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Makpar, NuAxis Innovations JV Secures $115M BPA Contract From Department of Labor; Raza Latif Quoted
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Makpar, NuAxis Innovations JV Secures $115M BPA Contract From Department of Labor; Raza Latif Quoted

MakNuAx, a joint venture between Makpar and NuAxis Innovations, has been awarded a $115 million contract from the Department of Labor (DoL) to provide enterprise service desk support services and continue the JV’s mission to help modernize the federal IT infrastructure by applying the discipline of customer experience.

“This award is a clear testament to the dedication and hard work of every NuAxis team member working for DOL. We are all eager to continue our work through the prism of CX and HCD as we develop solutions that impact DOL’s wide-ranging mission,” said NuAxis CEO Raza Latif.

In addition, Senior IT Manager Justin Torlone expressed his enthusiasm to work with NuAxis on these challenges as Makpar will also bring fresh innovation to the Department of Labor and continually attempt to lower costs while increasing its capabilities.

NTT Data will also support the project to continue NuAxis’ continued success, especially over the last seven years with the Department of Labor. NTT DATA’s trusted IT strategies and technology solutions have paved the way to modernization and IT transformation, leading to better efficiencies, heightened security, and measurable cost savings for more than 20 years.

“NuAxis has had the privilege of setting up the DOL ESD, evolving it and running it since 2014,” Raza Latif added. “I still remember where I was when we won this significant contract. It is absolutely thrilling to get the opportunity to continue supporting the DOL ESD.

About MakNuAx 

MakNuAx is an SBA-approved joint venture between SBA mentor-protégé firms NuAxis and Makpar. We work together to offer Federal agencies full-spectrum services for IT modernization.

With over 30 years of combined experience in delivering the future of Federal IT, we combine a focus on customer experience with a passion for new and emerging technologies to deliver the exact solution to meet Federal agencies’ most pressing challenges today.

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NASA Opens New CubeSat Launch Initiative Opportunities for Academic, Nonprofit Organizations
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NASA Opens New CubeSat Launch Initiative Opportunities for Academic, Nonprofit Organizations

NASA has opened new opportunities for educational institutions and nonprofit organizations to develop small satellites and conduct scientific investigations and technology demonstrations in space.

The agency said Monday the next round of the agency’s CubeSat Launch Initiative will provide the developers with hands-on experience designing and operating small research satellites to support space exploration initiatives.

Interested parties can submit proposals through Nov. 18 and NASA expects to select new participants for the CSLI program on March 17.

Bradley Smith, director of launch services within the Space Operations Mission Directorate at NASA Headquarters in Washington, said CubeSats play a key role in supporting the agency in areas of science, exploration, technology and education.

“They are a cornerstone in the development of cutting-edge NASA technologies, such as laser communications, satellite-to-satellite communications, and autonomous movement,” Smith said.

CSLI was established to provide U.S. educational institutions and nonprofit organizations with opportunities to build small satellites flown as payloads on upcoming launches.

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Navy Tests New Detect, Avoidance System for Manned-Unmanned Teaming
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Navy Tests New Detect, Avoidance System for Manned-Unmanned Teaming

The U.S. Navy has conducted the first flight test of a new ground-based detect and avoidance system, dubbed Guardian, to assess its capabilities to enable crewed/uncrewed teaming safety.

The test was held at Naval Air Warfare Center Aircraft Division headquarters in Patuxent River, where two RQ-21 Blackjacks flew toward each other, while Guardian operators monitored screens displaying the systems’ approach as part of the test plan, Naval Air Systems Command said Monday.

Once the unmanned air vehicles came within 400 feet of each other, Guardian alerted its operators of an imminent collision and made recommendations on avoidance maneuvers.

According to the NAVAIR, Guardian is the only ground-based detect and avoidance system developed in accordance with the Federal Aviation Administration’s performance standards for unmanned systems.

“Looking ahead, we’ll put Guardian through complex tests to confirm it will reliably handle congestion in the busiest airspaces as we work toward FAA certification which could significantly reduce Stingray’s developmental test time and costs,” said Lt. Cmdr. Alex Dulude, the Blackjack air vehicle operator supporting Guardian’s first flight.

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VHA Unveils Digital Health Playbook to Improve Patient Care
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VHA Unveils Digital Health Playbook to Improve Patient Care

The Department of Veterans Affairs has published a new guide outlining its priorities and goals for developing digital health care systems and devices designed to improve patient care, Nextgov reported Monday.

The Digital Healthcare Playbook, created by the Veterans Health Administration in collaboration with the Digital Medicine Society, aims to identify available digital health innovations that are capable of helping the U.S. health care system transform patient care delivery.

Specifically, VHA wants to evaluate the use of emerging technologies, including artificial intelligence, augmented reality and virtual reality and connected sensor technologies, in providing digital health care services.

Arash Harzand, the chief medical advisor for digital health at the VHA Innovation Ecosystem, said the goal is to find the best strategy for the VA and the industry to collaborate on digital health.

He said the playbook serves as a guide for industry to learn about what the VA wants in new healthcare technology devices and as an internal department analysis for the current healthcare software marketplace.

The guide is open for public access to spur wider discussion around the future of digital health. 

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NSF, Amazon Name Several Recipients of Advancing AI Research Program Award
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NSF, Amazon Name Several Recipients of Advancing AI Research Program Award

The National Science Foundation has teamed up with Amazon and selected several university-led projects on artificial intelligence and machine learning systems that will be awarded up to $9.5 million in financial support.

NSF said Monday the 2022 recipients of the Program on Fairness in Artificial Intelligence in Collaboration with Amazon awards have potential AI/ML-focused initiatives that seek to address the technology’s unfairness and bias, establish human interaction principles, develop algorithm theoretical frameworks and enhance speech recognition tech, among others.

The awardees are:

  • A New Paradigm for the Evaluation and Training of Inclusive Automatic Speech Recognition, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign
  • A Normative Economic Approach to Fairness in AI, Harvard University
  • A novel paradigm for fairness-aware deep learning models on data streams, University of Texas at Dallas
  • Advancing Deep Learning Towards Spatial Fairness, University of Pittsburgh
  • Advancing Optimization for Threshold-Agnostic Fair AI Systems, University of Iowa
  • AI Algorithms for Fair Auctions, Pricing, and Marketing, Columbia University
  • An Interpretable AI Framework for Care of Critically Ill Patients Involving Matching and Decision Trees, Duke University
  • Breaking the Tradeoff Barrier in Algorithmic Fairness, University of Pennsylvania
  • BRIMI – Bias Reduction in Medical Information, University of Connecticut
  • Fair Representation Learning: Fundamental Trade-Offs and Algorithms, Michigan State University
  • Human-Centered Approach to Developing Accessible and Reliable Machine Translation, University of Maryland, College Park
  • Toward Fair Decision Making and Resource Allocation with Application to AI-Assisted Graduate Admissions and Degree Completion, University of Maryland, College Park
  • Using Explainable AI to Increase Equity and Transparency in the Juvenile Justice System’s Use of Risk Scores, Bowling Green State University
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Lawmakers Eye Major Changes to Tech-Focused Small Business Programs; Heidi Shyu Quoted
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Lawmakers Eye Major Changes to Tech-Focused Small Business Programs; Heidi Shyu Quoted

The Small Business Innovation Research and Technology Transfer programs are set to expire by the end of September and lawmakers are considering major reforms to the programs to address concerns of alleged abuse of the so-called SBIR “mills,” Breaking Defense reported Monday.

The Senate Small Business Committee is pursuing two proposals and one of these two would limit eligibility to the SBIR and STTR programs based on the number of awards secured over a term of five years.

A House Small Business Committee proposal would restrict eligibility to the programs based on improved requirements related to current Phase I to Phase II transition rate and commercialization benchmarks under the third phase.

Heidi Shyu, undersecretary for research and engineering at the Department of Defense, said the proposed benchmarks introduce “significant concerns” for DOD and that an extension of the program would be the needed approach to evaluate potential challenges to the initiative.

“The Department, as well as the SBA and other agencies, respectfully disagree with the argument that multiple awards represent a significant problem and that having multiple awards ‘crowds out’ or limits competition,” said Shyu, a 2022 Wash100 Award winner.

“All SBIR/STTR awards are competitively awarded efforts with multiple awards addressing multiple topics. While a company can receive multiple awards, those awards are not for the same topic. In addition, the Department is concerned about the impact to the Department’s small business innovation base and its ability to meet warfighter needs if current SBIR/STTR projects are terminated due to benchmarks that go too far,” she added.

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DHS Kicks Off Search for Procurement Innovation Lab Director
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DHS Kicks Off Search for Procurement Innovation Lab Director

The Department of Homeland Security has begun its search for a new director of the procurement innovation lab within the office of the chief procurement officer.

The selected candidate will propose ideas for governmentwide procurement innovation through the Acquisition Innovation Advocates Council and other groups and forums and oversee a team that offers technical guidance and coaching to procurement teams across DHS, according to a USAJobs notice published Wednesday.

The incumbent will brief the OCPO leadership on the lab’s procurement projects, serve as a principal adviser on nontraditional procurement models, integrate best practices and new developments into the department’s acquisition procedures, policies and regulations and analyze sensitive and complex contracting problems.

DHS will accept applications through Aug. 18.

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Coast Guard Crowdsources Research Project Ideas
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Coast Guard Crowdsources Research Project Ideas

The U.S. Coast Guard has started its crowdsourcing effort to generate potential innovation ideas and challenges the maritime law enforcement service can incorporate into its fiscal year 2024 research portfolio.

USCG is accepting suggestions for how the branch can apply technologies to transform asset utilization for various missions such as crisis response.

Vice Adms. Scott Buschman and Paul Thomas, respectively holding the roles of deputy commandants for operations and mission support at USCG, have identified seven research priority areas for the FY 2024-2025 period.

These priorities involve data analytics, mobility, autonomous systems, human-machine teaming, C5I, services aimed at reducing climate change impacts and approaches to strengthen system and personnel security.

Interested parties can submit their innovative ideas to the service via the CG_Ideas@Work portal.

Top 10 Federal Government News Sources
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Top 10 Federal Government News Sources

It is a standard process among business leaders across different industries to monitor their market. By keeping tabs on the trends and activities of their target market, they formulate better strategies to sell or to prepare for any dips. And that is why news websites, such as these federal government news sources, come in handy for government contractors who want to stay ahead of their game.

Who are the top 10 federal government news sources?

ExecutiveBiz is a publication agency that gives industry key decision-makers an inside look on issues that affects them.

  1. ExecutiveBiz

The ExecutiveBiz delivers fresh off-the-press news that matter to the government contracting industry’s wavemakers. With experienced writers and researchers powering up the publication, the ExecutiveBiz gives an insider look at the latest federal government news about defense, healthcare, and technology. And to ensure that you wouldn’t miss any drop of info regarding the government contracting field, you can sign up for their exclusive newsletter so everything will be delivered to your inbox!

The Virginia-based government news agency is an official publication arm of Executive Mosaic (EM).

The Potomac Officers Club is an event production and multi-platform publication company under the Executive Mosaic.

  1. Potomac Officers Club

The Potomac Officers Club (POC) has been in the business of connecting and empowering government contracting executives for more than 20 years. This Virginia-based company is a market leader in building executive networking programs, bringing together like-minded individuals to help each other grow.

On top of being a top executive events producer, the company’s cross-platform publication is also growing steadily over the years. Their seasoned editorial staff follows the latest news about the federal government, the people, events, and trends that will shape the industry.

CNBC is a news and publication company focused on business and finance.

  1. CNBC

The Consumer News and Business Channel (CNBC) is one of the leading business and financial news agencies, reaching a hundred million readers globally across all of its platforms. They cover trending business and trading news from around the globe to provide the latest information to industry leaders and key decision-makers.

Nearly 400 million households tune in to CNBC’s global news TV channel. And you can access their 24/7 news reporting through their website.

U.S. News & World Report is a digital media agency that covers different industries, such as politics, education, and health.

  1. USNews

The U.S. News & World Report is a cross-platform digital media company that is at the forefront of delivering breaking news regarding issues that affect its consumers, business leaders, and policymakers. Headquartered in Washington, this news publishing giant offers a variety of services by covering industry-relevant topics on its different platforms: News, Education, Health, Money, Cars, Travel, and 360 Reviews.

The U.S. News & World Report readership reaches 40 million monthly.

The U.S. Department of State is the federal agency in charge of America's international relations and policies.

  1. U.S. Department of State

Although their organization is not similar to other news agencies since the government runs them, the U.S. Department of State houses critical information about the current affairs of the government. On its website, the Department of State regularly publishes news and press releases about America’s international relations and policies.

The New York Times is a news and publication giant that covers news from all over the globe.

  1. The New York Times

The New York Times is a globally renowned print news and digital media giant that the people have trusted for over a hundred years. Ever since it was founded in 1851 by Henry Jarvis Raymond and George Jones, The New York Times has prided itself on helping people understand the world through its independent journalism.

As one of the premier leading sources of news and current events in America, the New York Times consistently delivers fresh-off-the-press news about various industries, including U.S. and politics. They cover the White House, monumental supreme court rulings, legislation issues and developments in Congress, and more. The multi-platform publishing giant monitors issues and developments that affect the people, lawmakers, and the nation.

The Associated Press is a non-partisan and unbiased news organization that covers news and current events in America, and also in other parts of the globe.

  1. The Associated Press

The Associated Press is another globally-renowned and independent American news organization that has championed factual reporting since its founding in 1846. Also known as the AP, this New York-based news giant delivers fast, accurate, and nonpartisan news to its millions of readers worldwide.

The AP covers news and events in multiple sectors, including U.S. and international news, law and politics, sports, entertainment, business, technology, health, science, lifestyle, and more.

ExecutiveGov is an online news and publication agency for federal executives that is owned and operated by the Executive Mosaic.

  1. ExecutiveGov

The ExecutiveGov is a premier source of news and headlines in the federal government. With an expert team of editorial staff, ExecutiveGov delivers breaking news about the issues and challenges surrounding the federal departments, particularly Gov 2.0, cybersecurity policy, health IT, green IT, and national security. And on top of that, the Virginia-based publication agency also spotlights notable government employees and executives.

Furthermore, ExecutiveGov is also an official publishing arm of Executive Mosaic, along with ExecutiveBiz, Potomac Officers Club, and GovCon Wire.

The Department of Defense is one of the biggest federal agencies that is in charge of protecting the nation against all kinds of threats.

  1. U.S. Department of Defense

The Department of Defense (DoD) is the federal department in charge of safeguarding the nation against adversaries that threaten the peace and security of the country. The DoD is comprised of different components that protect the nation across different spheres: land, water, air, space, and cyberspace.

The defense department’s official website publishes news, updates, and press releases about the current events surrounding the federal agency. Although they are not primarily a news organization, keeping tabs on their website gives you access to the latest happenings of DoD.

CNN Politics is a news and reporting arm of CNN Digital that focuses on covering news about federal politics, campaign stories, and Washington coverages.

  1.  CNN Politics

CNN Politics is CNN Digital’s official platform for federal political news. CNN Politics delivers the freshest federal news, campaign stories, and Washington coverages.

CNN Digital is one of the world’s leading digital news organizations that is made up of more than 4,000 journalists worldwide who publish news that matter to you, 24/7.

What are the things you should know as a government contractor?

Staying on top of the latest news and events will help you stay ahead of the pack. Being in the loop gives you the opportunity to formulate better strategies to position your business favorably in the market.

But, it doesn’t stop there.

First, you must know the fundamentals of government contracting. From learning the right places to register to understanding the contract bidding process, this guide will help you navigate through it all. And if you feel that you are too intimidated to pursue this highly-competitive and complex industry, you should get to know these top thought leaders that may inspire you to continue your race.

Second, you should familiarize yourself with the types of federal contracts most accessible to you, especially if you are still new to the industry.

And third, try to diversify your sources of information. The federal government is a massive institution, and depending on a single source of information is a disservice to you. And if you want the freshest federal government news delivered to your inbox, subscribe to our newsletter today!

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Utah State’s Space Dynamic Lab Secures $200M Air Force Contract for Nuclear Enterprise R&D Services
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Utah State’s Space Dynamic Lab Secures $200M Air Force Contract for Nuclear Enterprise R&D Services

Utah State University’s Space Dynamic Laboratory has received a $200 million indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity contract from the U.S. Air Force to support the nuclear enterprise by providing research and development services over a 10-year period.

The Department of Defense said Friday a $7.7 million task order was awarded to the lab under the IDIQ for R&D services in support of the Sentinel weapon system.

Sentinel is planned to replace the legacy Minuteman III intercontinental ballistic missile as the land-based component of the U.S. nuclear triad. The system, initially called the ground based strategic deterrent, will be used to help ensure national security, with its capabilities expected to last through 2075.

The contractor will conduct contract work in Logan, Utah, and is expected to wrap up performance by Aug. 7, 2032.

The Air Force will obligate $1.5 million in fiscal 2022 research, development, test and evaluation funds for the first task order.

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