JA_Flight_Motion_Simulator__redacted_09082016.pdf

Justification and Approval (J&A) for Other Than Full and Open Competition

NOTE: If a Justification and Approval was approved for the preceding acquisition, a copy of the approved J&A for the predecessor action must be included in the staff package for approval of the instant J&A. This applies to J&A staff packages that are submitted for review and approval at a level above the contracting officer. The predecessor J&A will be used as a reference document by the approving official.

Contracting Activity: AFTC/PZIE

Purchase Request / Local ID Number: TBD / FA2487-15-M-0286

Program / Project (and PE, if applicable): Flight Motion Simulator (FMS)

Program Type (PEO or Other Contracting): Other Contracting (AFFARS Part 5302.101)

Authority (include full title): FAR 6.302-1 -- Only One Responsible Source and No Other Supplies or Services Will Satisfy Agency Requirements

J&A Type: Class Individual

COORDINATION (AFFARS 5306.304(a) )

Date

02 Jul 2015

Contracting Officer

Jonathan J. Esquivel

AFTC/PZIE / DSN 872-0159

Signature

Date

I. Contracting Activity.

AFTC/ PZIE, Air Force Test Center, Air Force Material Command (AFMC), 205 West D Avenue, Bldg. 350, Ste 414, Eglin AFB, FL, 32542-6864 is the contracting activity responsible for this proposed justification for other than full and open competition action.

Purchase Request Number is TBD.

II. Nature and/or description of the action being processed.

This requirement will be accomplished by a new firm-fixed price contract with Acutronic USA (herein referred to as "Acutronic".) Contract award is anticipated in the fourth quarter of FY15 and will be funded with Research Development Test & Evaluation (RDT&E) (3600) funding. Acutronic is the only responsible source for this commercial item and no other supplies or services will satisfy the requirement.

III. Description of supplies/services required to meet agency needs.

The Air Force Material Command (AFMC), Air Force Test Center (AFTC), 96th Test Wing (96th TW), Guided Weapons Evaluation Facility (GWEF) requires acquisition of an Acutronic HD550DC Flight Motion Simulator (FMS) to support a capacity expansion for infrared countermeasure (IRCM) testing. The FMS is one component of a larger effort to develop a fourth IRCM test area to address increasing workload. The FMS provides the angular motion dynamics of the missile in-flight and carries custom target/scene projection systems used to stimulate the missile seekers.

The GWEF has conducted IRCM testing since its inception and continually develops, modifies, and expands IRCM test capability as necessary to meet DoD test requirements using both internal and customer funds. The existing three IRCM test areas were developed using legacy FMSs manufactured by Carco Electronics (now defunct) and competitively procured for other test programs and re-purposed for IRCM testing. One FMS was procured ~1979, one in 1990, and one in 1999. The current three IRCM test areas were brought online around 2000, 2005, and 2010, respectively. The GWEF inherited additional IRCM workload with the 2011 closure of the Air Force's AFEWES facility resulting in a rapid increase in customer test requirements.

Under the contemplated contract, Acutronic will provide the following items and services:

1) One 5-axis HD550DC flight motion simulator tailored to specific performance, interface, and site installation requirements. System includes the FMS and subsystems/components required to make it operational (e.g. servo control system, prime power system) (

2) Installation, acceptance testing, and an acceptance test plan/report (included in base cost);

3) Operational training for facility personnel (included in base cost);

4) System documentation (included in base cost);

5) Critical component spares ( and

6) Options for a hybrid electro-optical slip ring with integrated rotary gas joint, integrated data acquisition system, and isolated roll table-top (

Total estimated value of contemplated contract is which is being funded through a FY15 Congressional omnibus spending bill. Delivery period for this contract is 14-16 months after receipt of order.

IV. Statutory authority permitting Other than Full and Open Competition.

10 USC 2304(c)(1), as implemented by FAR 6.302-1. Only One Responsible Source and No Other Supplies or Services Will Satisfy Agency Requirements.

V. Demonstration that the contractor's unique qualifications or nature of the acquisition requires the use of the authority cited above (applicability of authority).

The GWEF mission is hardware-in-the-loop (HITL) test and evaluation (T&E) of tactical guided munitions and IRCM systems. The HITL capability uses highly specialized equipment including high-performance FMS's. The GWEF currently has three test areas dedicated to IRCM customer test support and one test area dedicated to support and development of IRCM test technology. This FMS is being procured for a fourth IRCM customer test support area that is being developed as a capacity expansion due to rapid and sustained growth of IRCM test requirements. It is imperative that all IRCM test areas have a high level of hardware and software commonality to ensure consistent results between test areas, to achieve an acceptable level of integration risk, and to minimize operations and maintenance costs.

COMMONALITY. The GWEF has nine operational flight motion simulators, with five upgraded to the latest generation Acutronic Acutrol 3000e SCS and a sixth scheduled to be upgraded to an Acutrol SCS this year. Another single-axis Acutrol SCS is in use for a high speed roll fixture. The remaining three flight motion simulators use obsolete analog controllers that are targeted for replacement. For long term cost and maintenance reasons explained below, the GWEF has standardized on a common SCS throughout the facility based on the Acutrol SCS. Maintaining this commonality can only be achieved by procuring an Acutronic FMS.

COMPATIBILITY. Three of the IRCM test and development areas currently use Acutronic Acutrol 3000e servo controllers and the remaining area is scheduled to be upgraded with an Acutrol SCS this year.

These controllers are tightly integrated into the HITL simulation software, which contains thousands of lines of highly complex real time code designed to create a hybrid simulation of threat systems. The government developed simulation software takes advantage of the advanced capabilities of the Acutrol SCS and relies on a deep understanding of its internal operation and behavior. The interaction between the simulation software, integrating the equations of motion, and the flight motion simulator which physically recreates the motion in the HITL simulation is critical and requires precise timing and predictability. The existing simulations of over 17 threat systems have been successfully integrated with an Acutrol SCS. Re-accomplishing the integration with a new controller that does not produce identical behavior to an Acutrol SCS would require extensive re-work, pose significant schedule and performance risk, and drive integration costs (discussed below). Only an FMS equipped with an Acutrol SCS will provide the compatibility with the existing systems that allows for commonality of shared software and hardware components and avoids significant software development, maintenance, and operational costs that would be incurred with any other vendor solution.

INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY (IP). As all Acutronic USA systems were developed and funded internally, Acutronic USA owns all intellectual property associated with both the Acutrol 3000e SCS and the flight motion simulators used in the operational and developmental IRCM test areas. Acutronic will not provide the IP required for any competing vendor to provide a compatible SCS interface and system, nor will they provide an Acutrol 3000e SCS to a competing vendor for use in integrating competing equipment.

INTEGRATION COST. Using a vendor other than Acutronic USA will require significant government integration costs not incurred with an Acutronic system. This is estimated at a minimum of

The first Acutrol SCS required over a year and (conservatively) to fully integrate into the HITL. Integration included development of the realtime simulation software for over 17 threat simulations, building an understanding of the operational capabilities and limitations of the high-performance system, developing a working knowledge of the SCS internals and control loops, and verifying/validating the performance in the operational HITL environment.

Assuming other vendors provide a similarly advanced and capable system, the government estimates that software development, integration, and verification/validation of a new type system will require a minimum of with a labor cost of at least . This is broken down as:

• Training on new SCS for engineers, analysts, and technicians; ~ ;

• Development of interface software, integration into simulation software for the suite of threat systems, performance evaluation, developing understanding of control loops & internals (small team) ; and

• Verification and validation for the suite of threat simulations and test articles; requires a full test team and fully integrated and active test area, .

The integration of the FMS with the hybrid simulation is a far more complex task than simply adjusting the interface to account for differences in scaling factors, word order, and changes in control and status format.

There is an extremely tight coupling between the numerical integration of the differential equations of the simulated system components and the actual system components being stimulated in the physical or semi-physical portion of the simulation that must be achieved to ensure validity of the test results. Numerical simulation calculations occur at rates up to 2000 frames per second, so slight differences in the physical implementation of angular motion by the flight motion simulator can create significant variations in overall system simulation behavior. Resolution of these variations is a difficult and time consuming integration activity that can be avoided by utilizing a compatible controller.

It is not practical to expect any vendor to do this integration as part of the procurement as they would have to become experts on the existing HITL simulation software and test environment, be able to operate in a classified environment, and have long-term use of a GWEF test area or an identical facility.

RECURRING COST. Based on past experience, a recurring expense of approximately per year will be incurred to support a new type of SCS. This cost is broken down as:

• Dedicated technical support ( );

• Maintenance of a separate simulation software code base ( ); and

• Recurring verification/validation ( ).

The GWEF currently has one technician trained on the Acutronic Acutrol 3000e SCS who spends about one-third of his time maintaining and compensating (tuning) the Acutrol systems. A non-Acutrol SCS would require additional training (both initial and recurring to maintain proficiency) and efficiency would be significantly less since only one of these incompatible system would be maintained.

The tight integration of the SCS with the simulation software will necessitate a separate simulation software code base be maintained for any new SCS. Given the regular updates to the simulation environment, we estimate this to take approximately one-third man-year per year for a software engineer.

As these software updates are made, periodic verification and validation of the new software will have to be performed in an active test area with a full test team.

OPPORTUNITY COST. Selection of any other vendor will result in a loss of between in reimbursable test income for the GWEF, caused by the delay in completion of the test area by the 9-12 months required for integration of the new SCS. This estimate is based on the typical IRCM test area income of per month. This lost opportunity cost directly affects major acquisition programs.

The additional test area is being established to address significant capacity issues that are directly impacting ACAT I programs. Any delay in implementation of the additional test capacity will be translated into delays in test schedules of the affected programs.

SCHEDULE RISK. Selection of Acutronic is the only option to avoid unacceptable schedule risk in bringing the new test area online to support high-priority ACAT 1 IRCM development and fielding programs. The GWEF supports numerous high-priority IRCM test programs with a growing demand that currently exceeds capacity. Within the last two years, the competition for GWEF test resources has resulted in two instances of ACAT 1 programs being “bumped” from test areas by higher priority programs, with several lesser priority test programs denied entry altogether. Selection of any other vendor would delay completion of the test area by 9-12 months directly impacting the schedules of supported IRCM programs.

SUMMARY. Accordingly, Acutronic USA is the only firm capable of providing the supplies and services described in Section III above without the US Air Force experiencing substantial duplication of cost that could not be expected to be recovered through competition and unacceptable delays in fulfilling its requirements. There is no reason to believe that the 5-year integration and maintenance cost of over , the lost test income of over , or the long-term operations and maintenance cost could be recovered through competition or that competition would generate sufficient savings to justify delays in test support to ACAT 1D programs or the operational impacts to the facility of having a non-compatible system.

VI. Description of efforts made to ensure that offers are solicited from as many potential sources as practicable.

The GWEF has subject matter experts (SMEs) in test technology and we work closely with similar facilities throughout the Department of Defense on developing the technology required for HITL simulation. The SMEs keep abreast of technology and vendors in this field using trade journals, web research, inquiries, technical symposiums, and working groups.

Three potential sources were evaluated: iXBlue, Ideal Aerosmith, and Acutronic USA. Ideal Aerosmith and Acutronic USA are the two US companies that historically bid to provide and/or service FMS systems in the GWEF and similar facilities. iXBlue was discovered by PZIE.

In all three cases, it was demonstrated that the supplied servo control systems do not meet GWEF performance requirements.

That system met or exceeded all requirements.

A sources sought was posted by the Government to the Federal Business Opportunities website from 2 -17 June 2015 under Notice FA2487-15-X-0286. Two responses were received to the notice, one from Ideal Aerosmith and the other from Acutronic USA. The GWEF evaluated both responses and determined the following:

The Government will continue to monitor the industry through perusal of trade journals, technical symposiums and contact with industry representatives. Any future requirements will be researched and if a product meeting the requirements is identified then a competitive acquisition for the requirement will be considered.

VII. Determination by the Contracting Officer that the anticipated cost to the Government will be fair and reasonable.

The Contracting Officer will ensure the final price will be fair and reasonable. Cost analysis will be performed in accordance with the FAR. The Government will use a traditional pricing approach to determine fairness and reasonableness using the following means: (1) cost analysis IAW FAR 15.404-1(c);

thorough technical evaluation; and 3) utilization of weighted guidelines to determine profit. At the conclusion of negotiations, the contractor will be required to provide certified cost and pricing data in accordance with FAR 15.406-2-(a).

VIII. Description of the market research conducted and the results, or a statement of the reasons market research was not conducted.

As described in Section VI above, market research, in accordance with FAR Part 10, was conducted by synopsis of the proposed acquisition, advising industry of the pending acquisition and soliciting inquiries from interested parties.

IX. Any other facts supporting the use of Other Than Full and Open Competition.

For the current application, commonality with the existing hardware and software infrastructure is critical to minimize cost, hardware and software development, and simulation revalidation associated with integrating a new solution.

Due to their acquisition of the original FMS manufacturer, Acutronic owns the intellectual property (IP) associated with flight motion simulators installed in the operational and developmental areas. This IP is critical for designing compatibility between systems.

X. List of sources, if any, that expressed interest in the acquisition.

See Section VI above.

XI. A statement of the actions, if any, the agency may take to remove or overcome any barriers to competition before making subsequent acquisitions for the supplies or services required.

This office will continue to monitor the industry through perusal of trade journals, technical symposiums and contact with industry representatives. Any future requirements will be researched and if a product meeting the requirements is identified then a competitive acquisition for the requirement will be considered.

XII. Certification by the Contracting Officer.

As evidenced by my signature above, I have determined this document to be both accurate and complete to the best of my knowledge and belief.

XIII. Certification by the technical/requirements personnel.

As evidenced by my signature above, I certify that any supporting data contained herein, which is my responsibility, is both accurate and complete.