Podcast: No time to waste for defense innovation with BMNT’s Pete Newell
I was pleased to have Pete Newell back on the Acquisition Talk podcast to discuss the urgency of getting innovative defense prototypes into the field […]
prototyping
Is DoD wasting the creative resources of the country by dictating solutions?
Here is David Soergel, an industry consultant testifying to Congress in the 1975 hearing, “Major Systems Acquisition.” Sometimes new technology can offer solutions to problems […]
GAO struggles to define oversight for the Adaptive Acquisition Framework
Here’s the General Accountability Office’s take on Middle Tier of Acquisition (MTA) in space systems from a recent report. Remember, MTA efforts must be rapidly […]
Cutting contract documentation by 90+ percent
Here is Air Force general Chapman at a 1971 appropriations supplemental hearing with DepSecDef David Packard, asking for additional funds to do prototyping including funds […]
Reverse innovation, allied partners, and getting more bang for the buck
Consider an American company with a good-better-best product lineup with 80-90-100% performance at 80-90-100% pricing. When seeking to sell in an emerging economy, like India, […]
Is DoD starting to bridge the valley of death?
… funding for Advanced Components Development and Prototypes (6.4 funding) has increased from 20.4% of total RDT&E funding in 2012 to 30.2% in the enacted […]
DoD invites setbacks by relying on sequential measures of progress
Systems engineering techniques themselves contribute to disaster because they all are paper techniques and there are only two instead of N dimensions available. What we […]
David Packard on the benefits of prototyping
The continuation of prototyping programs will clearly be helpful in preserving and strengthening industrial design teams which I am convinced can develop a great deal […]
Packard’s fly-before-you-buy principle
Perhaps the best way to explain some variations of a practical fly-before-you buy policy is to take several examples. The AX program is one which […]
Competitive prototyping and pushing the state of the art
Only when the contractor is taking risks to develop the state-of-the-art and do something better than has ever been done before can there be much […]
David Packard pitches prototyping
There are two practices which have consistently led to excessive costs and unsatisfactory results in the development and procurement of weapons systems. One is the excessive reliance on paper studies and paper analysis. The other problem is the concurrency between development and production.