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NAVSEA Reassigns Components of Former Warfighting Capability Directorate; Vice Adm. William Galinis Quoted
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NAVSEA Reassigns Components of Former Warfighting Capability Directorate; Vice Adm. William Galinis Quoted

Naval Sea Systems Command has dissolved NAVSEA 06, also known as the Warfighting Capability and Enterprise Readiness Directorate, and will reassign components to specific programs and priorities.

Components of the now-defunct NAVSEA 06 have reformed to support Program Executive Office for Unmanned Small Combatants and other offices within NAVSEA, the command said Tuesday.

"This re-alignment will help us better leverage other parts of the NAVSEA team to support the important work being done by the SEA 06 team,” said Vice Adm. William Galinis, NAVSEA commander. Program offices originally assigned to naval special warfare and expeditionary missions will join PEO USC.

Logistics components of the old directorate will move to SEA 05R and SEA 03R, partly in a move to support Naval Information Warfare Systems Command's (NAVWAR) PEO for Manpower Logistics and Business Solutions.

SEA 06 components focusing on program management competency, national shipbuilding and supplier product quality will also transfer to other existing directorates.

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Lt. Gen. David Thompson Assumes Vice Chief Role at Space Force
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Lt. Gen. David Thompson Assumes Vice Chief Role at Space Force

Lt. Gen. David Thompson has taken up his new role as the U.S. Space Force’s vice chief of space operations, giving him the responsibility of supporting USSF’s operational readiness.

Thompson, formerly vice commander of Air Force Space Command, will focus on establishing USSF’s Pentagon headquarters and a new Space Warfighting Integration Center (SWIC) alongside Gen. John Raymond, the service’s chief of space operations and 2020 Wash100 Award recipient, USSF said Sunday.

USSF is organizationally ready to move its headquarters out from Peterson Air Force Base in Colorado, and perform HQ activities at the Pentagon, Thompson noted.

The SWIC will function as the Space Force’s field operating agency for modern technology integration, similar in fashion to the U.S. Army’s Futures Command.

Raymond led the ceremony through which Thompson assumed his new role and officially became a member of Space Force leadership. A more formal ceremony to commemorate Thompson’s promotion will take place at a later time with the attendance of his loved ones.

Thompson’s move to USSF ends a nearly four-decade tenure of service with the U.S. Air Force.

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Mark Esper: US Must Expand Fleet by 2045 to Retain Naval Dominance
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Mark Esper: US Must Expand Fleet by 2045 to Retain Naval Dominance

Mark Esper, secretary of the Department of Defense (DoD) and a 2020 Wash100 Award recipient, has said the U.S. Navy must launch fleet expansion efforts to ensure American military dominance against China.

Esper told attendees at a Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments event that the U.S. needs to expand its fleet to over 355 ships by the mid-2030s and 500 ships by 2045, Defense News reported Tuesday.

He noted that the Navy needs to prioritize deploying 70 to 80 attack submarines and modify its aircraft carrier programs to cover repurposing efforts for amphibious assault ships.

Esper envisions up to 240 unmanned and optionally manned subsurface and surface vehicles as well as additional units of small surface combatants, amphibious warfare ships and combat logistics force ships.

According to the defense secretary, the proposed fleet represents a “more balanced naval force” capable of executing fires across the land, air and sea domains.

“I agreed to provide additional funding from across the [DoD] enterprise, funding that was harvested from ongoing reform efforts such as combatant command reviews, ‘fourth estate’ reforms and other initiatives,” said Esper. “Together, these additional funding streams will increase the shipbuilding account to 13 percent.”

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Bruce Jette, James Geurts, Will Roper Talk Post-Pandemic Changes in Military Ops
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Bruce Jette, James Geurts, Will Roper Talk Post-Pandemic Changes in Military Ops

Leaders from the U.S. Army, Navy and Air Force have said that their respective service branches need to implement changes in force operations, supply chain management and workforce settings following the COVID-19 pandemic.

Bruce Jette, assistant Army secretary for acquisition, logistics and technology and a 2020 Wash100 Award recipient, told National Defense Magazine in an interview that the service “re-looked at how we think about safety and health” and is planning to renew its focus on biological warfare, the publication reported Tuesday.

Jette noted that the Army is also looking into alternative supply sources and advanced manufacturing techniques to protect its supply chain against future pandemic disruptions.

James Geurts, assistant Navy secretary for research, development and acquisition and fellow 2020 Wash100 awardee, said the service also needs to modify its operational activities to prevent “friction in systems and processes”. The shift to telework settings resulted in challenges for the service “for the first couple of weeks,” he added.

Will Roper, the Air Force’s assistant secretary for acquisition, technology and logistics and also a 2020 Wash100 Award winner, said the service was able to adjust its workforce to nontraditional operations in response to the pandemic.

He added that 93 percent of the Air Force is teleworking with “very little loss in productivity” because of commercial collaboration tools.

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NASA Appoints Barry “Butch” Wilmore as Commander of Boeing’s CST-100 Starliner; Leanne Caret Quoted
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NASA Appoints Barry “Butch” Wilmore as Commander of Boeing’s CST-100 Starliner; Leanne Caret Quoted

NASA has appointed Barry “Butch” Wilmore to serve as commander of Boeing’s CST-100 Starliner for the Crew Flight Test, succeeding Chris Ferguson, Boeing reported on Wednesday. Wilmore previously served as a backup crew member Starliner flight, and will join Nicole Mann and Mike Fincke for this first crewed mission of the Starliner spacecraft.

“My personal thank you to Chris for his leadership; he is putting his family first, which Boeing fully supports,” said Leanne Caret, president and CEO, Boeing Defense, Space & Security and 2020 Wash100 Award recipient. “We are fortunate he will continue to take an active role on the Starliner program and bring his depth and breadth of experience in human spaceflight to the program.”

Ferguson will transition to the role of director of Mission Integration and Operations. He will work to ensure the Starliner spacecraft and training systems support NASA’s astronauts, training and mission. Ferguson has been a member of the Starliner program since 2011.

“I have full confidence in the Starliner vehicle, the men and women building and testing it, and the NASA astronauts who will ultimately fly it,” Ferguson said. “The Boeing team has taken all lessons from our first uncrewed Orbital Flight Test to heart, and is making Starliner one of the safest new crewed spacecraft ever fielded. I will be here on the ground supporting Butch, Nicole and Mike while they prove it.”

Wilmore will begin training with his crewmates immediately in preparation for the 2021 flight to the International Space Station (ISS). Boeing will focus on delivering safe, reliable and cost-effective solutions for crew transportation services to and from the ISS. 

“I’m grateful to Chris for his exceptional leadership and insight into this very complex and most capable vehicle,” Wilmore said. “Having had the chance to train alongside and view this outstanding crew as backup has been instrumental in my preparation to assume this position.”

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Accenture Acquires Myrtle Consulting to Advance Digital Manufacturing; Nigel Stacey, Edwin Bosso Quoted
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Accenture Acquires Myrtle Consulting to Advance Digital Manufacturing; Nigel Stacey, Edwin Bosso Quoted

Accenture has entered an agreement to acquire Myrtle Consulting Group, an industrial operations consulting firm, to expand Accenture’s manufacturing and supply chain capabilities, Accenture reported on Tuesday. 

“Manufacturing and operations leaders… need to free untapped value across production sites and distribution centers, so they can invest in resilient and responsible operating models for manufacturing and supply chains that are future-proof and digital-enabled. This is what the combined skills of Accenture and Myrtle will help them achieve,” Nigel Stacey, global lead of Accenture Industry X, said. 

Myrtle has partnered with companies across consumer products, life sciences, chemicals, mining and heavy manufacturing industries to deliver products efficiently and sustainably. Accenture’s acquisition will expand the company’s ability to transform manufacturing for clients.

Accenture’s purchase will also expand initial value assessments, operating model strategies, new business processes and technology solutions. Myrtle’s team will merge with Accenture Industry X to improve how clients operate factories and plants.

Myrtle has focused on optimizing clients’ sourcing, production, supply chain operations and execution. The company also has experience in change management methodology, organization design and implementation, leadership development and frontline coaching. 

Edwin Bosso, CEO and founder of Myrtle, will join Accenture as managing director.  “Becoming part of Accenture Industry X will allow us to pair our frontline operational expertise with Accenture’s global reach and digital capabilities to bring solutions to clients that will transform their operations from the ground up,” Bosso said. 

Completion of the acquisition is subject to customary closing conditions. Financial terms of the acquisition were not disclosed.

About Accenture

Accenture is a leading global professional services company, providing a broad range of services in strategy and consulting, interactive, technology and operations, with digital capabilities across all of these services. We combine unmatched experience and specialized capabilities across more than 40 industries — powered by the world’s largest network of Advanced Technology and Intelligent Operations centers. With 506,000 people serving clients in more than 120 countries, Accenture brings continuous innovation to help clients improve their performance and create lasting value across their enterprises. 

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GSA, DoE Launch RFI for Resource-Efficient Technologies
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GSA, DoE Launch RFI for Resource-Efficient Technologies

The General Services Administration (GSA) has partnered with the Department of Energy (DoE) to issue a Request for Information (RFI), GSA reported on Wednesday. The agencies seek to receive responses from vendors on resource-efficient technologies that improve commercial building health and resilience.

The RFI will look for vendors that offer technologies that are nearly ready for commercial use, or in the early stages of commercial application. The RFI will be a part of the GSA Proving Ground (GPG) program for federally-owned facilities, or voluntary partnership programs facilitated by DOE for privately-owned facilities. The RFI will be open for submissions until Friday, Dec. 4, 2020. 

Vendors will support the technical and operational characteristics of the technology and its future deployment. The RFI has called upon three divisions of technologies, including integrated solutions, survivability and U.S. manufactured technologies. 

GSA will look to procure integrated solutions that manage indoor air quality without compromising energy efficiency, such as multi-zonal sensing and control, higher performance filtration and improved air sealing in ducts.

Of interest, the agencies will seek technologies that extend passive survivability and support continuity of operations during grid disruption, including advanced opaque retrofit envelope technologies that support passive heating, cooling and ventilation; window retrofit approaches; phased control or load coordination, among others. 

The RFI has announced interest in U.S. manufactured technologies that support the production of electrical energy through photovoltaics (PV), such as high-efficiency PV with improved materials construction, fabrication process and installation methods, building-integrated photovoltaics and innovative PV and storage systems.

About GSA

The mission of GSA is to deliver value and savings in real estate, acquisition, technology, and other mission support services across the government. One of GSA’s four strategic goals is to save taxpayer money through better management of federal real estate.

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Pavilion Data Systems Expands HFA to Federal Agency; Michael Tanner Quoted
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Pavilion Data Systems Expands HFA to Federal Agency; Michael Tanner Quoted

Pavilion Data Systems has announced that a federal agency customer has expanded its deployment of the Pavilion Hyperparallel Flash Array (HFA) to accelerate workflows throughout IBM Spectrum Scale environment, the company reported on Wednesday.

“The Pavilion Hyperparallel Flash Array enabled the organization to meet its stringent performance requirements, while simultaneously reducing the cost and complexity of its storage deployment,” said Michael Tanner, regional vice president and head of the Federal Business for Pavilion Data Systems.

Pavilion HFA has enabled the agency to safeguard American lives and property through the use of advanced analytics technology, while reducing the cost and complexity of their Spectrum Scale environment.

Pavilion has utilized Apache Spark and Nvidia GPUs to rapidly analyze vast amounts of data, using advanced AI-based algorithms to detect and eliminate threats. The Pavilion HFA has also allowed the agency to reduce the cost and footprint of other solutions.

In addition, the company’s solution has also reduced the management overhead associated with complex storage environments and opened compute resources that can be applied to critical application processing. “Our client’s workflows are critical to our nation’s security and they have demanding performance requirements,” Tanner added. 

About Pavilion

Pavilion Data Systems is the leader in the third wave of storage, delivering unmatched performance, density, and ultra-low latency at scale, without the cost and complexity of traditional storage. 

Pavilion enables global customers to shatter expectations today, tomorrow, and beyond by deploying storage solutions that scale linearly utilizing NVMe and NVMe-oF technology.

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Navy Eyes Army’s Ground-Based Sense and Avoid Tech for MQ-25 Tanker Drone
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Navy Eyes Army’s Ground-Based Sense and Avoid Tech for MQ-25 Tanker Drone

The U.S. Navy intends to use the U.S. Army’s Ground Based Sense and Avoid system aboard the Boeing-built MQ-25 Stingray unmanned aerial tanker, Inside Defense reported Tuesday.

Capt. Chad Reed, MQ-25 program manager, told the publication in a statement the service is eyeing the GBSAA platform to “support MQ-25 fleet operations in the national air space under federal aviation regulations.”

GBSAA has been used by the Army on the General Atomics-built Gray Eagle unmanned aircraft system since 2016 and works to provide situational awareness to UAS operators, according to an inactive solicitation by the service branch.

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DHS Issues Homeland Threat Assessment; Chad Wolf Quoted
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DHS Issues Homeland Threat Assessment; Chad Wolf Quoted

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has issued a report about national security threats facing the country based on insights collected from DHS’ operational and intelligence components.

“When the American people read this [Homeland Threat Assessment] they will be more aware of the traditional threats facing the Homeland like terrorism and organized crime,” said Chad Wolf, acting DHS secretary. “However, I think they will also realize that we face a significant threat in the Homeland from nation-states like China, Russia, and Iran,” he added.

Key findings of the HTA include the potential use of cyber capabilities by Russia, China and Iran to attack critical infrastructure that will be used during the 2020 elections and possible attempts by the three countries to influence U.S. voters’ perceptions and preferences.

The report also covers information on transnational criminal organizations, the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on migration and threats posed by natural disasters to citizens and national and local economies.

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