‘HACQING’ FOR DEFENSE
MULTIPLE PATHS TO ‘RAPID’
DIU leverages several kinds of vehicles for innovative projects—prototype other transactions (10 U.S. Code Section 2371(b)); production other trans- actions (10 U.S. Code Section 2371(f)); and experimentation procurement projects (10 U.S. Code Section 2373). DIU developed the commercial solu- tions opening process for competitive evaluation of prototype projects from nontraditional vendors.
The process includes:
Phase 0: Posting the solicitation or areas of interest for a minimum of 7–21 days.
Phase 1: Evaluating solution briefs, which may be either a five-page white paper or 15-page slide deck, received from the prospective vendors for initial selection.
Phase 2: Inviting selected companies from Phase 1 to make pitches in person or via Google Hangout. After the final down-select that follows, the draft statement of work is prepared with DIU, Army Contracting Command – New Jersey, the DOD customer and the vendor company during the same meeting (either by phone or in person, if practical) to agree upon expectations for the statement of work and other transaction authority.
Phase 3: A request for pilot proposal is sent to the selected vendor to trig- ger submission of the proposal. The submitted proposal includes terms and conditions, statement of work and payment milestones.
develop the statement of work, and I was asked to be part of that team.
Also during my first month, I had the opportunity to review and provide comments to the due diligence document for Synthetic Molecular Biological Agent and tactical augmented reality projects. Te work was really engaging and enlight- ening, and I couldn’t believe I was actually a part of the DIU team.
MAKING CONNECTIONS During my second month, I was intro- duced to a product manager at DIU’s Boston office who ran the critical supplies delivery program in the field. Tat manager asked me to talk to my home organiza- tion about this project and bring them on board if they were interested in improving field delivery of medical supplies.
At the same time, I met with DIU’s health systems portfolio director to discuss two capability gaps: a product for hemorrhage detection and a multichannel intrave- nous infusion pump. Te director asked me to contact the product manager at USAMMDA to find out if they would be willing to use DIU to facilitate find- ing product prototypes. During this time, I was surprised to learn that DIU provided its services to DOD, and some other federal agencies on behalf of DOD, without charge.
DOUBLE DUTY
DIU’s Mountain View, California, office is in a small building that houses the headquarters of the U.S. Army Reserve’s 351st Civil Affairs Command. (Photo courtesy of the author)
I wanted to share this with my own orga- nization, so I reached out to the U.S. Army Medical Research and Develop- ment Command’s Office of the Principal Assistant for Acquisition. She invited DIU representatives and the DIU HACQers to Fort Detrick to give a presenta- tion on other-transaction authority and commercial solutions opening processes. A commercial solutions opening refers to a merit-based, competitive evalua- tion process to award prototype projects
88 Army AL&T Magazine Spring 2020
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