US Army R&D endorses mission command
I think frankly, what they thought was [we had] an industrial age model that existed and as we move into the 21st century and what […]
Blog Posts
Feynman finds out technologists need feedback from the military
Here is a good part from Richard Feynman’s excellent book, Surely You’re Joking, Mr Feynman! (pp. 120) which nicely demonstrates the useful interaction between technology-push […]
How OSD, feeding on its growth, became a separate empire
I mention this point at the outset because, from shattered illusions that mere passage of a unification act would produce a military utopia, there has […]
William Roper is saying all the right things on defense innovation
What we really have to do in acquisition is shift the culture that is solely focused on the balance sheet — on cost — and […]
Stop funding new R&D under existing major programs, fund a prototype program
Here’s a good point from Craig Hooper over at Forbes: Given that research and development hard to fund these days, Navy innovation aboard ships and […]
Why aren’t investors interested in defense?
II think many of the policies that we have around small business have been focused on what I’d consider to be social justice more than […]
Acquisition headlines
U.S. Navy sponsoring development of a cloud-computing environment. Not clear why this cloud work should be using significant small business (SBIR) funding. A cloud infrastructure […]
Is the DOD too aggressive in dodging the acquisition process?
A program has to achieve 40 milestone requirements just to pass Milestone A into the second major phase of a program, the Technology Maturation & Risk Reduction […]
The SDA accountable, but not responsible, for space architecture
In August, 2018, the department put forward this report to Congress[that] … laid out these eight capabilities. … The Space Development Agency was set up […]
Real costs are defensive effort, risk aversion, lack of initiative, and failed partnernships
Opportunism, the pursuit of self-interest by means of duplicity and guile, is a key concept in neo-institutional economics (Williamson, 1967, 1985). It manifests itself in […]
Three factors of escalating defense costs, and some figures to go with it
The cost of maintaining our armed forces at adequate strength to deter war has steadily increased in recent years. This upward trend is likely to […]
Simulators, software, and complexity in weapons platforms
Replicating platforms accurately in simulations remains one of the biggest challenges for the Army, according to a service official. “As many of you know, […]
Cost escalation for defense labor and material — can it continue to grow so fast?
When we talk about procurement or support costs in the 2040 decade, obviously that’s a long way from now. Any sort of projection of a […]
Acquisition headlines
Accelerating DoD systems fielding while avoiding a new ‘valley of death’. A slice: “The new valley of death is created when a middle tier acquisition […]
Innovation hubs do not always lower barriers to entry
Like so many startups with great new capabilities and not much experience selling to government, the AI company was increasingly frustrated at its inability to […]