6 septembre 2019 | International, Aérospatial, Naval, Terrestre, C4ISR, Sécurité
By: David B. Larter
WASHINGTON — The U.S. Army faces problems on multiple fronts when it comes to sending business to small companies, the head of Army Futures Command said Wednesday.
Gen. John Murray said small businesses struggle under a procurement system that can take years, and then struggle to scale their businesses to meet the Army's needs.
“There is a lack of trust [on the part of small businesses] that the government can sustain [a] small-business model,” Murray told the audience at the third annual Defense News Conference. “The way we do budgeting, [program objectives memorandum] POM cycles and all that — a small business can't survive. We're going to have to prove to small businesses that we can adjust our POM cycles to meet their needs.
“And from the small business perspective, there are only a few ways that they can scale to the size we are talking about in terms of production. One of those ways is partnering with a traditional [defense contractor], so that's going to be a challenge going forward.”
Murray's comments come as the Army tries to engage with a range of partners — from universities and small businesses to the traditional prime contractors such as Raytheon and General Dynamics — to find ways to integrate new technologies into the force.
The outreach to small businesses at Army Futures Command is about finding new ways to get after the challenges the service faces, Murray said, but that in and of itself comes with challenges.
“This outreach to small business is not because there is anything wrong with traditional defense primes, it's really an outreach to find new ways to solve our problems,” he said. “I've been in the Army 37 years, and I think about solving our problems a certain way. I guarantee a lot of these small businesses think about how to solve problems a different way.
“Part of the challenge I have with small business is comfortably describing our problem to them. I can't talk in acronyms, I can't talk with 37 years of experience, I need to talk very clearly and very plainly.”
Murray said his teams have staged events aimed at the private sector, such as a recent one where startups gathered to figure out how to move artillery shells 250 meters using autonomous unmanned systems. Such events have been instructive, he noted.
Ultimately, however, the Army will choose the business that best meets the service's requirements, he said.
“What it really comes down to is what are our problems and where is the best place — whether that's small business or a university or a traditional prime — where is the best place to solve that problem,” Murray said.
19 avril 2023 | International, Terrestre
Under the contract Elbit Systems will supply a battalion?s worth of ATMOS (Autonomous Truck Mounted Howitzer) 155mm/52 caliber truck-mounted howitzers systems.
19 novembre 2021 | International, C4ISR, Sécurité
The DoD Small Business and Technology Partnerships Office announces the pre-release of the following Broad Agency Announcement (BAA) topics: Army SBIR 21.4 SBIR Topic A214-045: “Graph Neural Networks (GNN) for UxS Collaborative Agent Control,” published at https://sam.gov/opp/178e0311b4d04df2bf25025d5c99473d/view SBIR Topic A214-046: “Synthetic RF Training Data Generation,” published at https://sam.gov/opp/fa78f3dd832249ec925b092246c8ed0f/view SBIR Topic A214-047: “Height of Burst scoring through Machine Learning,” published at https://sam.gov/opp/e94aafd959174ec2882511ace4c3e939/view SBIR Topic A214-048: “Machine Learning (ML) for Breach Routing,” published at https://sam.gov/opp/f8c317353e0547f5b139fb87016075af/view SBIR Topic A214-049: “Artificial Intelligence/Machine Learning (AI/ML) for Radio Frequency (RF) Modulation Recognition,” published at https://sam.gov/opp/84a904f180234f85bc861a604844c8d8/view SBIR Topic A214-050: “Natural Language Processing+,” published at https://sam.gov/opp/a27caede2da442ce86ec6f52c2aa13f1/view SBIR Topic A214-051: “Asynchronous Neuromorphic Digital Readout Circuit for Infrared Cameras for Autonomous Target Acquisition and Autonomous Vehicles,” published at https://sam.gov/opp/b8c670091b7947ca99658c48f62e0621/view IMPORTANT DATES: November 16, 2021: Topics pre-release November 16, 2021: Topic Q&A opens to questions November 30, 2021: Topics open, begin submitted proposals in DSIP December 21, 2021: Topic Q&A closes to new questions at 12:00 pm ET January 4, 2022: Topics close, full proposals must be submitted in DSIP no later than 12:00 p.m. ET Full topics and instructions are available at the links provided above.
20 novembre 2023 | International, Terrestre
The Army's Lower Tier Air and Missile Defense Sensor enabled the intercept of a cruise missile target in a developmental test ahead of first unit fielding.