary of Defense Neil McElroy] told the Senate Committee on Armed Services that the present assistant secretary could not “give orders.” McElroy proposed a civilian […]
Why are analysts complicit in cost and schedule growth?
I showed that for 10 projects for which a cost risk analysis had been conducted, the actual cost was greater than the 90th percentile for […]
100,000 tons of inertia — the case to shift away from carriers
Here’s an excerpt from the 1st Prize paper in US Naval Institute’s 2019 contest, “100,000 Tons of Inertia.” It does a good job pulling apart […]