With billions of dollars at stake, let’s responsibly and deliberately spend America’s funds

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  May 14, 2020 | International, Aerospace, Naval, Land, C4ISR, Security

  Contract Awards by US Department of Defense - May 13, 2020

  NAVY The Boeing Co., St. Louis, Missouri, is awarded a $1,971,754,089 firm-fixed-price contract to provide non-recurring engineering associated with the Stand-off Land Attack Missile – Expanded Response (SLAM ER) obsolescence redesign effort as well as the production and delivery of 650 SLAM ER missiles in support of the government of Saudi Arabia. Work will be performed at St. Louis, Missouri (47%); Indianapolis, Indiana (37%); Pontiac, Michigan (9%); Melbourne, Florida (3%); Middletown, Connecticut (2%); and Black Mountain, North Carolina (2%). Work is expected to be complete by December 2028. Foreign Military Sales funds in the amount of $1,971,754,089 will be obligated at time of award, none of which will expire at the end of the current fiscal year. This contract was not competitively procured pursuant to Federal Acquisition Regulation 6.302-4. The Naval Air Systems Command, Patuxent River, Maryland, is the contracting activity (N00019-20-C-0003). The Boeing Co., St. Louis, Missouri, is awarded a $656,981,421 modification (P00014) to a previously awarded firm-fixed-price contract (N00019-19-C-0016). This modification procures and delivers 467 Harpoon full rate production Lot 91 Block II missiles and support equipment for various Foreign Military Sales customers. Work will be performed at St. Louis, Missouri (30%); McKinney, Texas (28%); Toledo, Ohio (6%); Grove, Oklahoma (5%); Pontiac, Michigan (4%); Putnam, Connecticut (2%); Galena, Kansas (2%); Burnley, United Kingdom (2%); Lititz, Pennsylvania (1%); Minneapolis, Minnesota (1%); and various locations within the continental U.S. (19%). This modification procures four Block II missiles and support equipment for the government of Brazil, eight Block II missiles and support equipment for the government of Thailand, 53 Block II missiles and support equipment for the government of Qatar, 402 Block II missiles and support equipment for the government of Saudi Arabia, and support equipment for the governments of Japan, the Netherlands, India and Korea. Work is expected to be complete by December 2026. Foreign Military Sales funds in the amount of $656,981,421 will be obligated at time of award, none of which will expire at the end of the current fiscal year. The Naval Air Systems Command, Patuxent River, Maryland, is the contracting activity. Strategic Airborne Operations JV LLC,* Newport News, Virginia, is awarded a $146,834,175 firm-fixed-price, indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity contract. This contract acquires the High Endurance Electronic Warfare Jet (HEEWJ) capability. Work will be performed in Cherry Point, North Carolina (5%); and various locations within and outside the continental U.S. (95%) to be determined on individual orders. The HEEWJ capability is an offensive air support for training that provides regionally based, geographically distributed aviation with a variety of airborne threat simulation capabilities to train shipboard and aircraft weapon systems operators and aircrew to counter enemy electronic warfare and electronic attack operations in today's electronic combat environment in support of Department of the Navy, other Department of Defense (DOD) agencies, non-DOD government agencies and Foreign Military Sales customers. Work is expected to be completed in May 2024. No funds will be obligated at the time of award. Funds will be obligated on individual orders as they are issued. This contract was competitively procured via an electronic request for proposal, and two offers were received. The Naval Air Warfare Center Aircraft Division, Patuxent River, Maryland, is the contracting activity (N00421-20-D-0108). Q.E.D. Systems Inc., Virginia Beach, Virginia, is awarded a $16,205,606 modification to previously awarded contract N00024-15-C-4400 for specification development and execution/procurement support services in support of Chief of Naval Operations availabilities, continuous maintenance availabilities (CMAVs), inactivation CMAVs, sustainment availabilities, phased modernization availabilities, re-commissioning availabilities, continuous maintenance and emergent maintenance window of opportunity for Navy surface combatant ship classes (CG 47/DDG 51). Work will be performed in Norfolk, Virginia (53%); San Diego, California (36%); and Everett, Washington (11%). Work is expected to be complete by October 2020. No funding will be obligated at time of award. The Naval Sea Systems Command, Washington, D.C., is the contracting activity. BAE Systems, Information and Electronic Systems Integration Inc., Greenlawn, New York, is awarded a $14,465,881 modification (P00010) to previously awarded, firm-fixed-price, indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity contract N00019-17-D-0006. This modification adds the requirement to procure 46 AN/UPX-41(C) digital interrogators and 10 Mode 5 change kits for the Navy, Coast Guard, the government of Japan and various countries under the Foreign Military Sales program. Work will be performed in Greenlawn, New York (80%); Austin, Texas (10%); and Manassas, Virginia (10%), and is expected to be complete by May 2023. No funds are being obligated at time of award; funds will be obligated on individual orders as they are issued. The Naval Air Systems Command, Patuxent River, Maryland, is the contracting activity. CACI Enterprise Solutions Inc., Chantilly, Virginia, is awarded a $13,904,377 cost-plus-fixed-fee task order modification in the four option years of the integrated business systems support services contract (N32205-19-F-1044 and P00008). Information technology services in this contract assist Military Sealift Command's business systems and ashore operations branch to manage, operate and maintain the command's business systems, as well as interfaces with the Navy Enterprise Defense Business Systems. Work under this modification will be performed in Norfolk, Virginia, and is expected to be complete by December 2023. This modification includes the remaining portion (eight months) of Option Year One as well as three 12-month options. If exercised, the cumulative value of this modification will be $13,598,409. The task order was competitively procured with proposals and four offers were received. The Naval Military Sealift Command, Norfolk, Virginia, is the contracting activity. Sikorsky Aircraft Corp., a Lockheed Martin Co., Stratford, Connecticut, is awarded an $8,954,062 modification (P00091) to previously awarded firm-fixed-price contract N00019-14-C-0050. This modification provides support for the integration and transition of Windows 10 and Server 16 into various VH-92A training devices. Work will be performed in Quantico, Virginia, and is expected to be complete by October 2022. Fiscal 2020 research, development, test and evaluation (Navy) funds in the amount of $4,667,720 will be obligated at time of award, none of which will expire at the end of the current fiscal year. The Naval Air Systems Command, Patuxent River, Maryland, is the contracting activity. ARMY Northrop Grumman, McLean, Virginia, was awarded a $176,471,668 modification (P00056) to contract W58RGZ-17-C-0014 to support Army special electronic mission aircraft fixed-wing life cycle services. Work will be performed in McLean, Virginia, with an estimated completion date of Aug. 31, 2020. Fiscal 2020 operations and maintenance (Army) funds in the amount of $176,471,668 were obligated at the time of the award. U.S. Army Contracting Command, Redstone Arsenal, Alabama, is the contracting activity. DynCorp International LLC, Fort Worth, Texas, was awarded a $167,556,981 modification (P00057) to contract W58RGZ-17-C-0011 for support services for government-owned fixed-wing fleets performing transport aircraft missions. Work will be performed in Fort Worth, Texas, with an estimated completion date of May 31, 2021. Fiscal 2020 operations and maintenance (Army) funds in the amount of $167,556,981 were obligated at the time of the award. U.S. Army Contracting Command, Redstone Arsenal, Alabama, is the contracting activity. Kiewit Infrastructure South Co., Sunrise, Florida, was awarded a $7,759,000 firm-fixed-price contract for Everglades restoration. Bids were solicited via the internet with three received. Work will be performed in Miami-Dade, Florida, with an estimated completion date of Nov. 16, 2021. Fiscal 2020 civil construction funds in the amount of $7,759,000 were obligated at the time of the award. U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Jacksonville, Florida, is the contracting activity (W912EP-20-C-0004). Michels Corp., Brownsville, Wisconsin, was awarded a $7,066,242 firm-fixed-price contract to repair levee systems in the Missouri River Basin. Bids were solicited via the internet with four received. Work will be performed in Pender, Nebraska, with an estimated completion date of Oct. 30, 2020. Fiscal 2020 other procurement (Army) funds in the amount of $7,066,242 were obligated at the time of the award. U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Omaha, Nebraska, is the contracting activity (W9128F-20-C-0026). Qualx Corp., Springfield, Virginia,* was awarded a $7,003,493 modification (P00010) to contract W91QF0-18-F-0047 for digitization of archival materials for the Army Heritage and Education Center. Work will be performed in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, with an estimated completion date of Sept. 25, 2021. Fiscal 2020 operations and maintenance (Army) funds in the amount of $7,003,493 were obligated at the time of the award. Mission and Installation Contracting Command, Carlisle Barracks, Pennsylvania, is the contracting activity. DEFENSE LOGISTICS AGENCY NuStar Terminal Partner TX L.P., San Antonio, Texas, has been awarded a maximum $22,392,616 firm-fixed-price contract for contractor-owned, contract-operated services to receive, store and issue U.S. government-owned jet propellant thermally stable. This was a competitive acquisition with one response received. This is a four-year base contract with one five-year option period with a possible six-month extension. Location of performance is Texas, with a June 30, 2024, performance completion date. Using military service is Air Force. Type of appropriation is fiscal 2020 through 2024 defense working capital funds. The contracting activity is the Defense Logistics Agency Energy, Fort Belvoir, Virginia (SPE603-20-C-5006). AIR FORCE CAE USA Inc., Tampa, Florida, has been awarded a $10,544,331 firm-fixed-price modification (P00158) to contract FA8223-10-C-0013 for support of the KC-135 Aircrew Training System. This modification provides for collective bargaining agreement wage adjustments resulting from Fair Labor Standards Act and Service Contract Act – Price Adjustment, and brings the total cumulative face value of the contract to $526,529,911. Work will be performed in Altus Air Force Base, Oklahoma; Grissom Air Reserve Base, Indiana; MacDill AFB, Florida; Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania; Rickenbacker Air National Guard Base, Ohio; Scott AFB, Illinois; Fairchild AFB, Washington; Milwaukee Air National Guard Base, Wisconsin; March AFB, California; and Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam, Hawaii. Work is expected to be completed by Dec. 31, 2020. Fiscal 2020 operations and maintenance funds in the amount of $10,544,331 are being obligated at the time of award. Air Force Life Cycle Management Center, Wright-Patterson AFB, Ohio, is the contracting activity. Honeywell International Inc., Phoenix, Arizona, has been award a $7,777,093 cost-plus-fixed-fee contract to research, develop, integrate, validate and demonstrate Consistent Logical Automated Reasoning for Integrated System Software Assurance (CLARISSA) for development and assessment of assurance cases. This contract provides for the research and development of technology to automate generation of assurance cases from curated evidence. Work will be performed in Phoenix, Arizona, and is expected to be completed by March 12, 2024. This award is the result of a competitive acquisition and two offers were received. Fiscal 2019 research, development, test and evaluation funds in the amount of $380,564 are being obligated at time of award. Air Force Research Laboratory, Rome, New York, is the contracting activity (FA8750-20-C-0512). (Awarded March 19, 2020) *Small business https://www.defense.gov/Newsroom/Contracts/Contract/Article/2185990/source/GovDelivery/

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  July 8, 2021 | International, C4ISR, Security

  Air Force tests new approach for assigning cyber missions

  A task force seeks to

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  October 29, 2019 | International, Aerospace

  European Missile Research Paves Way For Collaborative Weaponry

  By Tony Osborne Future conflicts will require weapons that can adapt to different target sets and collaborate to hit harder. As several European nations gear up to begin the development of advanced new combat aircraft, such as the Franco/German/Spanish Future Combat Air System and the British-led Tempest project, and invest in long-range ground-based weaponry, European missile manufacturer MBDA has begun focusing its research programs on delivering these advanced capabilities. The Anglo-French Materials and Components for Missiles Innovation and Technology Partnership (MCM-ITP), led by MBDA and sponsored by the French and UK defense ministries to the tune of €13 million ($14.5 million) a year, has been developing technologies over the last 11 years to help increase the performance and lower the cost of MBDA's British and French weapons. Small to midsize enterprises (SME) and academia have participated in the program, validating technologies with more than 200 projects in eight research domains ranging from rocket propulsion to seekers and fusing, developing them up to a technology readiness level (TRL) of 4. The research program has assisted in development of the French Mica NG air-to-air missile, supporting a small active, electronically scanned array radar module for the seeker of the radar-guided version, while the Spear 3, a network-enabled guided missile being developed in the UK will use a wire-free architecture. In addition, as the Spear 3 family of weapons broadens in the future, it will use an adaptive control system. The ITP is beginning to look at technologies that can speed up the engagement chain, adapt warheads for different kinds of targets and even develop lower-cost air-breathing engines for new families of so-called remote carriers—the attritable unmanned air systems that will support future combat aircraft into theater. “We know that collaborative weapons would be a big advantage to defeat air defenses, but how we do that has not yet been quantified,” says Olivier Lucas, MBDA's director of Future Systems, speaking to Aviation Week at the MCM-ITP Conference in Birmingham, England, on Oct. 15. “We need to demonstrate the benefits you can get from these networked weapons through operational analysis,” he adds. To make collaborative weapons work, Lucas says there will need to be developments in low-cost data links to connect them, and then algorithms that can take advantage of the cooperation and ensure all these systems can still work together in environments where navigation and communication signals could be degraded. Industry has already proved it can make UAVs collaborate and swarm in formations, but as Lucas points out, this is usually done with the aid of satellite-based global positioning systems. The military is unlikely to enjoy such a luxury in a high-end conflict. All four global navigation satellite systems (GNSS)—the U.S. Global Positioning System (GPS), Europe's Galileo, Russia's Glonass and China's BeiDou—work around similar frequencies and could be easily jammed. Weapons such as cruise missiles can already operate without GNSS by relying on inertial navigation systems (INS), or if flying over land they can recognize landscapes based on internal terrain databases. But what if a considerable part of their flight is over water, where there are no landmarks? As part of the MCM-ITP, a team from MBDA, Airbus Defense and Space and French aerospace research agency ONERA have developed a means of correcting INS drift using satellite communication signals. The Resilient and Autonomous Satcom Navigation (Reason) system gives the weapon an alternative measurement signal. Many military communication satellites already have the capability of geolocating interference. Using the signals to provide navigation updates employs a reverse of that process, say engineers. They have already proved the theory by linking an INS fitted to a 4 X 4 vehicle that took signals from two of the UK's SkyNet communication satellites and compared the INS track with that of GPS, noting small deviations from course. The team believes the Reason technology will be valuable for future generations of long-range cruise missiles and anti-ship missiles such as the Anglo-French Future Cruise/Anti-Ship Weapon, currently in a concept phase. Another MCM-ITP project is looking at using artificial intelligence (AI) and a process called deep reinforcement, learning to better understand the levels of autonomy that might be needed in the engagement chain. The Human Machine Teaming (HUMAT) project considers the growing complexity and capability of modern missiles and the increasing amounts of data being collected by multilayered intelligence systems. It recognizes that human operators may need to be supported in their analysis and prioritization of threats by artificial intelligence. The two year-long program, started in November 2017, has studied different elements of the engagement chain, as well as the ethical, legal and technological constraints, with the aim of creating “robust engagement decision-making,” and “effective transfer of task responsibilities between the human operator and the machine.” The HUMAT system has benefits for the weapon command-and-control systems, particularly air-to-surface attack, but also multilayered air defense systems, say MBDA engineers. “We have to understand the information we will share with the weapons, what will be split, what is planned and what decisions are left to the group of weapons,” says Lucas. “This process has to be tuned, you can either program the trajectory of each weapon or tell the weapons: ‘Here are your targets, now do your best,'” he says. Collaborative weapons will also need to feature additional low-cost sensors to help them make their targeting decisions, including those that understand radar signal and resolution, so that the most appropriate weapon can be selected to hit a particular target successfully. Mission planning is also being addressed. MBDA engineers and academics from Queen Mary University of London have been exploring the use of deep-learning techniques to speed up the targeting process for weapons such as cruise missiles. Current air-launched cruise missiles such as MBDA's Storm Shadow/SCALP family use an imaging infrared sensor and autonomous target recognition system in the terminal phase of flight. But to recognize the target, a 3D model needs to be developed as part of the mission planning process. This process can be laborious and time-consuming, so engineers have been studying ways to create the models using satellite imagery. Using deep-learning techniques, the system has been fed thousands of daylight and infrared satellite images taken in different conditions at different times of the day. The Fast Targeting algorithms have learned how to match images with the target area despite various geometric and radiometric distortions, allowing a 3D model of the target to be built much faster. The idea is to make such weapons much more flexible and pave the way for them to be used against time-sensitive targets. Lucas says such technologies will help address the issues associated with combat mass, dealing with the challenge of fewer platforms, so the same weapons will have to be adaptable for different missions and targets. “In recent conflicts in Libya and Syria, weapons could not be used to their full effectiveness, because they were too powerful, and there was a risk of collateral damage,” says Lucas. Operators will be able to program future weapons to scale the warhead's effects up or down to deal with different targets and environments, he suggests. Other projects in the MCM-ITP are developing lethality models for different types of targets, including aircraft, ships and structures. Replacing metal parts in warheads with reactive materials could result in more efficient and increased lethality, and if combined with additive manufacturing techniques warhead costs could also be reduced, say engineers. Additive manufacturing processes could lead to new designs for penetrator warheads in particular. Engineers from MBDA and SMEs Impetus Afea and Fluid Gravity Engineering have developed a 3D penetrator warhead case with a smaller mass than the thick casings usually produced through casting. Using the 3D-printed case means less energy is lost during warhead detonation than with the older cast penetrator. Testing has proved the 3D-printed casing can match the survivability of the thicker casing, and reduced collateral effects can also be achieved, MBDA says. The company is now looking to evolve the MCM-ITP to deal with new technologies that may cut across the eight domains of research, with the addition of a new ninth, open-challenge domain that will be more flexible for future program needs. A name change is also in the offing, with MCM-ITP being renamed the Complex Weapons Innovation and Technology Partnership (CW-ITP) from early next year. https://aviationweek.com/defense/european-missile-research-paves-way-collaborative-weaponry