Ambitious plans are in the works to pair stealth fighters with unmanned aerial vehicles that could serve as robotic wingmen in high-end combat. Missions could include a variety of tasks such as reconnaissance, electronic jamming, and marking or destroying targets. “The idea behind the remote carriers is that you will have a manned mothership, accompanied by … drones that are flying in the swarm, which are having to perform different tasks depending on the mission.

 
Drone Swarm Construct New Multi-Domain Operations Formation Configuration”

Unmanned Field Demos

​Unmanned Fleet Campaign Update
 
“Navy Developing Requirements and Future Plans for Large Unmanned Surface and Undersea Vehicles”

Preview Unmanned Progress "Snapshots"

Benefits of Using Advanced AI Tech in Training to Optimize Digital Twin Network Applications

Digital Twins Network Use in Unmanned Systems as Navy Invests in Shift to Distributed Fleet Architecture

Top 10 Future Steps Include Goals for Unmanned Programs

1. Continuing to leverage fleet experimentation exercises

 

1. Execute Navy Unmanned Campaign Plan

 

1. Creating more iterative experimentation process

 

1. Tighten the “test fast, operate, learn fast” concept

 

1. Improving industry partnerships

 

1. Participation in fleet experiments and exercises

 

1. Improving the integration of secure communication networks

 

1. Maximize effectiveness of manned-unmanned teaming

 

1. Developing concepts of operation and employment

 

1. Quickly operationalize unmanned systems

 




Our quick success points to the operational utility of swarming drones and we are ready to declare the program operational in short period of time. And we will smartly develop it year by year, moving swiftly where the technology allows and the threat invites.
 
Our drone test squadron has proved beyond doubt the disruptive and innovative utility of swarming drones under our program. service will scatter numerous, relatively small ships across the battlespace, and those without crew aboard them could be sent into the most dangerous situations.
 
The command and control systems were able to provide a mission plan, which consists of a scheme of maneuver and the system calculates the course in speed to complete those missions.
 
 
Battle Problem 21
 
Using a blend of information from unmanned and manned ships and aircraft, a guided-missile destroyer launched an anti-surface missile from over-the-horizon to hit a target more than 250 miles away without using active sensors as part of the Unmanned Integrated Battle Problem 21,
 
“It was really complex… We teamed manned and unmanned vessels together. We also used the fusing capability that we’re doing some experimentation on. It was totally passive where we didn’t have active sensors on target,”
 
 
 
 
Military action is likely to be conducted in the tactical edge environment. These actions at the tactical edge usually lack support of communication and data processing capabilities, far away from the command center, with limited resources of communication and computing.
 
The battle rhythm changes unexpectedly, leading to the frequent fluctuations of network connectivity and rapid changes of topology because of the highly dynamic and complex battlefield environment.
 
It is extremely important, to realize the rapid perception of the situation of the battlefield, the quick integration and scheduling of the unmanned resources between the tactical edge nodes, and the efficient processing and transmission of battlefield information.
 
 
The tactical edge is far away from the command center, the resources of communication and computing are limited, and the battlefield situation is changing rapidly, which leads to the weak connection and fast changes of network topology in a harsh and complex unmanned battlefield environment.
 
To meet the needs of communication and computing it is required to build a new generation of computing architecture for real-time sharing and service collaboration of tactical edge resources to win the future fight, the dispersed computing seeks a new solution to satisfy the requirements of fast and efficient sensing, transmission, integrating, scheduling, and processing of various information in the tactical edge
 
Tactical edge structure enables battlefield information to be sent to the right unmanned  units while reducing manual forwarding though intermediate links and improving timeliness. The multi-frequency structure adopted here improves performance of functions such as command communication, situational forwarding, and backbone network connection.
 
 
As Navy starts to map out how unmanned platforms would contribute to distributed maritime operations, the value of a good network – including one that can be accessed by the joint force – is becoming more and more apparent.
 
How do we get a fleet of manned assets under the sea, on the sea and in the air collaborating and working with unmanned assets in the fight? There’s a lot of groundwork that we recognize, specifically networks and command and control.”
 
Several ongoing efforts are looking at developing the network that will allow the sea service to make the most of families of unmanned surface and undersea vessels it’s currently developing, testing and buying.
 
Project Overmatch will “develop the networks, infrastructure, data architecture, tools, and analytics that support the operational and developmental environment that will enable our sustained maritime dominance.”
 
Project Overmatch is the key to “execute this in perpetuity and not just be bits and pieces that eventually kind of coalesce and come together. It is an overarching strategy that we are working through in all domains.”
 
“Currently we’re very stovepiped, we’re just aligned that way: air, surface, undersea. … we recognize that we’re kind of moving away from platform-centric capabilities and now we’re really looking at what does a network capability on the whole really look like. And unmanned is kind of driving that right now. Long-range fires will be the next follow.”
 
“We want to get an unmanned campaign to find out where the gaps are, tell leadership where Navy is not investing, what standards we need to have, what networks we got to have, et cetera.
 
The Navy is in the process of, right now we’ve stood up what we call a war room, and in that war room we’re going through things like unmanned and long-range fires. … What is that kill chain?
 
We’re essentially mapping out that kill chain,” and any gaps in the kill chain will become priorities for the research and acquisition communities to address.
 
“We’re kind of pulling the thread on that and figuring out, if I want to have distributed maritime operations that includes manned/unmanned capabilities, what does that really need to look like, from an investment perspective all the way through to sustainment.”
 
Though Navy is taking an approach that ensures entire families of systems can work together and with their manned counterparts through things like common command and control systems, common network interfaces, common combat systems and more, it’s also important that the joint force and allied forces can tap into the network too and either feed information to these unmanned systems or leverage the data they’re collecting.
 
“The idea is that we recognize, in order for us to scale we need to have more of a coalition” with the other services and partners.
 
“No systems have tripped wire just yet when it comes to a complete loss of human control. That being said, the Navy is in the process of working up a handbook, and that handbook would be, say, if a weapons system tripped that capability of being considered fully autonomous, what is it that the crew has to do and at what level is that going to be questioned, answered, and who will have the authority to sign off on that.”
 
“Initially, we don’t anticipate any systems reaching that point in the next few years, given the state of autonomy technology today, but that a fully unmanned system could certainly be fielded in the future.
 
​






Unmanned Press Reports
 
 
“Autonomous Controls Could Support Unmanned Beach Landings”

Summaries

“Warfighting Fleet Aims to Pace with Unmanned Tech”

Summaries

“Navy conducts live test of resupply drones for ashore, at-sea missions”

Summaries

“New Navy Experiments could get Drones beyond Spying and into Battle”

Summaries


The next big thing: Drones supplying Troops on the Battlefield

Summaries

“Future helicopters will be lighter, tablet operated and unmanned”

Summaries

“Multidomain network ready for operational use, nearing drone swarm capability”

Summaries

“Pentagon Unveils Details On Effort To Equip Its Services With Massive Swarms of Drones”

Summaries

“Unmanned Vehicles Provide Solutions to Air Lift/Distribution Domains Change How Marines Use Simulators Tools”

Summaries

“Here’s the Robotic Vehicle that will Haul Gear for Troops”

Summaries

“Navy Considering Drone Delivery for Essential Parts At Sea”

Summaries

“Marines Prepare for Continued Support With Ship-Launched Combat Drone Prototypes Subject to New Requirements”

Summaries

“Navy is plotting the drone-enabled fleet of 2045”

Summaries

Pilotless Black Hawk Highlights Emerging Technology in Demo Flight

Summaries

“First Navy Submarine Resupplied By Commercial Drone”

Summaries

“The Linchpin For Unmanned To Multi-Domain Operations Is Already Here
 
Summaries

​​Top 100 Outline Unmanned Systems Strategy/Approach to Develop/Deploy Ensure Tech Operates in Architecture of Operational Mission Networks
 
“Can Drone Swarms Map Battles in Real Time?”
 
With air and ground robots, DARPA tested autonomous systems built to scout and map battlespace environments. The drone swarm maps the neighborhood below, with buzzing and plotting, sharp angles and short orbits, creating in real time a blanket of surveillance over the selected objective.
 
Quadcopters are pieces in a greater whole, an incremental step to providing an expansive robot’s-eye view to humans fighting on the ground.
 
Quadcopters worked with ground robots to identify locations of interest and then create a perimeter around that objective, in a process DARPA likens to “the way a firefighting crew establishes a boundary around a burning building.”
 
Firefighting looms large in the modern conception of swarm tasks. A project was launched for drone swarms to model wildfires, with lessons applicable to military and battlefield uses.
 
Finding danger and plotting a path for humans through it is an ideal task for robots.
 
In an exercise, the swarm had to find a mock city center, an objective inside that building, and then provide situational awareness over the area in runs that lasted 30 minutes. The program wants to create in real life as close to the kind of real-time tactical information a person might find in a strategy video game.
 
The schedule is to have new exercises and new updates with the goal is for swarms of up to 250 drones to operate autonomously, providing real-time information to humans who can then move through the battlefield confident that the area has at least been robotically scouted and monitored.
 
Building tactics from the new capabilities, and machines specific to swarm-human teaming, will have to come later.
 
It’s worth looking at the swarms as a possible component of future battlefields, and when designing technologies to meet the needs of the now, keeping an open mind to how the functions of swarms might change in the future
 
 
Multi agent systems have become an essential part of the real-world applications of networks like Swarm Sense robotics-based systems. Due to the interconnection of multi agent systems and wireless networks, group of drones can be enabled to cooperate and coordinate them to perform the missions automatically, which require a large-area coverage, immediate data processing, efficient deployment without exact pre-planning, and uninterrupted cooperation and coordination during the emergency operations.
 
A common drone swarm system could consist of two drones unmanned aerial vehicle/over thousands of drones. The required autonomy increased to control such systems without any manual pilots, when the number of drones in a swarm system exceeded a predetermined threshold. Therefore, it is vital to create the autonomous drones which manage themselves automatically, effectively, and robustly in any anti-access, bandwidth-limited, and area-denied environments.
 

1. Advance manned/unmanned teaming within the full range of Naval and joint operations
2. Build a digital infrastructure that integrates and adopts unmanned capabilities at speed and scale.
3. Incentivize rapid incremental development and testing cycles for unmanned systems.
4. Disaggregate common problems, solve once, and scale solutions across platforms and domains
5. Create a capability-centric and sustainable approach for unmanned contributions (platforms, systems, subsystems) to the force.
6. Creation of an enduring plan of action and accountability through a concentrated group of senior authorities.
7. Work across boundaries and barriers to connect enterprise vision with collaborative solutions
8. Encouraging deliberate risk and embracing the “Red” culture improvement models.
9. Adapting, learning, correcting, and attacking barriers.
10. Driving a sense of urgency in improvement through centralized accountability and decentralized execution to maintain cohesion of plan and vision
11. Platforms & Enablers Requirements, resources and investment plans through development of a cross-domain capability-centric lens, addressing whole capability solutions to rapidly integrate across the Force.
12. Strategy, Concepts, & Analysis Alignment of strategic priorities, connecting cycle of analytics and informing and reporting on wargames, studies, exercises and experiments.
13. Fleet Capability, Capacity, Readiness & Wholeness Derive employment plans, exercises and CONOPs to inform requirements applied to fleet issues regarding manning, training, and equipping the fleet
14. RDT&E/Science & Technology Identifying, informing, and integrating the Naval Research Enterprise on focused capability development, validation and insertion.
15. Logistics & Infrastructure Ensuring the maintenance, sustainment, basing, and support of unmanned systems is understood and prepared to scale with the fleet.
16. Ensuring one coherent voice and vision is shared across the DON when it comes to the future of UxS.
17. Free warfighter for critical operations, by automating routine/repetitive tasks
18. Operate in complex and contested areas with reduced risk to life, force and mission
19. Awareness and exploitation of physical operating environment
20. Increased range, endurance and persistence – scalable beyond human operator limitations
21. Decreased risk to human life and access to uninhabitable environments
22. Enable faster, scalable, and distributed decision-making putting humans at the apex of command
23. Increase resilience, connectivity, and real time awareness with distributed network nodes
24. Utilize UxS capabilities and MUM-T operational concepts in planning to execute operations in new and unpredictable ways
25. Deliver performance at the speed of relevance, prioritize reliable and proven delivery of unmanned systems
26. Execute continuous adaptation accept frequent modular upgrades
27. Organize for innovation consolidate, eliminate or restructure as necessary to increase lethality or performance
28. Streamline rapid, iterative approaches from development to fielding Ensure S&T organizations, Sponsors, Program Offices, SYSCOMS and the Fleet
29. Increase capacity at decreased cost allows robust connectivity and communication resiliency.
30. Create platform agnostic and unmanned capability-centric narratives. Free resources through common systems that enhance overall capacity and readiness.
31. Aggregate demands on Command and Control (C2), proprietary system interfaces
32. Scale subsystems, prototypes, and technologies that have been tested and proven.
33. Ensure studies and analysis include unmanned focus
34. Coordinate with Naval Warfare Analysis Office on existing knowledge base
35. Incorporate unmanned system behavior and performance into the building of modeling and simulation environments
36.  Mature these tools and use resultant findings to identify gaps.
37. Identify areas where Fleet, industry, and warfare centers can perform experiments to test and exercises to validate prototypes and hypotheses regarding potential unmanned solutions at the platform, system, and subsystem levels.
38.  Include unmanned elements in all operational wargames
39. Conduct iterative unmanned centric games.
40.  Incorporate appropriate, realistic assumptions around unmanned aspects of wargaming.
41. Use early prototyping to prove out new technologies prior to integrating these subsystems onto a platform.
42. Consider entire solution including logistics, training, infrastructure, and Fleet Engagement from outset for successful fielding
43. Utilize land-based testing sites to allow for decoupling critical systems and testing prior to major design decisions, reducing risk before scaling into production.
44. Drive virtual modeling and simulation environments to study and compare technical and operational trades earlier in the design process.
45. Develop an adaptive infrastructure base that can support testing, sustainment and maintenance.
46. Increase joint interoperability between conventional forces and unmanned vessels.
47. Develop tactics, techniques and procedures to maximize the potential of new technologies, and CONOPS for joint forces to ensure safe operations, reliability and endurance.
48. Secure digital communication standards and common C2 interface protocols to enable shared situational awareness.
49. Develop secure supply chains, and joint operational maintenance and repair capacity
50. Ensure core technologies, enablers, and standards are common to all and testing happens early and often.

 
Top 50 Goals Promote “Build a little, test a little, and learn a lot” Construct for Navy/Marines Unmanned Systems
 

1. tightly coupling our requirements, resources, and acquisition policies
2. develop, build, integrate and deploy effective unmanned systems faster.
3. Framework contains overall concepts and strategies
4. execution plan of action and milestones (POA&M)
5. Secure digital communication standards and common C2 interface protocols
6. enable shared situational awareness.
7. Development of secure supply chains,
8.  joint operational maintenance and repair capacity
9. .System development to ensure common core technologies, enablers, and standards
10. testing happens early and often.
11. advance manned/unmanned teaming within the full range of Naval and joint operations.
12. Create capability centric and sustainable approach for unmanned contributions (platforms, systems, subsystems) to the force.
13. Disaggregate common problems, solve once, and scale solutions across platforms/domains.
14. Incentivize rapid incremental development/testing cycles
15. Build digital infrastructure to integrate/adopt capabilities at speed/scale
16. Use early prototyping to prove out new technologies prior to integrating these subsystems onto a platform.
17. Consider entire solution including logistics, training, infrastructure
18. Allow for decoupling critical systems and testing prior to major design decisions, reducing risk before scaling into production.
19. Drive virtual modeling and simulation environments
20. study and compare technical and operational trades earlier in the design process
21. develop an adaptive infrastructure base to support testing, sustainment and maintenance.
22. increase focus on developing enablers required to successfully scale lessons across investments
23. develop detailed technology maturation and acquisition roadmaps
24. innovate quickly to provide solutions for hard-to-solve problems of current and future conflicts.
25. Increased range, endurance and persistence
26. Scalable beyond human operator limitations
27. Enable faster, scalable, and distributed decision-making
28. Increase resilience, connectivity, and real time awareness with distributed network nodes
29. expand our intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance advantage
30. add depth to our missile magazines
31. Provide means to keep our distributed force provisioned.
32. moving toward smaller platforms provides affordable solutions to grow.
33. exploiting the technical revolution in autonomy, advanced manufacturing, and artificial intelligence
34. create many new risk-worthy unmanned and minimally-manned platforms that can be employed in stand-in engagements
35. prototyping, experimentation, and demonstration of new capabilities prior to transitioning to Programs of Record
36. Coordinate efforts in programming, resources, and acquisition.
37. Create platform agnostic and unmanned capability-centric narratives.
38.  Free resources through common systems that enhance overall capacity and readiness.
39. Aggregate demands on Command and Control (C2), proprietary system interfaces
40. includes intelligence, wargames, experiments, exercises, testing, modeling, and simulation to inform strategic decision-making
41. Include unmanned elements in all operational wargames and conduct iterative unmanned centric games
42. Incorporate appropriate, realistic assumptions around unmanned aspects of wargaming.
43. Incorporate unmanned system behavior and performance into the building of modeling and simulation environments. Mature these tools and use resultant findings to identify gaps.
44. Identify areas where Fleet, industry, and warfare centers can perform experiments to test and exercises to validate prototypes for potential unmanned solutions at the platform, system, and subsystem levels.
45. Stop independent system solutions to drive “solve once and scale” constructs
46. standardize autonomy interfaces and enable interoperability
47. shorten fielding times by leveraging scale modeling and live virtual environments in parallel to system development to build trust and expertise as systems are created.
48. evaluate current and future programs through mission level modeling and simulation
49. identifies how programmed platforms contribute to completing mission-specific tasks
50. informs programmatic decision-making to identify strengths/weaknesses within each target

 
 
Top 10 Core Tech

1. Positioning
2. Navigation & Timing
3. Sense & Decide
4. Communications
5. Mission AI
6. Cyber & Physical Security
7. Reliability
8.  Payload Integration
9. Power & Endurance
10. Edge Processing

 
 
Top 50 Opportunities to Execute Smart Processes in Every Phase of Weapons System Deployment Project and Do So within Established Program Imperatives.

1. All parts of our weapons systems program must execute smartly, and we constantly are examining steps that can reduce schedule risks and improve quality of product

2. The program is considered a high priority in part to ensure the resources we need to execute the program are not endangered. We are always reviewing our ongoing affordability initiatives.

3. We would like to share that everything that everything we do is focused on delivering the required capability to the Warfighter in the most affordable and timely manner possible while meeting our commitment

4. We are continually seeking to drive cost out of the program and maximize the dollars entrusted to execute this program.

5. An accelerated/high risk program requires a stable funding profile, especially early in the program.

6. The accelerated acquisition construct results in unusual budget and financial execution metrics.

7. Minor budget changes/corrections or marks to the program have significant impact due to compressed time for analysis and recovery..

8. Program requirements and their relationship to threats have been thoroughly scrubbed with design and system development elements of the program tightly coordinated with stakeholders.

9. Technical risks are well understood with sound mitigation strategies aligned to earliest retirement prior to lead system construction.

10. Since achieving lead system and follow “ready for patrol” milestones are paramount to meeting mission requirements

11. We are on track for cost and performance, and system development is on schedule.

12. Challenges remain in program oversight, program staffing, test schedule, production quantities, and integration with other systems.

13. Opportunities include introduction of a new Mission Control Station, and a common baseline for system model types.

14. We have several major development efforts, which are closely monitored with respect to the program controls regarding cost, schedule and performance.

15. All stakeholders must act as a team to execute our current program activity within cost and schedule constraints.

16.  The program impact of shifting of funding, and the generation of disruptive, unplanned activity, creates problems.

17. We have to manage a highly technical, challenging program with associated risks.

18. We have a very methodical, build-up prototype testing and risk management approach in support of design/technology maturation in order to minimize risk and increase confidence in a successful effort leading to production and fielding of this critical capability. .

19. We have established an initiative to improve weapons system program office reliability. To give us confidence that we are aggressively progressing up the reliability growth curve to meet reliability requirements, though further work is required and continued diligence.

20. Our sustainment team has worked extremely hard to put a lot of effort into our Reliability and Maintainability (R&M) efforts, getting a head start on our understanding of risk areas for R&M

21.Staffing maintenance monitors throughout the testing at by incorporating Supportability Test and Evaluation into our ground test program, and by improving on known R&M cost drivers.

22. The assessment is that, while we are not where we need to be for reliability, we really are not in too bad of shape either when looked at in the context of what it takes to introduce a new system of this complexity. The fundamental building blocks all work.

23. We received the proposal and continue to work through the contractual actions required to get to award. 

24. This remains one of our highest priorities and we have undertaken an effort to monitor progress daily to ensure we stay on schedule for award.

25. We have multiple areas that we are paying close attention to and sharing for your awareness but not looking for help.

26. Must get our prime contractor under contract in a timely manner to execute the program in front of us. We have a highly competent team that has continued to perform at a high level for a long time.

27. Track record isn’t great with Quality Management. We have a history of quality escapes where vendors have provided noncompliant parts,

28. Our management process did not detect those escapes until after they were installed in subsystems. We have focused special effort on vendor inspections, first article inspections, and acceptance testing to turn this around.

29. Another area of concern is contracting. We are currently war-gaming options that include requesting the extension of critical scope through completion of development while exploring opportunities to compete other parts of the program.

30. These potential competitive opportunities include all up round production, operations and support of the fielded system, system level engineering, test support, and some portions of the ground system.

31.  Breaking out these areas for competitive award provides opportunity for future cost savings. We will need to step up our game with integrating these functions to maintain a closely coupled system.

32. We are working multiple procurement actions, all in different stages of execution.

33. Through the normal course of retirements, rotations, and promotion opportunities elsewhere, we have undergone a fairly significant turnover in personnel where we have lost significant experience and institutional knowledge specific to the program.

34. Even with qualified personnel, ours, like any program, requires time on station to be fully effective in order to execute efficiently. The net effect is it takes longer to execute as we collectively grow and come up to speed as a team. We may go slow for a while in order to go fast in the long run.

35. Another problem we have is that the manning structure does not support an increasing workload.

36. We struggle to meet schedules and constantly re-prioritizing work to ensure we do not lose money, exceed proposal validity dates, etc.

37. The current composition, numbers and skills, was designed to support the original program strategy.

38. heavy reliance was placed on the vendor for support and resolution of issues with program office oversight.

39. Over the past several years, we have seen a steady increase in technical issues and wear and tear on the aircraft.

40. We have program staffing challenges in the area of contracting. Shortages of Contract Specialists have put us behind in contract awards and make it difficult to get sufficient contract input early in the procurement planning process.

41. While our existing workforce is hard-working and extremely motivated, there is a shortage of experience and insufficient numbers to produce work of the desired quality and quantity.

42. Another staffing concern is in program management. While current staffing is sufficient, continued pressure on manning levels gives us concern we will lose some of the billets needed to properly plan and monitor execution of our procurements.

43. The program is progressing through system design, having completed to-date the System Requirements Review at which the system requirements baseline was formally established

44. System Functional Review, where system functional baseline was established, and is scheduled to complete the Preliminary Design Review with establishment of the system allocated baseline.

45. Prototyping and test activity provides for data to inform the system design process as well as a methodical approach to risk reduction to—and increased confidence in—the Engineering and Manufacturing Development phase and meeting of system Key Performance Parameters/Attributes .

46. We have demonstrated labor savings from optimized modular construction plans.

47.  An examination looks at multiple elements of construction, including the best strategy of major ship module construction between contractors and how to best capitalize on material and component procurements from the industrial base.

48. We produced a tailored set documentation for our upcoming milestone and achieve the proper balance for a build program for statutory compliance, appropriate oversight, and value-added efforts for the program office to generate documents that are useful to our ability to execute our mission.

49. We have said there should be an opportunity established up-front for all future non-developmental, commercial-based recapitalization programs to make the same decision earlier so as to afford maximum program benefit, including avoidance of unnecessary program efforts and documentation development.

50. The program has been on track for key areas of focus including the System Development and Demonstration

51. ransition to production, preparations for fleet integration and introduction occuring following Initial Operational Test and Evaluation (IOT&E) in and the initiation of the development effort for a capability upgrade.

52. We have focused the review boards on prioritizing our deficiency trouble reports, and on aligning that prioritization with their potential to manifest as deficiencies from the test team or as risk to satisfaction of an IOT&E Measure of Effectiveness or Suitability.

53. We will align the build to correct all the deficiencies that we can within the cost and schedule parameters that we have, and will ensure we have a thorough understanding of the risk or work-arounds for those deficiencies we are not able to fix prior to IOT&E.

54. We manage risk through close collaboration between the daily review boards, our development team’s weekly cost and schedule reviews, our test team daily and weekly reviews, and PM reviews.

55. Each of these elements is a collaborative effort and pressure points are the volume of deficiencies we will have to manage.

56. Management is key to maximizing functionality and meeting schedule.

57. We have some margin with the schedule, and we work every day to balance discovery that might drive delays with opportunities to accelerate

58. Emphasis on applying execution reality to our attempts to capture those opportunities.

59. Our production team has done an excellent job gaining insight into why our system costs what it does to produce, and we are using that insight to establish the best incentive arrangements for our production contracts.

60. Our focus is on the cost of poor quality, indirect costs, and schedule.

61. We will incentivize quality so that we do not have excessive scrap rates built into supplier costs,

62. We will target indirect costs deep into the supply chain, and we will incentivize reduced lead time to meet our delivery needs and reduce build time cost.

63. We are doing Business Case Analyses to identify the optimum sources of depot repair and analyzing how to drive repair of items to the lowest level, understanding that it is less expensive to repair items at an operator level instead of a depot level.

64. As the program progresses, we will continue to use an events-based approach but will work to instill increased schedule discipline without being reckless.

65. The Program Office has been awarding single-year contracts for production and sustainment. We are trying to break that cycle. The production contract is planned to have a base year with multiple option years.

66. The contractor has struggled to get the cost data from their suppliers to support it. If we have to, we will award the single year and re-attack, but we have not given up yet.

67. The sustainment contract was originally planned for an even longer period of performance.

68. Pulling us back to a shorter multi-option year contract is not ideal, but this would still give us breathing room before negotiating the next one and at least break the single year paradigm.

69. The next contract we are awarding is our next system improvement contract. This could be an interesting negotiation, as we did not receive the funding to support all the system changes.

70. Despite the success in executing to the recovery plan, we need to see continued maturation in contractor production processes

71. Iimprovements in subcontractor and supply chain management. There remain inefficiencies which may impact execution and cost when the production quantities increase.

72. Engaging with the prime, first, and second-tier vendors is a step forward. We had reduced onsite visits in the past but apparently swung the needle too far.

73. We have seen benefit with the increased contractor site visits. We also placed pressure on other agencies for improved support. This effort had been lacking for some time, but now overall support has been excellent and effective.

74. It was evident that material cost and labor rates were increasing for suppliers.

75. We have been very engaged with contractor not just for their cost analysis, but to support an assessment of the industrial base.

76. We had them conduct an initial criticality and fragility analysis and based on the result, we identified several vendors that we need to monitor more closely.

77. But some contract compliance requirements are levied on the programs without funding, causing planned capabilities to be pushed to the right or out of scope completely.

78.  If the new contracting compliance requirements were bundled and sent out on a scheduled basis with sufficient funding and time to implement, the programs could make the necessary adjustments without negative consequences on program objectives.

79. An area where our programs need help is in the cycle time for review and approval of acquisition milestone and contracting documents.

80. Specific concerns include the serial nature of the process, the requirement to include documents that are ancillary and/or premature to the decision point, the duration of individual reviews.

81. It’s also a problem to receive comments that are not substantive or material to the acquisition Strategy. It simply does not make sense to require development and review of, for example, a final Performance Work Statement and Source Selection Plan for an acquisition whose strategy is not yet approved.

82. We will better focus on the work ahead, more adequately spread the load, and improve our overall speed and agility. We are preparing alternative offers to our resource sponsors, which will assess the risk of manpower cuts at various levels while also identifying tasks which will not be completed as a result.

83. The complexity of coordinating and maturing new processes, executing multiple efforts within the network architecture in a fixed price contract structure, and aligning with our industry, operational and external partners and organizations introduces significant risk of using excessive processes as a preferred control approach by the team.

84. To combat complexity internally and mitigate the risk of process stasis in the new program model, standing orders have been issued to each division lead to eliminate any piece of a process that, in their judgment, does not clearly add value.

85. . We are exploring innovative contract strategies to reduce the cost of competition and enable a smoother budget profile over time. To date we have identified some alternative strategies, which may meet these needs and which we continue to flesh out

86. We need to look into ways to use special contracts approaches if required to enable faster fielding of equipment and services.

87. We must support acquisition streamlining and limit documentation to only those which are either clearly proven to provide value added to the PM or meet a statutory requirement.

88. Although there are some parts shortages that are causing delays and out of station rework, these are manageable and part of a typical production launch for a complex system. These inefficiencies have contributed to some cost growth, but the growth is small when compared to total contract value. Of course Readiness Matters More than cost.

89. We do not expect the schedule delays to impact the test events on the critical path yet, and with the contract structure, the vendor is motivated to correct the issues.

90. Parts shortages are on a path to be corrected soon so that later vehicles will be built more efficiently with few or no out of station retrofits.

91. Upgrades for increased survivability and reliability are in production and the fielding effort is on schedule and well below cost

92. We have experienced cost growth related to underestimating prototype build cost and the c3mplexity of meeting Information Assurance requirements.
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93. Requirements have grown more complex and challenging for our systems recently, and there is a shortage both in the PM shops and at the vendor of personnel with a solid grasp of the field.

94. The program is challenged with respect to RDT&E funding. We have deferred some requirements, like training devices, in order to live within the adjusted budget. Though program disbursements should return to health eventually, additional RDT&E decrements or sequestration will force a significant schedule slip.

95. With the significant number of technical issues that have escalated over time, we struggle to support them all in a timely manner due to limited resources across their competencies. To meet acquisition office requirements as evidenced through engineering contract modification proposal inadequacies and lengthy negotiations complicated by inconsistent/non-compliant disclosures and rate structures as determined by review boards.

96. On the positive side, some vendors have made progress in resolving some outstanding contractual and audit non-compliance issues. There is now a more “customer focused” approach, which has improved the overall situation.

97. The modernization effort has been long time coming and the light is finally at the end of the tunnel. This program is progressing in an exemplary fashion and is tracking extremely well, accomplishing key critical milestones. Bottom line, this effort is proceeding very well, and we are confident we can overcome the challenges that still remain by empowering the PM to make critical decisions.

98. My weapons system program extension efforts are technically sound and delivering on schedule. However, I have increasing concerns in my long-term ability to sustain the reliability and accuracy of the Weapons System.

99.  It is critical my project continues to get support from senior leadership to ensure the success of my program, I must be properly resourced. I am constantly battling for resources to offset the “loss of buying power” Without getting the budget stability a program needs my buying power will be decimated and compromise my ability to continue to certify and maintain a capable weapon system,.

100. At some point, it will become impossible for my best efforts to result in continued program success unless we make reliability investments in developing tools/systems to assess combat support resource levels and ensure constant communications with warfighter.
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