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The Pentagon is seeing a greater number of industry partners open back up for business since the start of the pandemic, with the department urging prime contractors to continue efforts to push payments down to smaller, more vulnerable companies in their supply chain. Ellen Lord, DoD’s top acquisition official, told reporters Thursday the department is utilizing its $3 billion progress payment plan to assist prime contractors in accelerating payments to distressed companies, with $1.2 billion already processed and the remaining…
