14-009-Amendment-0001.pdf

ONR BAA 14-009 Amendment 01

The purpose of this amendment is to provide the DD 254 related to the BAA, the industry day briefing slides, the list of questions and answers from the Industry Day as well as questions submitted since the release of the BAA, and to delete sections of the original BAA.

Specifically, the paragraph beginning “It is extremely important….” immediately before “Thrust Area 1” paragraph in section I.F, page 7 is deleted in its entirety.

The paragraph beginning “To facilitate the alignment….” immediately after the paragraph titled “Thrust Area Dependencies in section I.F, page 11 is deleted in its entirety.

Questions received to date and their responses are as follows (similar questions are not repeated):

Question 1: I attended the Industry Day on 24 Jun and it was mentioned that the presentations would be made available via the FedBizOpps or ONR site the following week. Are these presentations available for download as of this time?

Response: The briefing slides are a part of Amendment 01.

Question 2: May we submit SCI level proposals and white papers? If yes, how do we coordinate delivery of these documents?

Response: The classification level allowed is only Secret.

Please refer to NISPOM Section 5-401 and 5-403 for mailing classified information requirements. If you will be using a courier to deliver the classified white papers, please let the security point of contact know ahead of time to ensure someone from ONR Document Control section will be available to receive the package.

Question 3: Period of Performance: The PoP is listed as “Up to five years.” Is there a notional schedule for the program (i.e., Thrust 1, years 1-3, Thrust 2, years 2-4, etc.)?

Response: At this time there is no plan to limit Thrusts to particular subsets of the five year period of performance.

Question 4: Cost Proposal: BAA indicates that awards will be made to offerors who are selected for “Year 1” funding. Does that mean that contractors should prepare a cost proposal to include each year as a separate option, or should options only be used for completely separate and optional features?

Response: Proposers should prepare cost proposals that include a base year with options, if appropriate. Options may also be used for completely separate optional features.

Question 5: Classification: The BAA says “If a classified proposal is submitted, the resultant contract will be unclassified.” Does that mean the literal contract (SOW, SRD, etc.) or the actual work will be unclassified?

Response: It means that the literal contract will be unclassified. Work and deliverables can be conducted at the classified level.

Question 6: Thrust 1 vs. Thrust 2 Discrepancy: Thrust 1 is strongly focused on SemWeb (RDF/OWL) technologies but Thrust 2, which deals with the cloud architecture (NCTRI) in which the data will presumably reside, does not contain any technologies that natively process or store RDF data. Additionally, none of the S&T Challenges for Thrust 2 address processing or storing RDF data. Therefore, if a contractor has ideas relating to the ingestion, processing, storage, and dissemination of SemWeb (RDF/OWL) data, does ONR recommend contractors to propose to Thrust 1 or Thrust 2?

Response: Ideas relating to the ingestion of SemWeb (RDF/OWL) data are best addressed in Thrust 2. Ideas relating to the processing of SemWeb (RDF/OWL) are assumed to be a form of analytic, and therefore best addressed in Thrust 3.

Ideas related to storage are not of interest. (Ideas related to Naval data representation are of interest and best addressed in Thrust 1). Finally, ideas related to dissemination of data are of interest if they focus on how data representation and semantic representation can facilitate dissemination, not on underlying dissemination mechanisms (which ONR is addressing separately). In this case, ideas for using data representations and semantic representations that facilitate dissemination should be addressed in Thrust 1.

Question 7: Integration and Experimentation: How many resources or personnel should be allocated to account for LTE (Testing and Transition) activities? The BAA provides little guidance in this area and therefore scope could be enormous.

Response: Limited Technology Experiments (LTE) are typically 4-9 months in duration (depending on scope) and have a battle rhythm that is orchestrated by an independent team, separate from offerors. Selected performers are expected to support weekly phonecons (~60-90 minutes) and depending upon S&T capabilities being developed performers may need to interact with other performers of co-dependent capabilities to resolve interface definition and/or issues that arise. The independent team will include an Experimentation Lead and Chief Engineer to orchestrate the effort, resolve conflict, etc. LTEs typically include integration periods at a government facility that are typically 1-2 months in duration although there are typically many technology articles being integrated so performers are only required on-site for a subset of this time. LTE execution is typically 1-2 weeks in duration depending upon scope and would require support by performers with technology articles featured in the LTE. Thus, resource scoping should include the following:

a. Weekly phonecon support (and prep if necessary)

b. Interface activity between co-dependent performers

c. Integration support

d. LTE execution support

Question 8: “NTCRI” and “Naval Data Ecosystem Framework” Link and Information Request: Please provide the missing link for the Naval Tactical Cloud Reference Implementation. The BAA provides URLS starting with http://, but the links are incompletely specified.

Response: Amendment 01 to the BAA deletes the references to these URLs.

Question 9: In the BAA the URLs to the Naval Tactical Cloud Reference Implementation and the Naval Data Ecosystem Framework are missing. Are these URLs available?

Response: These references and the associated links have been deleted from the BAA.

Question 10: NTCRI: Does the Naval Tactical Cloud Reference Implementation (NCTRI) exist? Can a contractor get access to its code and/or architecture document?

Response: Yes, the Naval Tactical Cloud Reference Implementation (NCTRI) does exist. Contractors that receive awards under this BAA will get access to code and documentation. Access will not be provided prior to award.

Question 11: Security: What security capabilities currently exist in the NTCRI?

Response: The primary security mechanisms in the NTCRI are the fine grain, cell-level access control mechanisms provided by Accumulo.

Question 12: Please clarify any distinctions between Thrust 1, 2, 3, and 4 with regards to response preparation, funding or schedule: The BAA states: “Any Offeror whose White Paper was not identified as being of “particular value” under Thrusts 1, 2, or 3, to ONR is ineligible to make an oral presentation or to submit a Full Proposal under this BAA.” What about Thrust 4?

Response: The same constraint applies to Thrust 4.

Question 13: Assuming a vendor’s response is selected and moves through the entire process, please advise what form of contract is expected to be awarded.

Response: A cost-type completion contract is expected to be awarded.

Question 14: Paragraph 1 on page 17 states that multiple White Papers may be submitted. If multiple White Papers are submitted, does each need to be sent in a separate email submission or can they be submitted under the cover of one email?

Response: Each White Paper should be submitted individually.

Question 15: We are interested in teaming with other companies having Naval domain expertise. Is it possible to get the list of attendees/companies who attended the ONR industry day?

Response: A list of attendees will not be provided.

Question 16: On FedBizOpps, BAA 14-009 is listed as presolicitation. Will there be a formal release of the solicitation? If there is an update, will additional time be given for the white paper, or is July 18th still the date?

Response: The date that BAA 14-009 was submitted to FEdBizOpps was the release date. No additional time will be given for the white paper due to this amendment.

ONRBAA 14-009

Advanced Analytics and Data Science for Naval Warfare Planning and Execution

Table of Content

The following information presents the basic organization of this document as well as the location of significant information:

I. General Information A. Agency Name B. Research Opportunity Title C. Program Name D. Research Opportunity Number E. Response Date F. Research Opportunity Description G. Point(s) of Contact H. Instrument Type(s) I. Catalog of Federal Domestic Assistance (CFDA) Numbers J. Catalog of Federal Domestic Assistance (CFDA) Titles

K. Other Information II. Award Information

A. Amount and Period of Performance B. Peer Reviews C. Production and Testing of Prototypes

III. Eligibility Information IV. Application and Submission Information

A. Application and Submission Process B. Content and Format of White Papers/Full Proposals

a. White Papers

b. Full Proposals

i. Instructions for Contracts

ii. Instructions for Grants

C. Significant Dates and Times D. Submission of Late Proposals E. Submission of Grant Proposals through Grants.gov F. Submission of White Papers and Full Proposals for Contracts, Cooperative Agreements and

Other Transaction Agreements V. Evaluation Information

A. Evaluation Criteria B. Commitment to Small Business - (Contract Awards Only) C. Options D. Evaluation Panel

VI. Award Administration Information VII. Other Information

A. Applies to Grant, Cooperative Agreement and Other Transaction Agreement applications only B. Applies to Contracts only C. Applies to Contracts, Grants and other Assistance Agreements

INTRODUCTION:

This publication constitutes a Broad Agency Announcement (BAA) as contemplated in Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) 6.102(d)(2) and 35.016 and the Department of Defense Grants and Agreements Regulations (DoDGARS) 22.315(a). A formal Request for Proposals (RFP), other solicitation, or additional information regarding this announcement will not be issued.

The Office of Naval Research (ONR) will not issue paper copies of this announcement. The ONR reserves the right to fund all, some or none of the proposals received under this BAA. ONR provides no funding for direct reimbursement of proposal development costs. Technical and cost proposals (or any other material) submitted in response to this BAA will not be returned. It is the policy of ONR to treat all proposals as sensitive competitive information and to disclose their contents only for the purposes of evaluation.

I GENERAL INFORMATION:

A. Agency Name - Office of Naval Research

B. Research Opportunity Title - Advanced Analytics and Data Science for Naval Warfare Planning and Execution

C. Program Name - Data Focused Naval Tactical Cloud

D. Research Opportunity Number - 14-009

E. Response Date -

White Papers: 7/18/2014 Full Proposals: 10/3/2014

F. Research Opportunity Description -

Objective.

The Office of Naval Research is interested in receiving white papers and full proposals for Advanced Technology Development that will forge major advancements towards a well developed and robust Naval Big Data Ecosystem that enables more sophisticated and powerful analytics for supporting Naval Warfighting applications. To accomplish this objective, ONR seeks to make advancements in four key Thrust Areas: (1) Development of a robust Naval Data Science foundation that addresses data representations and ontologies required to support a wide range of Naval Warfare Mission Areas; (2) Identifying, acquiring, ingesting, and indexing Data Sources pertinent to Naval Warfighting Missions; (3) Development of advanced analytics for Naval Warfare Mission Areas; and (4) Development of data protection and security mechanisms to ensure the integrity of data used throughout the analytic process. The overall objective of this effort is to achieve unprecedented access to data; to extract new and deeper insights by exploiting data in new and innovative ways; and to apply those new insights to improving Naval Warfare activities.

Integration of National and Tactical Information.

A major goal of this effort is to significantly improve the Naval community's real-time ability to bring together information from National systems and sensors with information from Naval combat and weapon systems and sensors. In the past, the ability to merge these types of information to support tactical warfighting has been extremely limited. Emerging technologies (such as Cloud, Computing, Big Data, and more effective Cross Domain technologies) are enabling us to overcome many of the technological and infrastructure limitations that limit the ability to integrate and exploit National and tactical data sources. This BAA seeks to leverage the power of these emerging technologies to develop innovative and ground-breaking analytic capabilities that enhance threat assessment and prediction, combat ID, integrated fires, and Naval mission planning and execution. Enhancements to these capabilities will be focused on two Naval Warfare Areas: Anti-Submarine Warfare (ASW) and Integrated Air/Missile Defense (IAMD).

Anti-Submarine Warfare (ASW).

Anti-Submarine Warfare is a critically important warfare area for the Navy. Over the past decade, U.S.

adversaries have been making significant investments in their submarine capabilities, making detection, identification, and en-gagement of submarine threats a much more challenging proposition. Furthermore, the large increase in commercial shipping traffic has made submarine detection and identification a much more difficult activity. Conventional methods of relying on organic tactical sensors as the primary means for conducting ASW are no longer sufficient. ONR is interested in developing advanced ASW analytic capabilities that make use of a much broader range of data sources and that cross traditional system boundaries. Some examples of the types of data sources and ASW analytical capabilities that are of interest include (but are not limited to):

• Enemy Course of Action data - example analytic might use historical Pattern of Life data such as depth operating profile, speed profile, noisy evolution schedule, navigational strategies, and historical tracks to portray three-dimensional probability distributions of likely threat position for each of the enemy course of action (ECOA) being modeled. Contact report data of various precision and confidence will be tested against the modeled ECOAs and the likelihood of each ECOA will be adjusted. The analytic will be expected to work in a multi-threat context and take advantage of class specific identifiers.

• Organic/non-organic combatant sensor data - example analytic might data mine for contact data and below threshold contact follower snippets to cluster information over time that may not be recognized when analyzed in isolation from one another. The analytic will test for consistency, allowing for unique capabilities of disparate sensor types. The analytical will account for bearing and range uncertainties in its kinematic testing of whether or not a single threat submarine could account for the cluster of data. Analytics may explore how filter thresholds (e.g., auto-alert thresholds) might be adjusted to better inspect only that data that would be consistent with the clustered snippets, thus allowing improved recognition while controlling false alarm rate.

• Organic/non-organic environmental data - example analytic might use in-situ acoustic data (e.g., noise measured through the sensor) or oceanographic data (e.g., sound speed profile from any number of sources including XBT data) to monitor differences between expected conditions and encountered conditions. The search plans and sensor line-ups are predicated on acoustic and environmental parameters. The analytic monitors the difference between planned and encountered conditions and evaluates if it is significant. When a difference is determined to be significant, an alert is generated that a new search plan or line-up plan may be needed. If search plan or line-up plan algorithms are resident in the NTC, a recalculation is spawned and operators are notified of results.

• Blue operational behaviors, characteristics and performance - example analytic might use in-situ platform position, heading, speed, and depth data to monitor platform compliance with the intended search plan. This analytic accommodates different levels of search plan specificity. The analytic monitors the difference between planned and executed search effort and evaluates if it is significant. When a difference is determined to be significant, an alert is generated that a new search plan may be needed. If search plan algorithms are resident in the NTC, a recalculation is spawned and operators are notified of results. Another analytic might monitor ship heading or towed array heading data and calculate the impact of course changes of search effectiveness; an alert may be generated when towed array stability is evaluated as overly compromised.

• National Technical Means (NTM) - example analytic might gather all available NTM data and process it so that it could be brought into a geographic plot of threat probability density. The analytic will be interested in gathering both positive search information and negative search information, which will require information of the NTM sensor footprint and conditions necessary for detection. An analytic may test this NTM data with other sensor data sources.

Proposers are encouraged to show how your proposed efforts would support the achievement of these objectives. Because many of the data sources and analytic methods associated with ASW are classified, ONR encourages Pro-posers to submit classified proposals where necessary to fully convey the proposed effort.

Integrated Air/Missile Defense (IAMD).

Integrated Air/Missile Defense is another Naval Warfare Area that is of critical importance to the Navy. The rapid expansion of anti-ship and ballistic missiles (both in numbers and capabilities) is a major challenge to Navy IAMD capabilities. AEGIS is the Nation's primary ballistic missile defense system, engaging air and ballistic missile threats with a family of Standard Missiles. In the past, AEGIS could be counted on to engage all incoming air and missile threats, but today's expanded missile threats and predicted raid sizes can easily overwhelm the weapon resources of a single ship. Going forward, the Navy must be prepared to use its sensor and weapon resources much more judiciously. It is critical to better characterize missile and air threats in a way that allows for intelligent use of Standard Missile resources (to engage only the most critical threats), as well as to identify air/missile threats that could be mitigated using other methods (e.g., deception, cyber methods, directed energy). ONR is interested in developing advanced IAMD analytic capabilities that make use of a much broader range of data sources and that cross traditional information swim lanes. Some examples of the types of data sources and IAMD analytical capabilities that are of interest include (but are not limited to):

• Improved Identity Classification, Intent and Future Movement Prediction, and Track Association -example analytic might use Identification Friend-or-Foe (IFF)/Automatic Identification System (AIS) data;

flight plans, schedules, air routes; intelligence information; collected second and third tier information sources in addition to primary sources; shipping lanes and fishing areas; organic sensor information to recommend the identification of a track, to predict its intent and future movement, and/or recommend its association with another track.

• Optimizing sensor configuration - example analytic might use historical and current environmental data;

indications, alerts, and warnings; real-time and historical sensor measurements; real-time operational status of a sensor; sensor models to produce optimal sensor settings recommendations.

• Identifying unexpected Red Air and Missile capabilities, behaviors, and operational patterns - example analytic might use intelligence information; missile models; historical measurements; Intelligence threat library (e.g. Anti-Ship Cruise Missile/Ballistic Missile Radar, Electronic Warfare, and Infrared signatures) data sets; live sensor data; Electronic Warfare/Non-cooperative target recognition data to identify new ca-pabilities, behaviors, and operational patterns and possibly recommend new systems settings to address them.

• Improved planning of asset movement and tactical utilization - example analytic might use models and simulations; readiness information; plans; doctrine; predicted Red/White/Blue future movement;

Intelligence data; historical and current weather conditions to recommend how to move assets so that tactical assets can be optimally utilized.

• Weapons usage optimization - example analytic might utilize threat disposition; current inventory levels across the battle group; knowledge of planned and active engagements and results; weapons models to recommend optimal utilization of weapons across the battlegroup/force and strategies for coordinated fires.

• Improved spectrum operations - an example analytic might use plans; historical usage patterns;

offender/victim performance parameters; Order-of-Battle/Electronic Order-of-Battle; Intelligence information; organic measurements; earth and space weather measurements and predictions to recommend an optimum spectrum allocation for the battlegroup/force, to identify interference, to support planning for future operations and changing environmental conditions.

• Improved situational awareness - an example analytic might use indications and warnings; current, predicted, and historical movements of Red/White/Blue assets; Intelligence sources to identify information that should trigger a warfighter notification (e.g. an alert).

• Cyber awareness - an example analytic might use data from organic and non-organic cyber sensors to assess the state of visible cyberspace and to identify patterns indicative of anomalous activity.

Proposers are encouraged to show how your proposed efforts would help support the achievement of these objectives. Because many of the data sources and analytic methods associated with IAMD are classified, ONR encourages Proposers to submit classified proposals where necessary to fully convey the proposed effort.

Cross Warfare Areas.

In addition to the ASW and IAMD Naval Warfare areas, ONR is interested in capabilities of a cross cutting nature. Since most Naval platforms are designed to support multiple Warfare areas, it is often the case that optimizing the battlegroup/force for one Warfare area comes at the expense of other Warfare areas. ONR is also interested in ana-lytics and applications that address battlegroup/force level operations that span multiple Warfare areas. Cross Warfare area proposals, need not be limited to ASW and IAMD. Other Warfare areas that will be accepted include Anti-Surface Warfare (ASuW), EW, Mine Warfare (MW), and

Strike Warfare. However, greater weight will be given to Cross Warfare area proposals that include either ASW or IAMD.

The Naval Tactical Cloud Reference Implementation.

Over the past several years, ONR has developed a Big Data Ecosystem software platform called the Naval Tactical Cloud Reference Implementation (NTCRI) that provides an environment for storing relevant Naval Data sources and for hosting and executing advanced Naval analytics and applications. The intent of this BAA is to leverage the NTC RI as the underlying environment for all work performed under this BAA. This will allow the full resources of this BAA to be focused on Naval Data Science, analytics, and applications, and not on the development and underlying Big Data and Cloud infrastructure. It is important for proposers to understand that this BAA seeks to develop Naval Data Science and analytics, not to develop infrastructure, systems, tools, or middle-ware. Proposers shall ensure that any proposed work under this BAA not come packaged within unique or proprietary platforms or systems.

Thrust Area #1. Naval Data Science Foundation.

The ability of Big Data to bring together and operate on large numbers of diverse data sets has made it more important than ever to develop common frameworks for characterizing data and achieving understanding of the data across diverse communities. In the past, data representations and ontologies have been developed for individual systems and communities. As we move to an integrated Big Data environment, it becomes important to develop data representations and ontologies that cut across these communities. As part of this BAA, ONR seeks to establish a strong Naval Data Science foundation that develops the data representations and ontologies that will support analytic development across the full range of Naval Warfare activities. ONR is interested in developing data representations and ontologies that address the highly integrated and interdependent nature of modern Naval Warfare. Experience developing real data representations and ontologies is critical for this Thrust Area, as this Thrust Area is focused on data representation and ontology development, not on developing data representation and ontology infrastructure and tools.

To maximize the use of commercially developed tools and services, ONR expects all data representation and ontology efforts to be done in accordance with World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) compliant Resource Description Framework (RDF) for data representation and Web Ontology Language (OWL) for ontologies.

To avoid past problems of attempting to develop a universal data representation and ontology, ONR seeks solutions that bring together and connect multiple data representations and ontologies from across many different communities and disciplines. Furthermore, because speed to fielding capability is critically important, the methodologies for developing, implementing, and cross-connecting data representations and ontologies are just as important as the resulting data representations and ontologies. Proposals for this Thrust Area shall speak to the methodologies and solutions that will be employed to enable rapid development, implementation, and alignment of data representations and ontologies, not just the data representations and ontologies that will be delivered. (Note that methodologies refer to patterns and practices, not to specific tools, systems, or software platforms).

In the past, efforts to develop all encompassing data representations and ontologies have met with significant failures. In many cases, this has been because of attempts to develop a monolithic, global solution that takes too long to develop and is not accepted by the various stakeholder communities. To avoid these problems, ONR is interested in developing small, self-contained data representations and ontologies that can be cross-connected and linked, as needed, to form larger, more complex data representations and ontologies. ONR sees this approach as more agile and flexible, better suited to leverage the work of other communities, and more conducive to support continual evolution.

Proposals in this Thrust Area shall speak to the proposer's ideas and experience in developing federated data representations and ontologies.

For this effort, ONR seeks proposals that will leverage data models and ontologies that have already been developed by various communities. It will be important to demonstrate a good understanding of current data representations and ontologies that already exist, and to address how they can be leveraged. Wherever possible, the use of existing data representations and ontologies from industry and/or from other government and DoD is highly desirable. Examples of such existing data representations and ontologies include

• Common Data Model (CDM) - from the Navy's Product Line Architecture (PLA).

• Track Data Model (TDM) - also from the Navy's PLA

• ASW Community-of-Interest Data Model (ACDM)

• Ontology for Geography Markup Language (OGC)

To fully support the diverse needs of Naval Warfare, it is necessary to represent and model information across a wide range of supporting disciplines. ONR is interested in data representation and ontology solutions that address and account for the following areas: Combat ID, Spectrum Management, Cyber, Blue and Red Force Readiness, Blue and Red Force Structure and Capabilities, Plans & Tasks, Meteorological, and Environment.

The S&T Challenges for this Thrust Area are as follows:

• How can we speed up the creation of data representation and ontology designs from taking years to taking weeks or months?

• How do we avoid the proliferation of too many specialized data representations and ontologies such that it becomes too hard to manage them and integrate them?

• How can we automate the capture and ingestion of legacy data representations and ontologies into the RDF/OWL framework?

• How can we automate the cross-connection of different data representations and ontologies from across diverse communities?

• What are the key data representations and ontology constructs for addressing Cross Warfare Area planning and resource allocation activities?

Those selected to work this Thrust Area will be expected to evolve the data representations and ontologies that are being developed to support the needs of other Thrust Areas. Proposals shall therefore not presume specific answers to what is the right data representation and ontology for a specific area, but shall show how the methodologies and solutions that are proposed can be flexible and adaptable to evolving needs.

Thrust Area #2. Naval Data Source Ingestion and Indexing.

In order to enable the development of advanced Naval Warfighting analytics, it is essential to acquire and make available large data storage that covers the full range of data relevant to ASW and IAMD. The purpose of work under this Thrust Area is to (1) build a rich set of data within the Naval Tactical Cloud Big Data environment that will support the development of advanced analytics for ASW and IAMD and (2) develop enhancements and aug-mentations to the current Naval Tactical Cloud that facilitate faster and easier data ingest and indexing.

Proposers for this Thrust Area shall demonstrate that they have skills, resources, experience, plan, strategy to monitor and correct the plan and one of the areas reviewers will focus on is computer science; another will be their capabilities with data. The goal is to focus on data ingest and indexing, not on educating a technical team as to what these data sources are and how they are used. Successful proposals in this area will require clear demon-stration of data domain expertise in the areas that are proposed.

The ability to ingest and index such a large range of data sets requires the development of highly agile and effective tools and processes for capturing the data. The current Naval Tactical Cloud environment comes with a set of tools and processes for facilitating data ingest and subsequent data indexing. However, the current state of these tools and processes requires Data Scientists to have a deep understanding of the Naval Tactical Cloud's underlying Ha-doop/Accumulo environment, and as a result, Data ingest and indexing activities can be highly complex, take significant amounts of time, and require special talent. ONR is interested in software tools and/or methodologies that Proposers can put forward that will help improve the current state of the practice for data ingest and indexing.

Primary interest is leveraging existing tools and methodologies, not developing tools and processes as part of this BAA. However, exceptional ideas for the development of such tools and processes will be considered if (1) they offer a compelling improvement over the current state of the practice and (2) they are considered highly cost effective.

The S&T Challenges for this Thrust Area are as follows:

• How can we improve the speed and accuracy of data ingest?

• How can we simplify the data ingest process to allow people without specialized knowledge of Hadoop/Accumulo to take on the data ingestion role.

• How do we establish and maintain a sufficiently comprehensive and up to date integrated Big Data store to fully support the needs of ASW and IAMD analytic development?

• What are the best ways to index the Naval Data Sources to effectively support ASW and IAMD analytics?

• To what extent can we automate data indexing to improve the speed at which effective indexes can be generated?

• How do we balance the need for extensive and rich indexes with the limitations of storage onboard ships, especially for smaller platforms such as submarines and destroyers?

Those Proposers selected to work this Thrust Area will be expected to adjust their data ingesting and indexing to support the needs of analytic developers working in Thrust Area #3. Proposals shall therefore account for some degree of flexibility as to the range and scope of the data that is put forward as part of your proposal.

Thrust Area #3. Naval Warfighting Analytics.

The central thesis behind Big Data is that great insights can be obtained from large diverse data sets if properly exploited with the right analytics. As ASW and IAMD threats become more capable and more numerous, the development of more powerful analytics is one of the few avenues available to the U.S. Navy to overcome these challenges. The objective of Thrust Area #3 is to develop and evaluate advanced analytics for supporting Naval Warf-ighting activities, particularly for ASW and IAMD. ONR is seeking highly innovative concepts for analytics that will make significant improvements to these Naval Warfighting areas.

All analytics developed under this effort will be expected to run in the Naval Tactical Cloud analytic environment. The Naval Tactical Cloud provides a batch analytic platform (MapReduce) and a streaming analytic platform (STORM). It is important that proposed analytic efforts be compatible with one of these elements of the Naval Tactical Cloud. Proposed analytic efforts that are incompatible with the Naval

Tactical Cloud analytic environment will not be considered.

Proposals for this Thrust Area shall include the following information for each proposed analytic effort: (1) A description of what the analytic is intended to accomplish; (2) What Warfare Area the analytic is intended to support (if applicable to more than one Warfare Area, please indicate); (3) Whether the analytic is a batch or streaming analytic; (4) The rationale for why the analytic will result in significant improvements to the stated Warfare Areas; (5) The data sources required for the analytic; and (6) An assessment of the computational complexity of the analytic.

ONR places no constraints on the type of analytic proposed or the data required to support the analytic (so long as it is reasonable that the data in question can be obtained in real world situations). However, greater weight will be given to analytics that (1) make more extensive use of cross-community data sources and (2) offer the most compelling case for significantly improving ASW and IAMD Warfighting performance.

Some specific examples of analytic areas of interest include:

• Improving Combat ID of submarines, ships, aircraft, and missiles, by analytics that combine data from National sensors, tactical sensors, and Combat Systems.

• Creating more accurate atmospheric and oceanographic forecasts by combing traditional METOC sensors and predictions with data collected by tactical sensors and combat systems.

• Improving the prediction of enemy operations and plans using analytics that exploit historical patterns of life combined with real-time sensor data of enemy movements and actions.

The S&T Challenges for this Thrust Area are as follows:

• How to effectively integrate data across traditionally separate communities (e.g., Intelligence, C2, and Combat Systems)?

• Developing advanced analytics that significantly improve detection and identification of ASW and IAMD threats.

• Developing advanced analytics that significantly reduce the time required to detect, identify, and engage ASW and IAMD threats.

• Developing advanced analytics that significantly increase the effective range and performance of ASW and IAMD platforms and sensors.

• Developing advanced analytics that predict enemy behavior including confidence factor.

• Control False Identification.

Those Proposers selected to work this Thrust Area will be expected to feed their analytics with data from the Big Data store developed in Thrust Area #2.

Proposals shall therefore account for some degree of flexibility as to the range and scope of the data that will be used to support your proposed analytic efforts.

Thrust Area #4. Data Cloud Security and Integrity.

The migration to the NTC environment provides an opportunity to give the warfighter the flexibility to fight through an adversary's attempts to use cyber to degrade or deny the decision making capabilities of naval commanders. Greater cyber maneuverability can be achieved through increased diversity, agility, non-persistent systems, controlled access/centralization, etc. For example, machine virtualization offers a means of decoupling software from a specific hardware implementation. It is now possible to use a commodity hardware model with different hard-ware/software instantiations deployed across the fleet, or even on a ship, at any given time. For an adversary to have a decisive advantage, they need to be able to compromise an operationally significant number of these instantiations. Similarly, rapidly swapping out hardware components, changing hypervisors or switching to new (or reverting to old) virtualized instantiations of an application potentially negate the significant amount of time / resources expended by an adversary to attack a single hardware or software component. Finally, virtual machines are non-persistent and, when re-started, can be returned to their original trusted state to resolve technical problems as well as minimize time that malware has a foothold in the system. These are examples illustrate how virtualization enables greater cyber maneuverability through diversity and agility

The S&T Challenges for this Thrust Area are as follows:

• Adapt/improve technologies and techniques to protect the NTC by identifying, isolating, and/or removing adversary cyber actors from this infrastructure.

• Develop analogous capabilities or new approaches for the Naval Big Data Ecosystem to assure the integrity and accuracy of the underlying data (which consists of many different types / formats) used to make decisions. These approaches shall provide the capability to understand the provenance of a piece of data (i.e. who created it, what was the process used to create it, who has touched or modified it over its life cycle), to validate or estimate the trust-worthiness of that data and if possible determine the likelihood that a piece of data has been tampered with. If it has been determined that a piece of data has been tampered with, the framework shall assist in finding other data elements that may have been tampered with and ultimately provide the ability to restore the tampered data to a known good state.

• Integrate these capabilities into advanced cyber analytics / applications that leverage the NTC analytic environment while being simple enough for a sailor to operate.

Thrust Area Dependencies.

Work in the first three Thrust Areas will be addressed separately but are not to be viewed in isolation. It is essential that the solutions in each Thrust Area function in a supportive manner. It is essential that data representations and ontologies developed under Thrust Area 1 support the needs of the other Thrust Areas and it is essential that the Data Sources developed under Thrust Area 2 support the advanced analytics developed under Thrust Area 3. ONR will assume responsibility and management to achieve inter-thrust area coordination of awardee activity if necessary.

Integration and Experimentation.

ONR intends all capabilities developed under this BAA to be integrated into the Naval Tactical Cloud Reference Implementation and undergo extensive experimentation to assess performance and operational effectiveness. To ensure successful integration, ONR will make available to all awardees or offerors a Naval Tactical Cloud Reference Implementation developer package (provided as a set of Virtual Machines).

Performers will be expected to use the NTC RI developer environment to support Data Science and analytic development and integration activities. Performers will also be expected to bring capabilities developed under this BAA into ONR's Limited Technical Experimentation (LTE) activities. LTEs are multi-performer events where the Data Science and analytic capabilities of multiple performers will be integrated and then evaluated in an operationally relevant environment. Performers will be expected to provide support for integrating their capabilities into the experiment and with the capabilities of other Performers. Performers will also be expected to provide additional technical support to facilitate the set up and execution of the LTEs, including planning for the experiment, set up and initialization of the experiment (including in-strumentation of the Performer's software deliverable if needed), execution of the experiment, and data collection during the experiment. ONR will provide a separate analysis team to independently assess the experimental articles and results. However, Performers will be expected to support the analysis team by responding to inquiries and pre-paring white papers on patterns and practices. All Proposers shall include resources and personnel as part of your Proposal to account for these LTE related activities.

Technology Transition.

ONR desires that S&T products that result from this BAA be capable of, and ready for, integration into yearly technology experiments involving Navy and/or Marine Corps systems. Where possible, products shall use common standards, open architectures, and be extensible for technology advances. ONR expects all work performed under this BAA, including the development of data representations, ontologies, analytics, and data security mechanisms to be made available to the Government with full Government Purpose Data Rights. Innovative Science and Technology (S&T) that supports these goals will be seriously considered and if selected, ONR will provide assistance in technology transition.

Work funded under a BAA may include basic research, applied research and some advanced technology development (ATD). With regard to any restrictions on the conduct or outcome of work funded under this BAA, ONR will follow the guidance on and definition of "contracted fundamental research" as provided in the Under Secretary of Defense (Acquisition, Technology and Logistics) Memorandum of 24 May 2010. As defined therein the definition of "contracted fundamental research", in a DoD contractual context, includes [research performed under] grants and contracts that are (a) funded by Research, Development, Test, and Evaluation Budget Activity 1 (Basic Research), whether performed by universities or industry or (b) funded by Budget Activity 2 (Applied Research) and performed on campus at a university. The research shall not be considered fundamental in those rare and exceptional circumstances where the applied research effort presents a high likelihood of disclosing performance characteristics of military systems or manufacturing technologies that are unique and critical to defense, and where agreement on restrictions have been recorded in the contract or grant.

Pursuant to DoD policy, research performed under grants and contracts that are a) funded by Budget Category 6.2 (Applied Research) and NOT performed on-campus at a university or b) funded by Budget Category 6.3 (Advanced Research) does not meet the definition of "contracted fundamental research." In conformance with the USD(AT&L) guidance and National Security Decision Direction 189, ONR will place no restriction on the conduct or reporting of unclassified "contracted fundamental research," except as otherwise required by statute, regulation or Executive Order. For certain research projects, it may be possible that although the research being performed by the prime contractor is restricted research, a subcontractor may be conducting "contracted fundamental research." In those cases, it is the prime contractor's responsibility in the proposal to identify and describe the subcontracted unclassified research and include a statement confirming that the work has been scoped, negotiated, and determined to be fundamental research according to the prime contractor and research performer.

Normally, fundamental research is awarded under grants with universities and under contracts with industry.

ATD is normally awarded under contracts and may require restrictions during the conduct of the research and DoD pre-publication review of research results due to subject matter sensitivity.

FAR Part 35 restricts the use of the Broad Agency Announcements (BAAs), such as this, to the acquisition of basic and applied research and that portion of advanced technology development not related to the development of a specific system or hardware procurement. Contracts and grants and other assistance agreements made under BAAs are for scientific study and experimentation directed towards advancing the state of the art and increasing knowledge or understanding.

As regards to the present BAA, the Research and Development efforts to be funded will consist of applied research and advanced technology development. The funds available to support awards are Budget Activity 2 and 3.

THIS ANNOUNCEMENT IS NOT FOR THE ACQUISITION OF TECHNICAL, ENGINEERING AND

OTHER TYPES OF SUPPORT SERVICES.

G. Point(s) of Contact -

Questions of a technical nature should be submitted to:

Program Manager Name: Dr. Carey Schwartz Address: 875 North Randolph Street, Arlington, VA, 22203 Code: 311 Phone: 703.696.7824 Email: carey.schwartz@navy.mil

Questions of a Business nature, and suggestions for improvement, should be submitted to:

Name: Lynnette Desorcie Address: 875 North Randolph Street, Arlington, VA, 22203 Code: BD252 Phone: 703.696.4324 Email: lynnette.desorcie@navy.mil

Any questions regarding this solicitation must be provided to the Technical Point of Contact and Business Point of Contact listed in this solicitation. All questions shall be submitted in writing by electronic mail.

Comments or questions submitted shall be concise and to the point, eliminating any unnecessary verbiage.

In addition, the relevant part and paragraph of the Broad Agency Announcement (BAA) shall be referenced.

Questions submitted within 2 weeks prior to a deadline may not be answered, and the due date for submission of the white paper and/or full proposal will not be extended.

Amendments will be posted to one or more of the following webpages:

• Federal Business Opportunities (FEDBIZOPPS) Webpage - https://www.fbo.gov/

• Grants.gov Webpage - http://www.grants.gov/

• ONR Broad Agency Announcement (BAA) Webpage - http://www.onr.navy.mil/en/Contracts-

Grants/Funding-Opportunities/Broad-Agency-Announcements.aspx

Questions of a security nature shall be submitted to:

Diana Pacheco https://www.fbo.gov/ http://www.grants.gov/ http://www.onr.navy.mil/en/Contracts-Grants/Funding-Opportunities/Broad-Agency-Announcements.aspx http://www.onr.navy.mil/en/Contracts-Grants/Funding-Opportunities/Broad-Agency-Announcements.aspx

Industrial Security Specialist Office of Naval Research Security Department, Code 43 One Liberty Center 875 N. Randolph Street Arlington, VA 22203-1995 Email Address: diana.pacheco@navy.mil

Note: All UNCLASSIFIED communications shall be submitted via e-mail to the Technical Point of Contract (POC) with a copy to the designated Business POC.

CLASSIFIED questions shall be handled through the ONR Security POC. Specifically, any entity wanting to ask a CLASSIFIED question shall send an email to the ONR Security POC with copy to both the Technical POC and the Business POC stating that the entity would like to ask a CLASSIFIED question. DO NOT EMAIL ANY CLASSIFIED QUESTIONS. The Security POC will contact the entity and arrange for the CLASSIFED question to be asked through a secure method of communication.

H. Instrument Type(s) - Contracts and Grants

Awards may take the form of Contracts and Grants as appropriate. ONR reserves the right to award a different instrument type if deemed to be in the best interest of the Government.

Any contract awards resulting from this BAA will incorporate the most current FAR, DFARs, NMCARS and ONR clauses.

Examples of model contracts can be found on the ONR website at the following link:

http://www.onr.navy.mil/Contracts-Grants/submit-proposal/contracts-proposal/contract-model-awards.aspx.

ONR Contract specific representations and certifications can be accessed on the following page of the ONR website: http://www.onr.navy.mil/Contracts-Grants/Funding-Opportunities/Requests-for-Information.aspx.

Examples of model grants can be found on the ONR website at the following link:

http://www.onr.navy.mil/en/Contracts-Grants/submit-proposal/grants-proposal/model-grant.aspx.

I. Catalog of Federal Domestic Assistance (CFDA) Numbers -

12.300

J. Catalog of Federal Domestic Assistance (CFDA) Titles -

Basic & Applied Scientific Research

K. Other Information -

II. AWARD INFORMATION

A. Amount and Period of Performance- Estimated Total Amount of Funding Available ($K):

http://www.onr.navy.mil/Contracts-Grants/submit-proposal/contracts-proposal/contract-model-awards.aspx http://www.onr.navy.mil/Contracts-Grants/Funding-Opportunities/Requests-for-Information.aspx http://www.onr.navy.mil/en/Contracts-Grants/submit-proposal/grants-proposal/model-grant.aspx

FY2015 FY2016 FY2017 FY2018 FY2019 Total

$3750 $4750…