28 novembre 2019 | International, Aérospatial, Naval, Terrestre, C4ISR, Sécurité
NAVY
United Technologies Corp., Pratt & Whitney Military Engines, East Hartford, Connecticut, is awarded a $521,996,409 undefinitized contract modification (P00070) to a previously awarded cost-plus-incentive-fee, cost-plus-fixed-fee and fixed-price-incentive-firm-target contract (N00019-17-C-0010). This modification provides performance based logistics sustainment in support of the F-35 Lightning II F135 propulsion system for the Navy, Air Force, Marine Corps, non-Department of Defense (DoD) participants and foreign military sales (FMS) customers. Work will be performed in East Hartford, Connecticut (73%); Oklahoma City, Oklahoma (18%); Camari, Italy (3%); Eglin Air Force Base, Florida (2%); Edwards Air Force Base, California (1%); Hill Air Force Base, Utah (1%); Luke Air Force Base, Arizona (1%); and Marine Corps Air Station Beaufort, South Carolina (1%), and is expected to be completed in November 2020. Fiscal 2020 operation and maintenance (Air Force) funds for $72,261,440 will be obligated at time of award, all of which will expire at the end of the current fiscal year. This modification combines purchases for the Air Force ($179,272,654; 34%); Marine Corps ($134,605,633; 26%); Navy ($29,758,385; 6%); non-DoD participants ($124,483,008; 24%), and FMS customers ($53,876,729; 10%) under the FMS Program. The Naval Air Systems Command, Patuxent River, Maryland, is the contracting activity.
Kings Bay Support Services LLC, Alexandria, Virginia, is awarded a $20,049,858 indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity modification for the exercise of the option to extend services for base operating support services at Naval Submarine Base, Kings Bay, Georgia. The work to be performed provides for all labor, facilities management, supervision, tools, materials, equipment, incidental engineering, environmental services and transportation to effectively execute base operating support services. After award of this option, the total cumulative contract value will be $342,241,061. Work will be performed in Kings Bay, Georgia. This option period is from December 2019 to May 2020. No funds will be obligated at time of award. Fiscal 2020 operation and maintenance (Navy) contract funds for $16,928,444 for recurring work will be obligated on individual task orders issued during the option period. The Naval Facilities Engineering Command Southeast, Jacksonville, Florida, is the contracting activity (N69450-11-D-7578).
ARMY
Seaside Engineering & Surveying LLC,* Baker, Florida (W9126G-20-D-6003); and Lowe Engineers LLC,* Robert, Louisiana (W9126G-20-D-6004) will compete for each order of the $240,000,000 firm-fixed-price contract for professional land survey architect-engineer in support of the Southwestern Division Department of Homeland Security Border Infrastructure Program. Bids were solicited via the internet with 12 received. Work locations and funding will be determined with each order, with an estimated completion date of Nov. 26, 2024. U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Little Rock, Arkansas, is the contracting activity.
Lockheed Martin Corp., Orlando, Florida, was awarded a $134,707,194 modification (P00094) to contract W31P4Q-15-C-0102 for procurement of the Joint-Air-to-Ground Missiles. Work will be performed in Orlando, Florida, with an estimated completion date of Feb. 28, 2023. Fiscal 2019 procurement of ammunition, Army funds in the amount of $134,707,194 were obligated at the time of the award. U.S. Army Contracting Command, Redstone Arsenal, Alabama, is the contracting activity.
Ames Construction Inc., Burnsville, Minnesota, was awarded a $58,784,850 firm-fixed-price contract for plant, labor, materials to construct a gated water control structure, dam walls, a vehicle service bridge, stilling basin, pre-formed scour hole, approach apron, a slope protection slab and approach walls. Bids were solicited via the internet with two received. Work will be performed in Fargo, North Dakota, with an estimated completion date of Oct. 16, 2024. Fiscal 2019 civil construction funds in the amount of $58,784,850 were obligated at the time of the award. U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is the contracting activity (W912ES-20-C-0001).
Technica LLC,* Charleston, South Carolina, was awarded a $17,880,934 modification (0004BK) to contract W52P1J-12-G-0018 for logistics support services, maintenance, transportation, and supply support. Work will be performed in El Paso, Texas, with an estimated completion date of June 2, 2020. Fiscal 2020 overseas contingency operations transfer and operation and maintenance, Army funds in the amount of $10,477,200 were obligated at the time of the award. U.S. Army Contracting Command, Rock Island Arsenal, Illinois, is the contracting activity.
Lockheed Martin Corp., Orlando, Florida, was awarded a $7,563,160 modification (P00002) to contract W52P1J-19-F-0533 for Modernized Target Acquisition Designation Sight Pilot Night Vision Sensor Systems, subcomponent production and technical services for the Apache Attack Helicopter. Work locations and funding will be determined with each order, with an estimated completion date of Jan. 1, 2023. U.S. Army Contracting Command, Rock Island Arsenal, Illinois, is the contracting activity.
DEFENSE FINANCE AND ACCOUNTING SERVICE
KPMG LLP, McLean, Virginia, is being awarded a labor-hour contract option with a maximum value of $41,643,963 for audit services of the Army general fund and working capital fund financial statements. Work will be performed in McLean, Virginia, with an expected completion date of Nov. 30, 2020. This contract is the result of a competitive acquisition for which one quote was received. The modification brings the total cumulative face value of the contract to $131,613,957 from $89,969,994. Fiscal 2020 Army operation and maintenance funds in the amount of $41,643,963 are being obligated at the time of the award. The Defense Finance and Accounting Service, Contract Services Directorate, Columbus, Ohio, is the contracting activity (HQ0423-17-F-0010).
DEFENSE LOGISTICS AGENCY
Apteryx Inc. Akron, Ohio, has been awarded a maximum $20,900,000 fixed-price with economic-price-adjustment, indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity contract for hospital equipment and accessories for the Defense Logistics Agency electronic catalog. This was a competitive acquisition with 101 responses received. This is a five-year contract with no option periods. Location of performance is Ohio, with a Nov. 26, 2024, performance completion date. Using military services are Army, Navy, Air Force and Marine Corps. Type of appropriation is fiscal 2020 through 2025 defense working capital funds. The contracting activity is the Defense Logistics Agency Troop Support, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania (SPE2DH-20-D-0025).
R.A. Miller Industries Inc.,** Grand Haven, Michigan, has been awarded a maximum $8,737,000 firm-fixed-price, indefinite-quantity contract for antennas and an antenna element. This was a competitive acquisition with one offer received. This is a three-year base contract with two one-year option periods. Location of performance is Michigan, with a Nov. 26, 2022, performance completion date. Using military services are Army, Navy, Air Force and Marine Corps. Type of appropriation is fiscal 2020 through 2023 defense working capital funds. The contracting activity is the Defense Logistics Agency Land and Maritime, Columbus, Ohio (SPE7MX20D0008).
LVI, Pendergrass, Georgia, has been awarded an $8,696,995 modification (P00036) exercising the fourth one-year option of a three-year base contract (SPM1C1-14-C-0002) with four, one-year option periods for warehousing, storage, logistics and distribution functions. This is a fixed-price with economic-price-adjustment contract. Location of performance is Georgia, with a Dec. 1, 2020, performance completion date. Using customers are Army and Defense Logistics Agency. Type of appropriation is fiscal 2020 through 2021 defense working capital funds. The contracting activity is the Defense Logistics Agency Troop Support, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
*Small Business
**Woman-Owned Small Business
https://www.defense.gov/Newsroom/Contracts/Contract/Article/2028834/source/GovDelivery/
9 avril 2024 | International, Naval
The Navy's top civilian called the establishment of a robotics warfare rating "a significant milestone" in the service's journey toward a hybrid fleet.
7 décembre 2020 | International, Aérospatial, Naval, Terrestre, C4ISR, Sécurité
By: Aaron Mehta WASHINGTON — The U.S. sold $175 billion in weapons to foreign partners and allies in fiscal 2020, a 2.8 percent rise from the previous year's total, according to a Friday announcement from the Defense and State departments. The total comes at the end of the Trump administration, which made increasing arms exports a key part of its economic growth platform. Export licenses via the Direct Commercial Sales program totaled $124.3 billion in FY20, up from $114.7 billion the previous year. A series of reforms, started under the Obama administration and continued under the Trump team, has pushed more defense articles into the commercial sales realm. Deals made through the Foreign Military Sales program, which cover the majority of large defense articles, totaled $50.78 billion. Of that total, $44.79 billion came in payments from partner nations, $3.3 billion from Foreign Military Financing, and $2.69 billion for cases funded under Defense Department Title 10 grant assistance programs, such as train and equip programs. The FMS total represents an 8 percent drop from FY19. In FY17, the U.S. sold $41.93 billion in FMS deals. That number jumped a dramatic 33 percent in FY18 to $55.6 billion, then dipped slightly to $55.4 billion in FY19. Despite back-to-back years without growth, officials expressed optimism, pointing to the three-year rolling average of implemented FMS cases — which rose from $51 billion covering FY17-FY19 to $54 billion covering FY18-FY20 — as a sign of overall growth. Officials have historically argued that the volatility of the year-to-year FMS process means that the three-year average is the best indicator of overall growth or decline, as it captures sales that implemented late in one fiscal year or early in the next. The total of official sales is different from the total number of FMS cases cleared by the State Department. The latter figure — 68 cases worth $83.5 billion, the highest annual total of FMS notifications since the start of the Trump administration — is a good indicator of future sales, but quantities and dollar figures often change during negotiations. While industry will cheer the sales total, William Hartung of the Center for International Policy warned that the total may be questionable. “It is important to note that this is a vastly inflated figure if one is looking for statistics on sales that are actually likely to eventuate in contracts and deliveries,” according to Hartung. “There are many steps along the way in which an authorized sale can be sidetracked, including, for example, changes in demand and economic capacity on the part of potential customers. “The truth is we do not have reliable figures from the Pentagon or the State Department on how much weaponry the United States delivers each year, and what items have been delivered to what countries. Without this information, it is difficult to fully assess the impact of U.S. arms exports.” https://www.defensenews.com/pentagon/2020/12/04/american-sold-175-billion-in-weapons-abroad-in-fy20
31 juillet 2018 | International, Aérospatial
BY PATRICK TUCKER A research team is training computers to find and fuse clues from wildly different rivers of digital data. Hiding illicit nuclear programs might be getting harder, thanks to new ways of gleaning and combining clues from various rivers of digital data. That's the conclusion of new research funded in part by the U.S. Energy Department's National Nuclear Security Administration. Satellites offer one kind of information; social media another — particularly inside countries that may be trying to flout inspections. But large volumes of satellite imagery and social media data aren't similar. You can have one analyst examine satellite pictures and another look at social media posts to see if they align, but the process is time-consuming and generally far from comprehensive. The study's authors developed a method for fusing different types of data in a machine-readable way to offer a much clearer picture. “In light of their ubiquitous emergence, social media increasingly promise to be of great value even though associated applications have thus far remained simple, and their fusion with other data has been largely ad hoc,” the team from North Carolina State University writes in “Fusing Heterogeneous Data: A Case for Remote Sensing and Social Media.” Only by creating a new statistical method for fusing the outputs of satellite data and social media data do you get something you can use to predict what might happen next within a given area of interest, such as a specific nation's nuclear enrichment or weapons development. The researchers looked at satellite and social media data from August 2013, when deadly floods killed eight people and caused widespread damage in Colorado. They sought to show that if you could algorithmically identify which imagery showed the flooding from space, and which geotagged tweets described it on the ground, you could could much more quickly verify one data set against another — that is, you could determine whether incoming social media data supports the conclusions you might be reaching from your satellite data, and vice versa. “Next steps for the project include evaluating nuclear facilities in the West to identify common characteristics that may also be applicable to facilities in more isolated societies, such as North Korea,” notes a press release on the paper. One of the authors, NCSU computer and electrical engineering professor Hamid Krim, said the team would try to “address the insufficient knowledge in general in areas of great interest (e.g. N. Korea and Iran). The goal is to come up with systematic methodologies to transport knowledge about nuclear environments available in other areas (e.g., in the West) to these domains where there is very little available. Creating such an environment in these places of interest will help them detect potential undesired activity.” Of course, there are limitations to media monitoring in Iran and North Korea. The former's social media environment is largely underground, thanks to bans on Twitter and many other social networks. The latter has virtually no social media environment at all. Krim noted that the “adversarial strategy” of social-media censorship makes his team's analysis harder. But even social posts from nearby countries can help illuminate their more secretive neighbors, he said — think tweets from Japan after earth tremors are felt. https://www.defenseone.com/technology/2018/07/satellite-imagery-social-media-new-way-spot-emerging-nuclear-threats/150146/