REDSTONE ARSENAL, Alabama -- The U.S. Army Space and Missile Defense Command/Army Forces Strategic Command is searching for new and innovative ideas for space and missile defense technology.
USASMDC/ARSTRAT made a broad agency announcement, or BAA, to industry and academia in an effort to quickly leverage technology advancements. The BAA, which was officially announced April 6, is a competitive solicitation procedure used to obtain white papers and proposals for basic and applied research.
"The BAA is a request for new and innovative technologies that we can bring into the command to look at the technology implementation into current or future systems," said Mark McClellan, SMDC Chief Technology Office general engineer.
SMDC conducts space, directed energy, missile defense, cruise missile defense and related technology research and development and has an interest in receiving research, development and technology maturation white papers and proposals with technical, management, and cost presentations.
White papers and proposals submitted should include new ideas for advanced and innovative concepts as well as prototype hardware and software for current and emerging space and missile defense science and technology.
"The BAA is a broadcasting out to the entire nation, soliciting for ideas from both industry and academia, thoughts and concepts that can help this command do its mission better, smarter and more efficiently for current and future threats we face," said Dr. Steve Pierce, SMDC chief technology officer. "The first part will be the opportunity to submit a white paper. The purpose of the white papers is to give those responding the ability to submit research concepts and technologies without the significant time, resources and personnel needed to submit full proposals. The command will then decide if the submitted white papers are ideas that are good enough for us to move forward on.
"What we do then is send out a request for proposals that shows our commitment to the white paper concept but requires more effort on the part of the submitter." he added.
Pierce said this BAA seeks white papers and proposals for scientific study and experimentation directed toward advancing the state-of-the-art or increasing knowledge or understanding from basic and applied research.
"The command wants this to happen because there are a lot of ideas out there that we want to leverage," Pierce said. "This is a vehicle and tool for us to accomplish that. This BAA ties into our mission sets. This is designed to help our command do its mission better and smarter."
Maj. Scott Blount, SMDC technology plans officer, added that a white paper is a two page write-up that explains what they are able to do or what they are interested and show us what they are trying to do.
White papers and proposals may be submitted by any U.S. non-governmental entity, commercial firms, universities, research institutions and non-profit organizations.
SMDC is emphasizing for fiscal years 2017 and 2018 white papers and proposals focused on supporting our warfighters in the future Multi-Domain Battlefield, third offset strategy, space-based technologies, integrated air and missile defense, directed energy, cybersecurity, global satellite communications and test technologies.
"We want to tailor our responses to best support advancing promising technologies and to get concepts and ideas that supports the doctrine of Multi-Domain Battle," Pierce said.
McClellan mentioned that the command's BAA effort has been supported not only by SMDC leadership, but also by Army Contracting Command, or ACC, and it is good for one year. After the year is up, another BAA may be submitted with possible modifications in alignment with the command's mission set.
"In the future, we may be able to better define what we are looking for and pass that on as it applies," McClellan said. "The fact that we are aligning this to the mission set gives us a more accurate and honest representation to industry, academia and other government agencies of what our focus is for any particular year that a BAA applies, and we can modify that."
The selection of proposals will be based on an evaluation of proposals submitted in response to the BAA. The purpose of the evaluation will be to determine the relative merit of the proposed technology and the feasibility of the technical approach of each proposal. Selection of proposals for award will be based on the potential benefits to the government weighed against the cost of the proposals.
For more information, go to: https://www.fbo.gov/notices/1e0c9ee97a1d5d864db6903c158cecb8
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