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  October 6, 2022 | International, Aerospace, C4ISR

  Space Development Agency awards low Earth orbit experiment contracts

  Bell Aerospace and York Space Systems will help test technology that could inform future capabilities.

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  June 20, 2019 | International, Aerospace

  Pentagon, Lockheed Martin Failed to Ensure Proper Parts for F-35

  CHARLES S. CLARK A major contractor and the Pentagon's top management office came in for criticism from an inspector general for cutting corners in assuring that the massive joint-service F-35 stealth fighter is equipped with ready-for-issue parts. In a report dated June 13, the Defense Department watchdog found that parts for the department's largest acquisition—with an estimated $406 billion price tag and sales planned to foreign allies—were not being received according to the contracts and performance incentives. The parts contracted for delivery by Lockheed Martin Corp. include wheel, seat, and window assemblies, said the audit addressed to the Defense secretary for acquisition, the Air Force secretary, the Air Force inspector general and the Defense Contract Management Agency. The federal contracting offices and the corporate teams working on the plane are supposed to ensure the sustaining parts are delivered “ready for aircraft maintenance personnel to install on the aircraft,” as well as have an Electronic Equipment Logbook assigned that spells out each part's history and remaining life. Too often, however, the parts arrived not ready in accordance with contracts and incentive fees on the sustainment contracts because of “inflated and unverified F‑35A aircraft availability hours. This occurred because the [Joint Program Office] did not conduct adequate oversight of contractor performance related to receiving F‑35 spare parts and aircraft availability hours,” the report said, calling the inflation of hours unintentional. As a result, the department received non-ready spare parts and spent up to $303 million in labor costs since 2015, “and it will continue to pay up to $55 million annually” for such parts until a fix is made. In addition, the Defense Department has “potentially overpaid” $10.6 million in performance incentive fees by not independently collecting and verifying aircraft availability hours. “The lack of available [ready-for-issue] spare parts could result in the F‑35 fleet being unable to perform required operational and training missions,” the report warned. The Joint Program Office was aware of the problem, auditors found during their review from June 2018 to April 2019, but did not resolve the issue or require the services to better track the non-compliant parts. Interviews with the Joint Program Office staff in Arlington, Va.; the DCMA administrative office in Lockheed Martin's facility in Fort Worth, Texas; and Lockheed staff at three sites found, for example, that of 74 spare parts delivered to Hill Air Force Base in Utah from Sept. 17-30, 2018, 59 spare parts (80 percent) were non-ready for issue. Of the 263 spare parts delivered to Luke Air Force Base in Arizona in June 2018, 213 spare parts (81 percent) were non‑ready. And of 132 spare parts delivered to the Marine Corps Air Station in Beaufort, S.C., in September 2017, 58 spare parts (44 percent) were non‑ready. The IG recommended that the F-35 program executive officer improve oversight by coordinating with DCMA to pursue compensation from the contractor for the costs of mishandling the supply of spare parts since 2015. It also recommended that he direct the contracting officer to add clarifying language to future sustainment contracts, and task the lead contracting office with updating its Quality Assurance Surveillance Plan. Navy Vice Adm. Mathias Winter, the program executive, agreed, stating that there is value added in tracking and using contractor performance data. https://www.govexec.com/defense/2019/06/pentagon-lockheed-martin-failed-ensure-proper-parts-f-35/157822/

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  August 9, 2019 | International, Aerospace, Naval, Land

  Final hypersonic missile contract awards imminent as US Army preps to shoot one in FY21

  HUNTSVILLE, Ala. — The U.S. Army is just weeks away from awarding the final contracts related to the development of its mobile, ground-launched hypersonic missile. The Army will award a contract within the next three weeks to a company to develop a launching system for the hypersonic missile in co-development across the services, Lt. Gen. L. Neil Thurgood, the service's Rapid Capabilities and Critical Technologies Office director, said Aug. 7 at the Space and Missile Defense Symposium. RCCTO's job is to serve as a bridge between the science and technology community and the program executive offices, helping bring technology out of development and into soldiers' hands, first on a small scale and then a larger scale when passed off to program offices. The office is primarily focused on hypersonics and directed energy. While the missile is under joint development, the Army needs a special launcher to make the missile road-mobile. The contract will encompass the design and integration of a vertical launcher onto a trailer, Thurgood said. Additionally, the RCCTO is preparing to award a contract, also in the next three weeks, to a vendor to produce the glide body for the hypersonic missile, Thurgood said. The Navy will own the design of the glide body, but the Army will own its production, he said. “We have a company that we are in the final process of negotiating an [other transaction authority contract],” Thurgood said. An OTA is a contract that allows for rapid prototyping by bypassing the usual red tape associated with acquisition. “What is interesting about the glide body technology is we also have to create an industrial base to do this. There is no industrial base in the United States for glide bodies,” Thurgood said. The technology is owned by the government labs, he noted, “so we are transitioning that out of the labs into the commercial marketplace. That is a really hard thing to do, but there's a lot of energy and a lot of momentum behind that outcome.” Unlike other programs, Thurgood said, there is not a single company that can produce a hypersonic missile and its equipment alone. “It actually takes a collaborative effort amongst the industry partners,” he added. The first contract will be awarded to one company, but there will be follow-on contracts for other vendors to learn how to make the glide body at the federally funded lab where it was developed. The methodology energizes the supply chain from the prime contractors all the way to sub-contractors should the service decide to make a large number of the weapons, Thurgood told Defense News in an interview at the symposium. Thurgood noted that in order to bring industry closer to the RCCTO's endeavors, the office established an industry board in addition to its board of directors to promote “horizontal communication.” The Army plans to field a hypersonic missile and launcher to a unit in the fourth quarter of fiscal 2021. The unit will train for an entire year without live rounds, Thurgood said, adding that the canisters the unit will use will be cement-filled to match the weight. The first live-round test will take place in FY22 and will be conducted by a battery led by a captain. Thurgood was tasked Feb. 14 to come up with a plan for hypersonic development, and given 30 days to do so. Now, almost six months later, the RCCTO is about to award all associated contracts to move forward in building prototypes that will be in soldiers' hands in just a couple of years, Thurgood said. https://www.defensenews.com/digital-show-dailies/smd/2019/08/07/final-hypersonic-missile-contract-awards-imminent-as-army-preps-to-shoot-one-in-fy21/