SOURCES SOUGHT
99 -- Hypersonics Request for Information
- Notice Date
- 7/28/2023 10:57:29 AM
- Notice Type
- Sources Sought
- Contracting Office
- W6QK ACC-RI ROCK ISLAND IL 61299-0000 USA
- ZIP Code
- 61299-0000
- Solicitation Number
- W519TC-RFI
- Response Due
- 9/8/2023 2:00:00 PM
- Archive Date
- 09/23/2023
- Point of Contact
- Kelli Senger
- E-Mail Address
-
kelli.k.senger.civ@army.mil
(kelli.k.senger.civ@army.mil)
- Description
- The Office of the Under Secretary of Defense and the Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Industrial Base Policy are seeking proposals to assess potential supply-chain risks and costs within the Hypersonics industrial base and to develop risk mitigation strategies. As part of this initiative, the Innovation Capability and Modernization (ICAM) team has been established to work across the DOD agencies to bring novel technologies, new manufacturing capabilities, and industrial modernization to strengthen the competitive posture of the US Defense Industrial Base (DIB).� The expectation of these investments is to improve some combination of capacity, performance, and major cost reduction of critical hypersonic subsystems.� �While ICAM is interested in all proposals that can help field systems faster, ICAM is especially interested in those that reduce cost and reduce production time of All-Up-Round (AUR) components, and in many cases the efforts will seek an order of magnitude cost reduction. Recent advances in Hypersonic technologies by potential adversaries, have seen numerous successful tests of hypersonic weapons.� The United States is actively pursuing the development of hypersonic weapons; maneuvering weapons that fly at speeds of at least Mach five.� The focus of the ICAM team is to improve Hypersonics supply chain technologies, to reduce costs, increase manufacturing capacity and bring disruptive technologies to address critical gaps impeding production advancements. All investments will be selected with the goal to transition, and the ICAM office will work closely with the services & agencies - identified as recipients of these advancements - to ensure requisite steps are taken throughout the process to enable transition.�� A DoD cross functional team will solicit inputs from Hypersonic vendors, national laboratories and accredited universities to develop proposals that accelerate the manufacturing technologies, weapons systems and integration functions. The desired result will be to develop proposals that affect key gaps in the development timeline and show significant promise to advance the Hypersonics enterprise in terms of capacity increases and cost reductions. A team of subject matter experts will review each of these proposals, selecting the most promising prospects to address gaps in the technology and manufacturing supply chain.� Risk mitigation will also be evaluated with respect to raw materials and the value stream pipeline; potential non-domestic suppliers must be identified within the final proposals.� Objective The objective of this task is to solicit new technologies and scaled production capacity to enable advancements and cost reductions of critical subsystems & raw materials.� �These will include but are not limited to: Thermal Protection Systems (TPS), Scram Jet Engines (SJE) Additive Manufacturing (AM), Cables and Wiring (CAW), Glide Body (GB) subsystems & integration Forgings and Castings (FAC) This effort focuses on cost reductions and facilitates the scaling of current technologies critical to the Hypersonics missile portfolio through the acquisition of new equipment, optimization and updating of processes, training personnel required to reduce costs. The industrial base must support cost reductions and increased AUR throughput to establish an appropriate manufacturing capacity to support current and future warfighter needs.� The contractor shall establish the equipment, processes, and personnel necessary to achieve cost reductions and higher rates of production capacity. These cost reductions and capacity expansions focus on the processes and equipment that are specifically designed to complete the detailed assembly and rigorous testing of the hardware for all Hypersonics programs. � Expected Requirements The contractor shall plan and execute the following tasks in support of the capacity expansion efforts. Targeted range of cost reductions are in the order of 30% to 80%. Program Management Since there will likely be many different technologies evaluated and integrated, the DoD expects that the contractor will participate in a Program Management Plan IAW DI-MGMT-XXXX which shall describe the management tasks, planned activities, status reporting and schedule for achieving the required affordability goals.� An example of a PM plan is show below and will likely be abbreviated. The contractor shall participate in monthly telephone conferences and conduct quarterly Program Management Reviews that will be jointly led by ICAM and Hypersonic program of record offices.� Typical Systems Engineering and Technical Reviews will be performed. �The timeline below, while not specific to any development effort, is representative of the rigor required to transition new developments into operational systems.� ICAM intends to advance subsystems to include prototyping and to support a sufficient level of testing so that the services/agencies can seamlessly transition the advancement through an equivalent EMD-like effort.� �See Hypersonic Figures attachment. Additive Manufacturing and Anticipated Technologies With the advancements in robotics and software it is anticipated that Additive Manufacturing (AM) technologies will be part of these proposals.� The DOD has issued guidance per DODI 5000.93 in which the policy document is a comprehensive plan to implement AM throughout DOD based on the themes and goals of the AM Strategy. The purpose of the instruction is to establish policy, assign responsibilities and provide implementation procedures. It provides unified direction across the DOD, ensuring alignment and collaboration while minimizing duplication of effort. The policy assigns specific AM responsibilities to the Under Secretary of Defense for Research and Engineering, the Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition and Sustainment, the DOD Chief Information Officer, the Director of the Defense Logistics Agency (DLA), the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and the secretaries of the military departments (MILDEPs), defense agencies and DOD field activities with AM requirements. The policy then outlines procedures and guidance for OSD, military departments, defense agencies and DOD field activities with AM requirements. These cover eight critical areas: see Hypersonic Figures attachment.� The policy then pivots to the industrial base, directing: �Apply AM to enhance the DOD�s industrial base, including small businesses, in order to advance weapon systems capabilities and sustainment.� The guidance document directs the Department to ensure adequate resourcing for AM plans, programs and requirements. The policy recognizes that the DOD and many of its suppliers currently use AM, thus it emphasizes the importance for the AM community to collaborate, share best practices and collect lessons learned. Simultaneously, the policy recommends that the DOD provide education and workforce development to expand the base of AM-knowledgeable individuals, including equipment operators, engineers, deployed personnel, research and development (R&D) personnel, contracting officers, item managers, logisticians, acquisition professionals and leaders. In addition, it establishes that AM must be used securely, which requires the DOD to deploy a secure cyber-physical infrastructure while at the same time protecting the DOD�s investments in AM technology development from exploitation by strategic competitors. There will be specific sectors for each of these proposals to address as part of the Anticipated Taxonomy Sectors (ATS) throughout the missile design architecture.� There will be specific interest in Terminal Sensing technologies Terminal Sensing Thermal Protection Systems Integration and Testing Actuation Rocket Motors and Propulsion Forgings and Castings Digital Engineering and Manufacturing The RFI Development and Process The proposal Pugh Matrix will be sent to vendors that request it during the RFI process from the ICAM team with the intention of developing and refining each proposal with sufficient detail to enable the DOD SME team to determine the merit of these proposals and if there is potential for investment based on: Ability of the proposed technology to meet baseline performance expectations Realistic expectation to the baseline cost vs. future cost vs. targeted 30% to 80% reductions The ability to scale any prior design testing to full scale models Risk mitigation factors within development, integration and schedule The launch of the RFI ICAM Hypersonics process will entail this letter, a Pugh Matrix template and guidance instructions for populating the matrix.� There will be a reasonable allotment of time to facilitate questions that are anticipated during the process and a data call will be held as needed with selected vendors to promote a detailed response and facilitate the expected timeline requirements. RFI Submission and Contact Information In the RFI response, please provide your name(s), contact information, the company/entity, CAGE code, and industry sector that the response represents. Responses can be provided in word format as a white paper not to exceed three pages.� Responses will not be made public. RFI submissions will be accepted as email attachments only.� All responses must be sent to the Contract Specialist, kelli.k.senger.civ@army.mil with �Hypersonics RFI� in the subject line.
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