By Ann Roosevelt
A Materiel Development Decision is scheduled for Dec. 22 to discuss the planned way forward with the Army’s Ground Combat Vehicle (GVC) in advance of the potential release of a Request for Proposals (RFP) early next year, a service official said.
“That’s where we’ll get the guidance on what they’d like us to do for the analysis of alternatives, making sure that the GCV is the right way to go, or if there’s another solution out there that’s already developed,” Col. Bryan McVeigh, project manager Manned Systems Integration, told Defense Daily in an interview. “It will determine if our technical development strategy makes sense, at least the summary of it, and that’s what will authorize us to release the RFP.”
McVeigh’s office is within Army PEO Integration office, which leads the development program. The PEO was created in the wake of the termination of the Future Combat System (FCS) manned ground vehicle (MGV) program.
The Army wants industry White Papers for the unclassified portions of the second Industry Day by Dec. 16 and the classified documents by Jan. 6.
The second of two Industry Days was held Nov. 23-24 at the Tank Automotive Research and Engineering Center in Warren, Mich.
The event drew more than 300 people from 247 companies that wanted to know GCV specifics for the vehicle the Army wants as part of its modernization strategy, Paul Mehney, director of Public Communications PEO Integration, said.
The Army took some 14-15 questions submitted in writing and will provide answers to everyone, even those who did not attend, Mehney said. The majority of the questions focused on mobility requirements, vehicle survivability, crew survivability requirements, and body-of-knowledge related questions–industry asking the government what we perceive as potential carryovers from the MGV program.
Industry Days are part of the Army’s engagement to bring industry early into the RFP process.
At the first Industry Day in October, attendees received the draft GCV performance specification and draft requirements document to then provide feedback.
“We received over 115 white papers from over 45 different companies across the military-industrial base giving us insights on what’s available and changes they would recommend to make the performance specification cleaner, clearer to effect better what we believed they wanted them to do,” McVeigh said.
The Army provided an updated requirements document at the second Industry Day, after the Army Training and Doctrine Command made significant advances. An updated performance specification was also released, reflecting the updated requirements. For example, he said, the first requirements document offered high-level requirements for the base vehicle, but didn’t offer much detail on what was specifically required for the Infantry Fighting Vehicle.
The second Industry Day also brought out the classified requirements, which industry had not yet seen. That covers things such as the type of protection levels the Army wants for the vehicle.
“By giving them the classified requirements, they have a better understanding of the holistic nature of nature of all the requirements,” McVeigh said.
From the two Industry Days, the Army has received the kind of information it was looking for through its engagement strategy.
“To date, yes,” McVeigh said. “Based on what I saw from the initial White Papers that came back, they were tracking modifications we thought we needed, and they also were giving us insights from a different perspective” on whether something was written clearly.
“We’re going to release a Request for Proposal in the beginning of February in order that we can award a contract–given that Department of Defense says this is where we want you to go–by the end of August or September next year,” McVeigh said.
Additionally, industry was given access to the body of knowledge gained in work on the FCS MGV. At the second Industry Day, the Army had several displays of things accomplished under FCS and the MGV program.
“Now it doesn’t necessarily mean this is the right solution,” McVeigh said. “Industry has to come back and tell us.”
However, the service would like to leverage work done on the MGV. The service will find out what industry thinks when proposals come in.
“We’re not directing them that they have to use what we give to them, but we’re making sure they’re aware of what we did on MGV so we’re not paying for the development of a product twice,” he said.
The latest updates and releases about the program are available on Fedbizops, including the updated documents from Industry Day 2.
“Later this week, we’ll be releasing the scope of work on Fedbizops. Again, the idea is that as we get the requirements and documents,” McVeigh said. “We want to get it out to industry so they know where we’re going rather than wait until the whole package is put together and released.”
In the fourth quarter of fiscal year ’10, the service will ask for permission, based on results of the analysis of alternatives, whether to award up to three contracts. That’s when the program actually enters the technical development phase.
“We’re looking at the first prototype vehicles by first quarter FY ’15. We believe the first production-representative vehicle will be in fourth quarter FY ’17.”
“I believe we have an executable schedule that is very aggressive,” McVeigh said.
The focus on this program is to making sure we’re providing a very survivable vehicle based on what we are seeing as emerging threats in theater, but not only the vehicle that’s survivable, but that it’s mobile, he said.