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DARPA Launches 10-Year Lunar Architecture Capability Study
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DARPA Launches 10-Year Lunar Architecture Capability Study

The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency has put out a call for technical approaches as it launches a seven-month capability study that aims to develop technology concepts that could pave the way for the development of an integrated, multiservice lunar infrastructure.

The 10-Year Lunar Architecture study seeks to build an analytical framework that could define opportunities for commercial and scientific activity on and around the lunar surface and has several thrust areas, including transit or mobility; communications; energy; and other revolutionary orbital or surface infrastructure concepts, DARPA said Tuesday.

“To get to a turning point faster, LunA-10 uniquely aims to identify solutions that can enable multi-mission lunar systems – imagine a wireless power station that can also provide comms and navigation in its beam,” said Michael “Orbit” Nayak, program manager at DARPA’s Strategic Technology Office.

“Just like DARPA’s foundational node of ARPANET grew into the sprawling web of the internet, LunA-10 is looking for those connective nodes to support a thriving commercial economy on the Moon,” added Nayak.

DARPA will accept three-page abstracts through Sept. 6 and will ask the selected respondents to submit 10-page white papers and technical presentations by Sept. 25.

The agency will announce the chosen performers for the LunA-10 study during the Lunar Surface Innovation Consortium’s fall meeting in October, ask them to provide a briefing by April 2024 and deliver a final report by June 2024.

Space Technologies Forum

Join ExecutiveBiz’s Space Technologies Forum on Aug. 29 to hear insights from industry experts, government officials and other thought leaders across the space domain as they discuss what lies ahead for space technology. Register here.

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Atlantic Council Report: DOD Needs More In-Depth Exploration of Human-Machine Teaming
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Atlantic Council Report: DOD Needs More In-Depth Exploration of Human-Machine Teaming

The Atlantic Council has released a report on the advantages and limitations of human-machine teaming, and artificial intelligence as a whole, as a tool for the Department of Defense.

The findings, which were published Monday, indicate that DOD must clarify and expand its definitions of HMT to cover wide-ranging applications for the technology.

AI and HMT can increase situational awareness and put DOD at an advantage in multiple combat domains. In administrative functions, they can improve logistics, sustainment, and efficiency in operations, cost and processing times, the council said.

The nonprofit group recommended that in the adoption of HMT, DOD must prioritize human operator training, comfort level and trust to optimize the use of such a partnership. The agency should conduct more experiments to build human trust and identify the strengths, weaknesses and breaking points of their machine counterparts.

Trusted AI and Autonomy Forum

ExecutiveBiz, sister site of ExecutiveGov, is putting artificial intelligence in the spotlight at its Trusted AI and Autonomy Forum on Sept. 12. The in-person event, which takes place in Falls Church, Virginia, is now open for registration.

DAF Prepares for Enterprise IT as a Service Wave 1 Rollout
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DAF Prepares for Enterprise IT as a Service Wave 1 Rollout

The Department of the Air Force has conducted a roadshow of enterprise information technology services at various military installations in preparation for the Wave 1 of its Enterprise IT as a Service program.

During the roadshow, selected communication squadrons from eight Air Force and Space Force installations participated in a limited EITaaS program called Risk Reduction Effort to inform the DAF’s transition to an enterprise service model from an in-house base-centric delivery model.

An industry team led by CACI‘s National Security Solutions division secured a $5.7 billion blanket purchase agreement to deliver services to over 800,000 individuals across the DAF under the EITaaS Wave 1 effort.

Wave 1 includes an upgraded IT service management system, enterprise service help desk, image and endpoint management stack, end-user devices and local field services.

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Jinyoung Englund Named Chief Strategy Officer for Algorithmic Warfare at CDAO
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Jinyoung Englund Named Chief Strategy Officer for Algorithmic Warfare at CDAO

Jinyoung Englund, most recently acting director of Defense Digital Service within the Chief Data and Artificial Intelligence Office of the Department of Defense, has transitioned to the role of chief strategy officer for algorithmic warfare within CDAO.

She spent more than three years at DDS, where she started as a digital service expert before being appointed chief of staff and interim principal director.

Prior to DDS, Englund served for two years as a liaison officer at the FBI’s National Cyber Investigative Joint Task Force.

Jennifer Hay, a visiting fellow with the National Security Institute, took over Englund’s responsibilities at DDS by assuming the director position on a permanent basis. She is former head of global government relations at DataRobot who joined DDS in January as principal deputy.

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NASA, DARPA, Sikorsky Design Software for Future Automated Air Taxis
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NASA, DARPA, Sikorsky Design Software for Future Automated Air Taxis

NASA is working with the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency and Sikorsky, a Lockheed Martin subsidiary, to develop and test autonomous software designed for future self-flying air taxis.

The research is led by NASA’s Advanced Air Mobility program, which aims to take transportation to new heights by innovating passenger and freight flights in dense traffic environments and other scenarios, the agency said Tuesday.

AAM’s mission is to ensure a safe, accessible, automated, yet affordable air transport in hard-to-reach urban and rural areas.

The three organizations are currently designing software using scripted flight paths as well as customized test tablets and ground control room simulations to understand the technology’s behavior and response to air-to-air encounters.

The software will eventually be installed and tested on Sikorsky’s modified S-76B helicopter, labeled the Autonomy Research Aircraft, and its Optionally Piloted Vehicle Black Hawk helicopter.

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DOE’s INFUSE Program Awards 6 Grants to Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory
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DOE’s INFUSE Program Awards 6 Grants to Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory

The Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory secured six of the 18 public-private partnership grants awarded by the Department of Energy for fusion energy research.

The 2023 DOE Innovation Network for Fusion Energy chose PPPL along with six of its principal collaborators, including Commonwealth Fusion Systems, a spinoff of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, the laboratory announced Monday.

INFUSE is an annual funding program launched in 2019 to accelerate fusion development, and bridge research and development efforts among laboratories, universities, and the industry.

MIT spinoff CFS is studying deuterium, a hydrogen isotope, as an alternative to a radioactive form of the element in coating the tokamak, which is seen as the main plasma confinement device for future fusion power plants.

PPPL’s other partners are Focused Energy, Helion Energy, Kyoto Fusioneering America, Gauss Fusion and its New Jersey division, Bruker OST. All of them will leverage the laboratory’s resources and capabilities to further their experimental technologies and facilities for the nuclear reaction-based power concept.

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BAE Systems Secures DARPA Contract to Develop Efficient Analog Correlator; Bryan Choi Quoted
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BAE Systems Secures DARPA Contract to Develop Efficient Analog Correlator; Bryan Choi Quoted

BAE Systems’ research and development arm has received a contract from the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency as part of its Massive Cross Correlation program.

Under the $14 million contract, BAE Systems’ FAST Labs segment will develop technology designed to support the use of modern signal processing and computation on a novel variety of compact military platforms, BAE announced from Merrimack, New Hampshire on Wednesday.

“Smaller and more efficient systems improve size, weight, power, and costs to allow for full-spectrum signal processing closer to the edge, or onto platforms operating in denied airspace,” said Bryan Choi, who serves as technology development director for FAST Labs.

He added that the new analog correlator technology can improve decision making, equip small platforms to deploy mission-critical technology and help build a new type of system.

Signal processing enables Department of Defense activities surrounding sensing, imaging and communications systems, and correlators play a major role in comparing, contrasting and processing signals. Today, many digital correlator technologies are cumbersome and require large amounts of power.

BAE Systems’ role in the program will be to create a more efficient analog correlator with high dynamic range and wide bandwidth to support new capabilities, such as synthetic aperture radar image classification and image formation, automatic target recognition, passive coherent location and jam-resistant communications in small form factor platforms.

In carrying out this work, BAE Systems will team with the University of Minnesota, a subcontractor on the program.

This award follows multiple DARPA contract wins for BAE Systems. In May, the company’s FAST Labs sector received a $7 million award to develop an autonomous space-based surveillance tool under the agency’s Oversight program, and in March, FAST Labs booked a $5 million contract to continue its work on the Technologies for Mixed-mode Ultra Scaled Integrated Circuits initiative.

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Video Interview: Rob Geckle on How Airbus US Is Supporting Defense Tech Innovation
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Video Interview: Rob Geckle on How Airbus US Is Supporting Defense Tech Innovation

As the defense landscape continues to evolve, Airbus is looking to accelerate its development of new platforms and technologies here in the United States. Airbus U.S. Space and Defense Chairman and CEO Rob Geckle spoke with Executive Mosaic’s Summer Myatt in a new video interview about what the company is bringing to the U.S. defense ecosystem.

“I’m constantly looking to cultivate additional technologies that I can Americanize, industrialize and improve and adapt here in the United States,” said the 2023 Wash100 Award winner.

“An interesting feature of U.S. national security policy is to foster and encourage foreign direct investment in the United States in a way that is consistent and supports national security,” Geckle noted. “Folks will often ask me, ‘Rob, how can a company like Airbus — which is a European company known for commercial technology and aircraft — how can you be a defense contractor?’”

Geckle explained that Airbus U.S. operates under what’s known as a special security agreement, which allows the company to work directly with U.S. officials in the proper classification settings.

“I report to an independent board of directors, that is majority controlled by U.S. nationals with requisite security clearances and allows me to operate in a classified environment, take technology that’s ready, affordable, I can industrialize it in the United States and have improved and adapted manufactured by U.S. nationals, adapted by U.S. engineers and improved over time iteratively,” Geckle shared.

With trends like peer and near-peer warfare, deterrence and data-centric warfare shaping the defense landscape today, Geckle said Airbus U.S. “can add value along a number of those axes, whether it’s platforms, aircraft, whether it’s space or space systems.”

Watch the full video interview with Airbus’ Rob Geckle for more insights about U.S. defense trends and technologies.

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USAF Selects Amentum to Provide Aircraft Maintenance Under $223M Contract; Dr. Karl Spinnenweber Quoted
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USAF Selects Amentum to Provide Aircraft Maintenance Under $223M Contract; Dr. Karl Spinnenweber Quoted

Amentum has booked a contract worth $223 million from the U.S. Air Force to furnish planes carrying high-consequence leaders with its aircraft maintenance expertise.

Specifically, the firm-fixed-price, five-year award via the USAF 316th Wing charges Amentum’s team with administering high-grade upkeep and backshop services to the executive airlift fleet of the 89 Airlift Wing, the Chantilly, Virginia-based company said Tuesday.

In a statement, Dr. Karl Spinnenweber, president of the company’s critical missions group, underlined the consistency with which the service branch has relied on Amentum over the last two-plus decades to provide “24/7, no-fail, high stakes transportation.” This work has, the executive said, made a noticeable impact on national security.

The engineering and project management company’s efforts will ideally optimize the aircraft so that their passengers — which potentially include the U.S. President, Vice President, cabinet officials and military leaders — can traverse the globe securely and with ease.

“Our top-tier sustainment professionals deliver exceptional performance and have earned the prestigious FAA Diamond Award for Excellence 21 consecutive years in recognition of their commitment to aviation maintenance and training,” commented Amentum Senior Vice President of Sustainment Analytics and Aviation Solutions Joe Kelly.

Work under the contract will be performed at Joint Base Andrews in Maryland and will reportedly utilize cutting edge tools and technologies.

The USAF contract follows two other major awards for Amentum from military service branches over the last month. Mid-July, the company secured a six-year, $946.6 million contract to conduct life cycle support services for the U.S. Army’s fixed-wing aircraft fleet used in transport missions.

Earlier this month, Amentum was awarded an eight-year, $818 million indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity contract to evolve and sustain F-16 combat training fighter jets for the U.S. Navy.

DOD Kicks Off Talent Management Innovation Challenge; Gilbert Cisneros Quoted
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DOD Kicks Off Talent Management Innovation Challenge; Gilbert Cisneros Quoted

The Department of Defense has launched the Talent Management Innovation Challenge in an effort to enhance its recruitment, retention and diversification of military and civilian employees.

DOD said Friday the inaugural initiative will gather talent management ideas from the department’s workforce from Aug. 11 to Sept. 30 and proposals will be assessed by senior leaders to determine potential for broad applicability and positive impact.

Recruiting and accessions; promotion and retention; and wild card are the three categories under the challenge led by the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness.

“This challenge reinforces the need to tap into the full range of strengths and capabilities of all our employees,” said Gilbert Cisneros, Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness. “By harnessing the tremendous talent and experiences of our military Service members and civilian colleagues, we can bring forth new, innovative, and effective ideas tailored to our personnel.”

The DOD 2040 Task Force supported the launch of the challenge. For future initiatives, the Chief Talent Management Officer and Talent Management Executive Council will take charge.

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