New Contracts Fast-Track Critical Combat Tools

The Air Force Installation and Mission Support Center is leveraging the AFWERX Expedient Basing Challenge to capitalize on industry expertise to rapidly address urgent U.S. Air Force needs.

AFIMSC partnered with AFWERX to award contracts through the Expedient Basing Call under the AFWERX Challenge Commercial Solutions Opening, or CSO, earlier this year. The challenge is an open crowdsourcing effort to advance the Department of Air Force’s ability to establish and manage distributed operations in hostile environments around the world.

By using a CSO as the contracting vehicle, AFIMSC and AFWERX are able to provide an innovative, rapid and flexible contracting pathway for solution providers under the challenge.

“Using the CSO reduces project execution timelines and helps us put needed capability into warfighter hands more quickly,” said Dustin Dickens, principal innovation program manager with AFIMSC.

The partnership is already yielding results. AFIMSC awarded a contract to Street Smarts VR 27 August to develop a virtual combat support training range. The new system will provide immersive training experiences by simulating a range of combat scenarios, terrain types and potential threats to enhance their preparedness.

AFIMSC plans to award four more contracts through the CSO in the near future to address a variety of critical mission needs:

• The further development of Sentry, an intelligent remote security system, to enhance current security forces tactical sensor capabilities. The contractor will design a system to autonomously scan, detect, classify and track threats, providing rapid and effective responses to protect friendly forces during combat.
• An innovative logistics and asset management system. The contractor will create a new logistics and asset management system that incorporates a marketplace concept to enable seamless resource allocation, tracking and storage across global locations.
• The procurement and evaluation of a corrosion protection solution for Air Force infrastructure, equipment and components. The aim is to assess the suitability of the product for protecting equipment and reducing lifecycle sustainment costs.
• The procurement and evaluation of rapid repair kits for asphalt and concrete airfield surfaces. The kits use a durable, low-cost petroleum resin combined with indigenous materials to create a ready-to-traffic surface without the need for curing. The evaluation will determine the product’s suitability for Air Force runway repairs.

The solutions in the Challenge CSO portfolio can be put on contract by any Department of Defense organization, said Shanya Hans, AFWERX Challenge program manager, “which makes it easier for organizations like AFWERX and AFIMSC to partner and collaborate on innovative, game-changing technologies and capabilities.”

As the Air Force reshapes, refocuses and reoptimizes in an era of Great Power Competition, Dickens said it’s important for AFIMSC to partner with industry to help address the problems and priorities the center’s mission areas focus on.