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Cori Zarek to Assume Deputy Administrator Post at US Digital Service
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Cori Zarek to Assume Deputy Administrator Post at US Digital Service

Cori Zarek, executive director of the Beeck Center for Social Impact + Innovation at Georgetown University, has announced her upcoming move to the U.S. Digital Service to serve as its deputy administrator.

In a blog post published Wednesday, Zarek said her return to public service is set later in August and is focused on working within the White House unit to provide U.S. citizens with services through design and technology.

She was the deputy chief technology officer of the U.S. prior to joining Georgetown University. In that role, she was responsible for creating a more digital, open and collaborative government.

At the Beeck Center, Cori provides fellows, students and staff with leadership in action-oriented research projects and partnerships. Their work includes the use of data, design and technology as well as policy to drive more equitable societal outcomes.

“Having previously spent eight years in public service, I know well the need for strong partnerships and collaboration across all sectors and I’m proud of what we’ve built here at the Beeck Center,” she noted.

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House Committee Seeks Briefing on Federal Response to Log4j Vulnerability
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House Committee Seeks Briefing on Federal Response to Log4j Vulnerability

The House Energy and Commerce Committee sent an inquiry Wednesday to the heads of five federal agencies on what measures they have implemented to identify and mitigate the critical vulnerability in Java-based Log4j software.

Leaders of the committee and its subcommittees invited the departments of Health and Human Services, Energy and Commerce as well as the Environmental Protection Agency and the National Telecommunications and Information Administration to hold a staff briefing on the matter by Aug. 24.

The inquiry comes nearly eight months after the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency directed all federal civilian organizations to immediately apply patches to internet-facing government networks due to the discovered exploitation.

“The risk to federal network security is especially concerning because nationstate threat actors have attempted to exploit this Log4j vulnerability,” the lawmakers wrote. They seek to better understand the scope of the cybersecurity incident and mitigation efforts.

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LMI to Deepen Involvement With STEM Scholarship Program Under $450M DOD Contract; Doug Wagoner Quoted
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LMI to Deepen Involvement With STEM Scholarship Program Under $450M DOD Contract; Doug Wagoner Quoted

Business and logistics management consulting firm LMI has secured a $450 million contract from the Department of Defense to continue its work on a science and mathematics mentor and scholarship program.

The Tysons Corner, Virginia-based company said Thursday that through the contract award it will be responsible for designing and sustaining the web and information technology architecture for the DOD’s Science, Mathematics and Research for Transformation scholarship-for-service endeavor, as well as facilitating the program’s operations and distributing scholarship funds.

“We are thrilled to continue supporting this impactful and collaborative program. It has proven to develop some of the best and brightest innovators we have seen in the federal government,” remarked Doug Wagoner, CEO and president of LMI and a three-time Wash100 Award winner.

LMI has been involved in the SMART program for the last five years. With 480 students already inducted in 2022, DOD is currently looking to expand the project, with its sights set on widening the amount of scholars awarded as well as deepening auxiliary offerings such as mentorship and research funding and connecting individuals with DOD-affiliated resources. The department has identified LMI as crucial to the program’s growth.

The SMART program provides high-achieving STEM students throughout the U.S. with college benefits such as full tuition, annual stipends, internships and pledged employment with the DOD post-graduation. It has awarded 3,800 students in total throughout the life of the initiative.

During the new contract period, LMI’s team is also expected to participate in attempting to impact underserved communities and institute new diversity, equity and inclusion policies for SMART. They will be assisted with a variety of aspects of the contract work by iTechAG, Scholarship America and Ernst and Young.

LMI is currently working under another contract from the DOD, handed out in March, for efforts involving the management and maintenance of weapon systems and military equipment such as industrial base assessments and data analytics.

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BigBear.ai Posts 18 Percent Growth for Analytics Revenue in Q2 2022 Financial Report; GovCon Expert Reggie Brothers Quoted
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BigBear.ai Posts 18 Percent Growth for Analytics Revenue in Q2 2022 Financial Report; GovCon Expert Reggie Brothers Quoted

Artificial intelligence technology services company BigBear.ai has released its second quarter 2022 financial report, which includes a revenue result of $37.6 million.

The Columbia, Maryland-headquartered company said Thursday that its Q2 gross margin was 25 percent and analytics revenue grew at a rate of 18 percent ($2.9 million) from the prior year period, but that geopolitical events such as Russia’s invasion of Ukraine as well as an unstable economic climate hindered other areas of income.

Reggie Brothers, CEO of BigBear.ai and a GovCon Expert, noted second quarter triumphs such as the company’s acquisition of modeling, simulation and planning application manufacturer ProModel; the widespread usage of BigBear.ai software in hospitals; and a new deal with “one of the largest health systems in the Eastern U.S.”

The company also reported a net loss of $56.8 million — compared to a loss of $3.2 million in the comparable period in 2021 — and a non-GAAP adjusted earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization of negative $7.7 million, as opposed to a positive $0.5 million for the same quarter last year.

GovCon Expert Reggie Brothers, who is a multiple-time recipient of the Wash100 Award, pointed to the significant revenues that the company normally generates from government customers who have been preoccupied with the conflict in Ukraine as a major factor in reducing earnings, though he also said that ultimately the military’s missions and objectives overseas will likely call for the adoption of many of the AI tools and technologies BigBear offers.

For the time being, though, BigBear.ai’s team has altered its expectations and outlook for 2022 to accommodate hold-ups in contracts from the government and protracted sales cycles. It is looking to tighten spending and extricate unnecessary costs going forward.

Recently appointed chief financial officer Julie Peffer predicted that contract work for which BigBear is currently developing prototypes will pay off in the form of “large multi-year contracts with considerably higher margins” in the coming year.

BigBear.ai additionally reported a solid backlog of $325 million for the second quarter of 2022.

“While the second quarter presented challenges to our 2022 performance and slowed the pace of our transformation, we remain confident in our ability to capture larger, higher-margin projects with both federal and commercial customers to drive long-term growth,” Brothers commented.

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Navy Demonstrates Snakehead LDUUV Prototype for Autonomous Missions
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Navy Demonstrates Snakehead LDUUV Prototype for Autonomous Missions

Naval Undersea Warfare Center Division Newport has demonstrated the ability of the U.S. Navy’s Snakehead large displacement unmanned undersea vehicle prototype to support an end-to-end intelligence preparation of the operational environment mission at the Narragansett Bay Test Facility.

During the mission, the Snakehead LDUUV conducted long-distance ingress, performed a sonar survey box, collected sonar data and then egressed back to the test facility, Naval Sea Systems Command said Wednesday.

The Snakehead LDUUV is the Navy’s modular, reconfigurable and multi-mission system designed to deliver navigation, guidance and control, maneuvering, situational awareness, propulsion and sensors during IPOE missions.

“The success of Snakehead testing is a direct result of the time and energy spent designing the vehicle. In-lab hardware and software simulations are major contributors to the success in water,” said Allison Philips, the test and evaluation lead for Snakehead at NUWC Division Newport.

In 2020, the Navy issued a solicitation for a contract to design, develop and fabricate two prototypes of the Snakehead LDUUV. The service branch christened the first prototype in February.

Snakehead has since conducted 155 in-water sorties and more than 78 hours of runtime using a government-owned and controlled modular open system architecture.

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NIST Unveils Updated Online Reporting System for Federally Funded Inventions
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NIST Unveils Updated Online Reporting System for Federally Funded Inventions

The National Institute of Standards and Technology has launched a redesigned interagency online reporting platform that enables federal research funding recipients to report their subject inventions and patents.

NIST said Tuesday the modernized Interagency Edison system, also known as iEdison, now includes an upgraded user interface, new messaging and security features designed to better help grantees and contractors comply with the Bayh-Dole Act’s reporting requirements.

The revamped iEdison also includes an expanded application programming interface to automate some reporting tasks and incorporates information systems from the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office to update patent information more easily.

According to the agency, more than $150 billion in grants and funding agreements are allocated annually to support research and development projects led by academic institutions and other non-federal organizations.

“The new upgrades to the iEdison system will help inventors, awardees and the government manage these investments efficiently and transparently,” said Mojdeh Bahar, associate director for innovation and industry services at NIST.

The platform was originally created in 1995 and hosted by the National Institute of Health. The responsibility for iEdison was transferred to the Department of Commerce in 2018 and NIST began development of the new system in 2019.

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DOE Announces New Offices to Spearhead Electric Grid, Clean Energy Investments; Jennifer Granholm Quoted
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DOE Announces New Offices to Spearhead Electric Grid, Clean Energy Investments; Jennifer Granholm Quoted

The Department of Energy has launched two new program offices to direct investments from the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law to modernize the electric grid and advance clean energy projects.

The Grid Deployment Office will oversee $17 billion in investments to identify and address national transmission, distribution and clean generation needs while the Office of State and Community Energy Programs will invest $6 billion in projects aimed at increasing access to clean energy technologies, DOE said Wednesday.

Maria Robinson will serve as director of the Grid Deployment Office and lead efforts to modernize and upgrade the electrical grid and critical electricity-generating facilities across the U.S.

Senior experts Pat Hoffman and Whitney Muse will also serve as the office’s principal deputy director and chief of staff, respectively.

Henry McKoy will lead the Office of State and Community Energy Programs as director supported by Michael Forrester as acting principal deputy director, Annamaria Garcia as associate director and Chris Castro as chief of staff.

“The new offices announced today will help ensure that the President’s Bipartisan Infrastructure Law provides states, Tribes, and territories with the best practices and proven approaches to drive down energy costs for American households and deliver cleaner air for their communities,” said Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm.

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DIU Seeks Commercial Expeditionary Small Boat Platforms
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DIU Seeks Commercial Expeditionary Small Boat Platforms

The Defense Innovation Unit has asked industry to propose expeditionary small boats that could be used to perform distributed and littoral maneuver, sensing, logistics and reconnaissance operations.

DIU said it is seeking platforms that would build on current rigid inflatable boats and feature streamlined draft and hull design, 5G and sensor integration, improved electrical output capacity and storage, propulsion systems and autonomous platform integration, among other capabilities.

“The ability of the prototype to demonstrate simplicity, robustness and modularity across varying conditions and settings is of strong interest, to include features that enable fast, mobile, low-signature movement and sustainment of naval expeditionary forces operating across a series of austere, temporary locations,” the solicitation notice reads.

DIU is interested in platforms that have the capacity to transport eight to 15 combat personnel, demonstrate precision steering and maneuverability, operate with limited signature and integrate with the U.S. Marine Corps’ communications platforms and sensor suites, among other features.

The agency expects the performance period for mission concept sprints and prototyping work to last between 18 and 24 months.

DIU wants selected vendors to deliver two units of their proposed platforms by April 2023 and additional prototypes by June 2023 under an other transaction agreement. Solution briefs in response to the solicitation are due Aug. 22nd.

DOD’s Farooq Mitha Discusses Mentor-Protege Program to Defense Business Board
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DOD’s Farooq Mitha Discusses Mentor-Protege Program to Defense Business Board

Farooq Mitha, director of small business programs at the Department of Defense, emphasized the role mentor-protege relationships play in DOD contracting efforts at a recent meeting with the Defense Business Board.

He said proteges have added to the military technology portfolio, but additional security requirements such as the updated Cybersecurity Maturity Model Certification program could limit their ability to pursue work with the department.

“We came into this administration trying to make things easier for small businesses, but there’s only so much that can be done,” Mitha told the board.

DBB members have recommended that Congress make the Mentor-Protege Program a permanent initiative, update tools for capturing program-related data and establish a single point of contact for all small business opportunities across the department.

The board found that more than half of 1,200 former proteges in MPP continue to serve as defense suppliers and account for approximately 5 percent of the Pentagon’s $83.4 billion in small business contracting awards during fiscal year 2021.

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NORTHCOM Expects Long-Range Missile Defense Radar to be Operational Within ‘Months’
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NORTHCOM Expects Long-Range Missile Defense Radar to be Operational Within ‘Months’

Brig. Gen. Joseph Lestorti, head of the U.S. Northern Command’s Operations Directorate/J3, has said NORTHCOM expects the S-band missile defense radar it is currently testing to become operational in the next few months, Breaking Defense reported Wednesday.

“We are literally months away from being able to plug in the Long Range Discrimination Radar, LRDR, in the missile defense operational architecture,” he shared during a space and missile defense event in Alabama. “From the testing so far we are seeing positive results for what this radar can do for us, discriminating threats to the continental U.S. to make ground-based interceptor engagements more lethal.”

LRDR is envisioned to strengthen homeland defense through enhancing ballistic missile tracking capability as well as to increase the military’s space domain awareness.

Lestorti also noted the importance of using sensor data. “We need to explore the possibilities of future sensors contributing to the expanded domain awareness in hypersonic tracking. It’s imperative that we incorporate fuse, exploit and leverage every bit of radar data regardless of source and distribute it as needed to the joint force and select partners,” he said.

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