By Geoff Fein
As the Navy moves toward open architecture (OA) systems, companies shouldn’t worry they will be closed out of opportunities, according to a top Navy official.
“There are always opportunities for companies. That’s the one phenomenon that people have to understand,” Robert Carey, Navy chief information officer, told Defense Daily in a recent interview.
Moving to OA requires vendors to think about their particular business value to this department, he said, whether it is a business system or a warfighter support system. Vendors have to think about delivering systems in such a way that it is readily interoperable with its associated system.
“All of our systems are not interoperable by definition, and we want to get there, so that we have the seamless ability to move information around as we see fit…move it around with impunity,” Carey said.
But there are obstacles to achieving interoperability, Carey noted. For example, there is a financial obstacle. “You can’t reinvent something the size of the Department of the Navy in a couple of years.”
“You get to invest in reinventing naval IT (Information Technology) if you will and moving down the open path only as much as your development modernization checkbook allows,” he added. “I think what you typically see in the weapons system…the integrated warfare system, the combat system, the business system…are all moving down this path to the extent that their [development modernization] budgets allow.”
Some people have already gotten there, Carey added, while others have a long way, because that’s how far they were invested in proprietary stuff, or what Carey called closed architecture.
“Those closed architectures work just fine, they are just not as able to seamlessly interoperate with other systems as we would want them to be,” he said.
Moving toward OA has also been met with some resistance, Carey added. “Change is hard.”
“Change is a fundamental factor in everything we do. Understanding that technology generally works and cultures generally are resistant to change…moving down the path of ‘this is a new way of doing business and it will be better,’ is generally met with a little bit of resistance,” Carey said.
But once Carey is able to demonstrate why moving toward a new business systems is better, cheaper, and reduces development and maintenance costs, then the OA strategies start to earn their keep, he said.
There has also been criticism that the pace of the Navy’s efforts to transition to OA have been slow.
Carey said that while moving to OA on the business side is still complicated, diverse and difficult to do, the Navy is able to get it done a little bit faster because the service controls all the assets. “They are all shore-based.”
On the fleet side it is a different situation, he added.
A good example to look at is what the Navy is doing with the Consolidation of Afloat Networks and Enterprise Services (CANES). The Navy does not pull its ships up to the pier and shut them down for months at a time and then go onboard, rip out the guts and put on new stuff and set sail again and conduct patrols and missions.
“That’s one of our dilemmas the world has difficulty with,” Carey said. “If we were going to change something out across the fleet, how long would that take?”
For example, with aircraft carriers, based upon their operational schedules, they are available to be taken off the line only every few years, Carey pointed out.
Because of the operational schedules and availabilities, Carey said he understands why industry is frustrated and thinking the Navy is dragging its feet.
“But if you think of it, the platform isn’t able to be stopped. It’s sort of like taking nuclear power plants off line to change out the rods. That’s the reason why you have redundant reactors., because the only way to work on one is to shut it down. We don’t have redundant carriers. We only have so many and they are all fully dispatched,” he said.
While the large prime contractors, whether it be for information systems or combat systems, may not worry about work flow, smaller companies might avoid submitting bids for competitions knowing they are going up against a large defense company.
Carey, however, said a number of acquisition programs offer industry days where companies large and small can come in and find out what direction the Navy is headed on a program.
For example, the Navy recently held an industry for NGEN (Next Generation Enterprise Network), the follow-on to NMCI (Navy Marine Corps Internet).
And Carey noted that being “open” allows lots of people to “play in the space, as long as they can scale to what that space is.”
“I take a lot of briefings from vendors, large and small, and I will tell you vendors that deliver briefings to me, open or not, where their solution is delivered in the context of a business problem or warfighting problem that we have, [are] a whole lot better received,” he said.
“Every where I go where I speak with industry audiences, I say this until I am blue in the face: Small companies, large companies, all companies, have to do their homework on representing their technology, their business solution, or whatever it happens to be, whether it is warfighting, warfighting support, logistics…you name it, but the solution has to be presented in the context of a Navy-Marine Corps problem–‘here is how I can solve that problem better and I am going to show you how I can do that,'” Carey explained.
“Many companies come in and tell you they can solve world hunger, if you just write them a check…” he added.
Carey added, he can’t. Even if the company is able to demonstrate that its software works, if it is not presented in the context of a business or warfighting problem the Navy or Marine Corps have right now, it won’t go very far.
“The ones that have done their homework, are far more effective at showing me or showing anybody that their solution actually solves the problem, and if they can go to the last step of the investment and the ROI (return on investment) payoff…,” Carey said. “Or, if it isn’t a financial ROI, it is a capability based ROI captured in a metric that operators would understand…once you frame your solution in the context of a Navy or Marine Corps problem, you have a whole lot better ground that A) you understand our business, and B) you can deliver on your promise.”
Carey gets about one to two presentations a week from companies he is unfamiliar with, in addition to the work he does with more familiar firms.
“I would say that one in 20, one in 25, comes in with the solution stated in the context of a business problem we have, and I can immediately say, ‘You need to go talk to SPAWAR, MARCORSYSCOM, and here is the guy, because I think you are on to something,” he said.
Successful marketers understand their client very well, Carey added. “You have to solve a problem that we have.”
When that occurs, the conversation quickly moves to a brainstorming phase, because the company already gets the first part–solving a problem.
“Unfortunately, with a lot of vendors, we don’t get to have that first conversation because we spend a lot of time just getting them educated,” Carey said. “I can’t tell you how many vendors, even as late as two years ago, when you said NMCI they said ‘What’s NMCI?'”
While Carey still gets pitches from companies that haven’t done their homework, he is finding more often they are coming in better prepared.
“We have had more companies coming in with a fundamental understanding of what we do or at least an attempt to understand where their solutions fit in our world of challenges,” he said.