Undersecretary of Defense for Acquisition and Technology
Paul G. Kaminski today announced plans for the FY 1997 Dual Use
Applications Program. The program includes two parts, the
Commercial Operations and Support Savings Initiative ($100
million) and the Science and Technology Initiative ($85 million).
Commercial Operations and Support Savings Initiative (COSSI)
will demonstrate an approach to be used to lower the operations
and support costs of fielded military systems by inserting
commercial technology. The Science and Technology Initiative
will fully transition to the military services the dual use
procedures pioneered by the Defense Advanced Research Projects
Agency.
Reducing operations and support costs is a critical element
in DoD's long-term strategy to increase funding for
modernization. COSSI will support the engineering and testing
needed to retrofit fielded military systems with commercial
technologies in order to save future operations and support
costs. The program requires that firms team with the appropriate
military service customer to create kits, based on a commercial
product or process, that will maintain the performance of a
fielded system while reducing its operations and support costs.
The government will share the costs of developing and testing
these kits. If the development and testing is successful, the
firms could then sell the kits and perhaps a maintenance contract
to the government. The teams military service customer will
oversee kit development and testing, and, assuming a successful
development and available funds, would ultimately purchase the
kits.
In the Science and Technology Initiative, the service
acquisition executives will identify industry proposals that
develop a dual use technology that has both military relevance
and potential commercial applications. The Dual Use Applications
Program and the military services will share the cost of these
projects with industry.
In discussing COSSI, Kaminski noted, This initiative will
pair industry, both commercial providers and military system
prime contractors, with the military service organizations
responsible for operating and maintaining our weapons systems.
It will put the Department on a path to a time when the defense
industry and DoD routinely look first to the commercial sector
for the technology, products, and processes we need to keep our
operating costs down. Looking first to the commercial sector is
another cultural change for our acquisition system; COSSI is an
opportunity to demonstrate and institutionalize it.
DARPA prototyped the early dual use efforts to leverage
commercial technology at the research and development stage to
increase affordability, performance, and sustainability of
military equipment. Now, the Military Services will incorporate
the dual use approach directly into their own technology
development programs, explained Lee Buchanan, deputy director of
the DARPA and executive director of the Dual Use Applications
Program. And with COSSI, we will shift our focus towards
inserting existing commercial technology into existing DoD
weapons systems and platforms. The Dual Use Applications
Programs two-pronged strategy will help us take advantage of
commercial industrys research, technology, products, and
processes at every stage of the acquisition life-cycle.
A solicitation (DARPA SOL 97-12) describing the COSSI
program and soliciting industry proposals is available by: (1)
calling 1-800-DUAL-USE; (2) sending a facsimile to the
Joint Dual Use Program Office at (703) 807-0678; (3) sending
email to address Dual-Use@arpa-mil; or, (4)
downloading from the World Wide Web at http://www.jdupo.darpa.mil/jdupo/ (no longer available). A total of $100 million has been appropriated
for this competition. Proposals are due on March 18, 1997;
winners will be announced in early May.
Each military service will issue its own solicitation for
the Science and Technology Initiative in the next few months.
News media may obtain copies of the COSSI solicitation from
Lt. Col. Joan Ferguson, (703) 695-0192, in Pentagon room 2E765.
