Ukraine producing more drones than state can purchase, minister says

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  16 avril 2024 | International, Aérospatial

  Air Force to get a head start on GPS, target tracking efforts

  The service's first two Quick Start efforts involve boosting GPS resilience and advancing moving target indication capabilities.

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  2 octobre 2018 | International, Aérospatial, Naval, Terrestre, C4ISR, Sécurité

  Facing industry pressure, Pentagon backs off contract payment changes

  By: Aaron Mehta and Joe Gould WASHINGTON – Following a wave of criticism from the defense industry and members of Congress, the Pentagon on Monday backed off proposed changes to how companies receive cash flow on their contracts. In a statement released at the unusual time of 7:19 PM, Deputy Secretary of Defense Patrick Shanahan said the decision to withdraw the proposed acquisition changes stemmed from a lack of “coordination” inside the department. “Recently, proposed amendments to the Defense Federal Acquisition Regulation Supplement (DFARS) were prematurely released, absent full coordination,” Shanahan's statement read. “As a result, the Department will rescind the proposed amendments. In coordination with industry, the Department will create a revised rule to implement section 831 of the FY2017 NDAA.” "The department will continue to partner closely with Congress and industry to examine all reform opportunities, ensuring we provide the best value to taxpayers and critical capabilities to military personnel who defend this great Nation,” Shanahan said. Unsaid in the statement: that since word of the proposed changes got out, the defense industry has been loud and unanimous in its opposition, and has enlisted its supporters on the Hill to help fight against the plan, put forth by Undersecretary of Defense for Acquisition and Sustainment Ellen Lord. As part of a broader set of changes to the acquisition rules, Lord hoped to change how companies receive their cash flow based on performance measurements, to act as an incentive for good behavior. In a Sept. 5 interview with Defense News, she laid out the rationale, saying “I believe the lifeblood of most industry is cash flow, so what we will do is regulate the percentage of payments or the amount of profit that can be achieved through what type of performance they demonstrate by the numbers.” However, three major trade groups — The National Defense Industrial Association, Professional Services Council and the Aerospace Industries Association — objected to the proposal, which would slash the payments on work to be performed from 80 percent to 50 percent, with incremental increases for maintaining quality or on-time delivery — and decreases for companies that have committed fraud. Rep. Mac Thornberry, R-Texas, and Sen. Jim Inhofe, R-Okla., the chairs of the House and Senate Armed Services Committees, sent a Sept. 21 letter to Shanahan calling the proposal “fundamentally flawed" and asking that it be rescinded and revisited. “We should not make it harder to do business with the Department of Defense than it is to do business with other parts of government — and that's exactly what this regulation does,” Thornberry told reporters last Tuesday. “We try to streamline acquisition, we try to make it easier to do business with these small companies; and then something like this comes out.” The Pentagon had hoped to implement the rule changes by the end of the year and had planned to hold a public meeting on Oct. 10, before the public comment period ended on Oct. 23. Whether that event will still happen is unclear. https://www.defensenews.com/pentagon/2018/10/02/facing-industry-pressure-pentagon-backs-off-contract-payment-changes

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  6 décembre 2019 | International, C4ISR, Sécurité

  These companies are teaming up to pursue a $1B cyber contract

  By: Mark Pomerleau ManTech and General Dynamics are joining forces to compete for the Pentagon's top cyber training contract, a deal that is thought to be worth nearly $1 billion. In a Dec. 5 Facebook post, ManTech announced the partnership with General Dynamics Information Systems and General Dynamics Mission Systems for the Cyber Training, Readiness, Integration, Delivery and Enterprise Technology (TRIDENT) contract. Raytheon, Lockheed Martin and Northrop Grumman have previously said they will also compete for the award. The primary component of the contract is the Persistent Cyber Training Environment (PCTE), an online client in which members of U.S. Cyber Command's cyber mission force can log on from anywhere in the world for training and to rehearse missions. Pentagon leaders view PCTE as one of the more critical needs for Cyber Command. Currently, no integrated or robust cyber training environment exists. ManTech and General Dymanics will “will develop a Persistent Cyber Training Environment (PCTE) platform that empowers holistic, enterprise-wide U.S. cyber training capabilities for the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD), delivering cyber threat-informed services, regional compute and data storage capabilities, and real-time #DevSecOps on a global scale,” the Facebook post stated. An award for the contract is expected in late 2020. https://www.fifthdomain.com/dod/2019/12/05/these-companies-are-teaming-up-to-pursue-a-1b-cyber-contract