Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), Contract Management Directorate (CMD), 3701 N. Fairfax Dr., Arlington, VA 22203-1714

A -- POWER AWARE COMPUTING AND COMMUNICATIONS SOL BAA97-37 DUE 121699 POC Dr. Jose Munoz, DARPA/TTO Fax: (703) 522-7161 WEB: http://www.darpa.mil, http://www.darpa.mil. E-MAIL: BAA97-37@darpa.mil, BAA97-37@darpa.mil. The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) is soliciting proposals for research on various aspects of power managed computing and communication in support of the DARPA basic research program and Power Aware Computing and Communication (PAC/C) program. This BAA solicits research to define, develop and accelerate the adoption of a new class of computing and communication systems composed of hardware and software that is able to dynamically respond to the changing energy resources encountered in power constrained systems. The adaptations are driven by the need for optimum performance across rapidly evolving computational, environmental, and fault tolerance constraints. Power Aware Computing/Communication (PAC/C) will create programmable software and hardware building blocks, and software tools for analyzing the trade space in Quality of Service, energy, performance, mission requirements, and other parameters to provide the power efficiency of custom solutions. The vision is a capability where the application can tailor the power, dynamically, to best satisfy mission needs in the context of available power. PAC/C will support the intelligent management of energy and energy distribution. "The right power, at the right place, at the right time." or "Just in time power." PAC/C goals are to provide an integrated software/hardware technology suite with the potential to reduce power requirements by two to three orders of magnitude (100X -- 1000X) as measured by energy*delay or performance/watt. PAC/C will provide the minimum power required to complete a mission/task. This will be accomplished by pioneering promising new areas such as: a) power aware algorithm designs/libraries, b) power aware compilation, c) power aware operating systems, d) power aware middleware, and by exploiting emerging technologies such as e) voltage/frequency scaling, f) clock gating, g) architectural features and innovative circuit design and h) CAD tools. It is imperative that an integrated architecture approach to both software and hardware fronts be pursued in order to provide an integrated, comprehensive solution that allows mission resource optimization through appropriate trade-off analyses. PAC/C will seek to steer industry as it moves from desktop to portable and mobile platforms by anticipating power-aware needs and strategies. It will seek to establish working agreements with industry to evaluate and incorporate the results of the program into mainstream commercial processors/systems that will enable new and enhanced military applications. Military applications and platforms have an urgent and growing need for power efficient computing and communications. More power efficient systems would a) empower platforms to perform new missions, b) enable dramatically extended mission timelines, c) enable new capabilities on existing missions, and d) reduce logistics costs by requiring fewer energy resources and less frequent replenishment cycles. A recent National Research Council study (1997) concluded that the major impediment tothe Army After Next is its power requirements [for computation and communication]. Satellite missions would benefit enormously if platforms had the ability to effectively and efficiently manage power resources in response to changing environmental and mission conditions. Such changing mission requirements necessitate designs based on worse case power requirements that burden platforms with cumbersome additional power resources. The technology base exists to address adaptive power efficient computing. Researchers have been able to develop point solutions that exhibit three orders of magnitude power reduction (as measured by energy*delay) over conventional computing/communication resources. What is needed is a comprehensive, systematic program to take that technology base in power aware computing and create broad, general purpose, energy efficient strategies applicable to a wide range of military platforms. Of particular interest to this solicitation are the following technical topic areas, consistent with theinitial goal of exploring/exploiting existing technologies during the initial phases of the PAC/C program: Architectural approaches: This technology area shall address how power-aware systems can be synthesized and orchestrated to exploit various power-aware components (processing, communication, memory, algorithms, middleware, operating system, protocols, etc.). Compilation strategies: Compiler and compilation strategies that incorporate energy as an additional constraint. Algorithms: Algorithms and algorithmic approaches where energy plays a central role. (1) Middleware: Application program interfaces that will enable an application to monitor, control, distribute and adapt the energy consuming resources in response to application needs.(2) Benchmarks/Simulation: A set of benchmarks, and associated measurement technologies, for power-aware computing must be defined and developed. This area also includes tools and technologies that can be used for accurate power performance prediction. (3) Protocols: Communication protocols that minimize energy use and adapt to energy availability are sought. It is strongly recommended that respondent's address how their particular solution could be integrated with the above technical topic areas of the PAC/C program and thereby represents a complementary and integratable solution. Examples of this might be how compilation approaches could be further improved by modifications to the processor or device architecture; or how algorithmic approaches could benefit from suggested middleware features. Proposals must target and quantify revolutionary advances in one or more critical parameters that directly impact system-level application performance. Such parameters include: effective execution time, reconfiguration time, power consumed, bandwidth, latency, mapping efficiency, throughput, portability, or algorithm development/mapping time. PROGRAM SCOPE: Proposed research should investigate innovative approaches and techniques that lead to or enable revolutionary advances in the state-of-the-art. Proposals are not limited to the specific strategies listed above and alternative visions will be considered. However, proposals should be for research that substantially contributes towards the goals stated. Research should result in prototype hardware and/or software demonstrating integrated concepts and approaches. Specifically excluded is research that primarily results in evolutionary improvement to the existing state of practice or focuses on a specific system or solution. Integrated solution sets embodying significant technological advances are strongly encouraged over narrowly defined research endeavors. Proposals may involve other research groups or industrial cooperation and cost sharing. Power Aware Computing and Communications is a new effort that begins in FY2000. It is targeted to be a five-year program with funding for the first two years having been allocated. Proposed efforts greater than two years in duration should reflect the requirement for option years after the first two years. GENERAL INFORMATION: In order to minimize unnecessary effort in proposal preparation and review, proposers are strongly encouraged to submit brief proposal abstracts in advance of full proposals. An original and 6 copies of the proposal abstract must be submitted to DARPA/TTO, ATTN: BAA 99-37, 3701 North Fairfax Drive, Arlington, VA 22203-1714, in time to reach DARPA by 4:00 PM (ET), Thursday, October 28, 1999, to guarantee review. Upon review, DARPA will make a recommendation to offerors either encouraging or discouraging submission of full proposals. Proposers must submit original and 6 copies of full proposals in time to reach DARPA by 4:00 PM (ET), Thursday, December 16, 1999, in order to be considered. Proposers must obtain a pamphlet, BAA 99-37 Proposer Information, which provides further information on the areas of interest, submission, evaluation, funding processes, proposal abstracts, and full proposal formats. This pamphlet may be obtained by fax, electronic mail, or mail request to the administrative contact address given below, as well as at URL address http://www.darpa.mil/tto/Solicitations.html. Proposals not meeting the format described in the pamphlet may not be reviewed. This Commerce Business Daily notice, in conjunction with the pamphlet BAA 99-37 Proposer Information, constitutes the total BAA. No additional information is available, nor will a formal RFP or other solicitation regarding this announcement be issued. Requests for same will be disregarded. The Government reserves the right to select for award all, some, or none of the proposals received. NOTICE TO OFFERORS: (1) All responsible sources capable of satisfying the Government's needs may submit a proposal that shall be considered by DARPA. Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCU) and Minority Institutions (MI) are encouraged to submit proposals and join others in submitting proposals. However, no portion of this BAA will be set aside for HBCU and MI participation due to the impracticality of reserving discrete or severable areas of this research for exclusive competition among these entities. (2) It is the policy of DARPA to treat all proposals as competitive information, and to disclose their contents only for the purpose of evaluation. The Government intends to use employees from a non-Government source, DynCorp of Arlington, Virginia to assist in administering the evaluation of the proposals. These personnel will have signed, and will be subject to, the terms and conditions of a non-disclosure agreement. By submission of its proposal, an offeror agrees that its proposal information may be disclosed to those employees of DynCorp for the limited purpose stated above. Selections under this BAA, however, made only by Government evaluators. (3) Awards made under this BAA are subject to the provisions of the Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) Subpart 9.5, Organizational Conflict of Interest. All offerors and proposed subcontractors must affirmatively state whether they are supporting any DARPA technical office(s) through anactive contract or subcontract. All affirmations must state which office(s) the offeror supports and identify the prime contract number. Affirmations shall be furnished at the time of proposal submission, and the existence or potential existence of organizational conflicts of interest, as that term is defined in FAR 9.501, must be disclosed. This disclosure shall include a description of the action the offeror has taken, or proposes to take, to avoid, neutralize or mitigate such conflict. If the offeror believes that no such conflict exists, then it shall so state in this section. EVALUATION CRITERIA: Evaluation of proposals will be accomplished through a scientific review of each proposal using the following criteria, which are listed in descending order of relative importance: (1) overall scientific and technical merit, (2) potential contribution and relevance to DARPA mission, (3) offeror's capabilities and related experience, (4) plans and capability to accomplish technology transition, and (5) cost realism. All administrative correspondence and questions on this solicitation, including requests for information on how to submit a proposal abstract or proposal to this BAA, must be directed to one of the administrative addresses below by 4:00 PM (ET), Thursday, December 9, 1999; e-mail or fax is preferred. DARPA intends to use electronic mail and fax for some of the correspondence regarding BAA 99-37. Proposals and proposal abstracts may not be submitted by fax; any so sent will be disregarded. The administrative addresses for this BAA are: Fax: 703-522-7161 Addressed to: DARPA/TTO, BAA 99-37, Electronic Mail: baa99-XX@darpa.mil, Electronic File Retrieval: http://www.darpa.mil/TTO/Solicitations.html, Mail: DARPA/TTO,ATTN: BAA 99-37, 3701 North Fairfax Drive, Arlington, VA 22203-1714 Posted 09/20/99 (W-SN382177). (0263)

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