Other Transaction Authority awards have soared 712 percent since 2015, helping jumpstart R&D, including on COVID vaccines. But now the Space Force’s OTAs have been derailed by a court case against contractor NSTXL – and the whole OTA system is under fire.
Want to make a mini-tank that carries two passengers in back? Or put the heavy weapons on one vehicle and the passengers in another? Go for it, the Army’s armor modernization director told industry.
Answering the Pentagon’s call to bolster defense industrial base.
"The Joint Force depends upon SATCOM communication services as part of its JADC2 and Internet of Things," says Maj. Gen. Kim Crider, Space Force acting technology innovation officer.
The Army will give companies more time to refine their designs for the Bradley replacement, but there’s a four-month gap in funding in fiscal 2023.
Army Contracting Command still accounts for 45 percent of all DoD Other Transaction Authority obligations, but the Air Force and, belatedly, the Navy are starting to catch up.
The Pentagon will retain strict security protocols to ensure “we’re not training Chinese scientists that are going to go help their programs" said Gillian Bussey, head of the Joint Hypersonic Transition Office
The challenge for Western democratic institutions is not a lack of capability — it is a structural one.
"[I]t's really a good time, and important, for the government to step in and help prime the pump," says Celia Merzbacher, deputy director of NIST's Quantum Economic Development Consortium.
The Light Reconnaissance Vehicle, an off-road truck to scout ahead of airborne and light infantry units, could lead the Army’s move to electric motors. But electrifying heavy cargo trucks, let alone tanks, could take decades.
DARPA used the collaborative to find and contract the industry competitors in the AlphaDogfight which resulted in an AI 'pilot' built by Heron Systems beat a top Air Force F-16 pilot in a simulated WWII-style aerial battle.
"Our goal is that by the end of fall to have these test beds stood up, and industry working at those sites," Joseph Evans, DoD's technical director of 5G, says.
DoD hopes that sharing spectrum will help lower costs and create a sustainable 5G industrial base as it battles to keep up with China.
Four bases around the country will pioneer military use of the new high-speed communications network technology.
If you want to prototype 5G networks on a military base, you need to join the National Spectrum Consortium first. That’s an increasingly common model.