SOW.pdf

Statement of Work for Strategic Forecast and Assessment Research for Langley

Introduction NASA Langley Research Center, established in 1917, is the oldest of NASA’s field centers and is located on 764 acres in Hampton Virginia. It is comprised of nearly 200 facilities and employs more than 3,500 civil servants and contractors and supports a budget of $1.03 billion. Langely provides support to all of NASA’s missions which includes Aeronautics, Space Exploration, Science and STEM Engagement. Within this scope, Langley works to make revolutionary improvements to aviation, expand understanding of Earth’s atmosphere, and develop advanced technologies for space exploration.

Over the last year, Langley has focused on supporting NASA’s Future of Work effort, specifically around the concepts of reimagining working norms, prioritizing workforce flexibilities, and optimizing workplace investments to accelerate Langley becoming NASA’s Research Lab of the Future. Having made the transition to a hybrid work environment, NASA is now shifting its Future of Work efforts to focus on driving towards a modern work experience in support of NASA’s long-term future through the NASA 2040 effort. Langley is also shifting to the development of a modern work experience and is focusing on strategically planning Langley’s long-term future. At Langley, we believe the future of Langley is not just the future of our field Center, but the future of R&D at NASA and the future of R&D in aeronautics, space exploration, and science for the Nation. Langley is the future, so Langley is embarking on strategically planning Langley’s transformational pivot to support NASA and the Nation in 2040 and beyond.

Langley Is the Future (LIFE) is Langley’s program of effort to pivot Langley towards the future and prepare Langley for the pivot. LIFE will strategically plan and transform Langley’s work, business model, and organization for Langley’s 2040 future state.

Scope

Today’s environment is fast-paced, and tomorrow’s aerospace ecosystem is wide-open.

NASA Langley Leadership realizes that to position Langley to respond to this dynamic environment and envision a thriving future state, Langley must make hard trade off decisions about its future driven by data. Therefore, Langley is conducting market research on the growth potential of several scenarios to determine which path is most beneficial to Langley, NASA, and the Nation and that Langley has a competitive advantage in providing. Langley seeks to further understand the evolution of competition, customer behavior, government budgets, and commercialization to continue development of technology innovations that will shape the industry over the coming decades. The focus of this project is to rigorously assess potential market evolution scenarios, covering the next 20 years, to support NASA LaRC strategic planning and workforce development efforts.

To accomplish the above, the Vendor shall conduct the following:

1. Monthly Status Meetings: Conduct monthly status meetings to provide updates on overall approach and schedule and identify key parameters relevant to the execution of this SOW. The vendor shall also provide feedback and reviews of Langley-developed scenarios and address areas of concern related to this SOW.

2. Kick-off Meeting: Conduct a Kick-off meeting to review the Center-developed potential future scenarios. The purpose of this meeting is to establish future scenarios (not to exceed 5) for which the Center wants to conduct further analysis. This meeting shall also foster a discussion of the Center’s current key capabilities, including but not limited to, atmospheric characterization; systems analysis and concepts; advanced materials;

aeronautical sciences; entry, descent, and landing; and intelligent flight systems. Other capabilities of interest based on the selected future scenarios may also be addressed as applicable.

3. Phase 1: Top-level 20-year outlook

The vendor shall:

a. Develop a top-level 20-year outlook for the future scenarios developed by the Center as the highest priority for further analysis. Specifically, this phase will consist of data collection and synthesis to assess which future scenarios present promising synergy with current and anticipated trends in the aerospace industry.

b. Conduct a data-driven evaluation of the future scenarios to enable assessment and prioritization based on:

• Underlying industry market size (e.g., estimated number of hypersonic air transport firms)

• Underlying industry market maturity (e.g., primarily start-ups primarily large contractors)

• Market technologies and synergy with current or future Langley capabilities

• Industry partnership potential

• Identification of adjacent industries (such as robotics, agriculture, financial services)

In this phase, within the context of the scenarios, the vendor shall conduct a minimum of

30 targeted interviews across aerospace industry segments to understand the value proposition the Center presents to them today and how that role may evolve in the future. These interviews shall target the current/past Center partners and non-partners alike to determine what roles NASA could and should play in the scenario, identify what NASA is doing well or not doing well, identification of LaRC specific role within the NASA role, and enable analysis of future industry direction and prospects for partnerships. Following a presentation of the top-level 20-year outlook for each future scenario, the vendor shall provide recommendations to enable the Center to identify which are the most promising future scenarios to move forward for further investigation in phase 2.

c. Provide assessment of scenarios through lens of national political and policy sensitivities

1. The vendor shall conduct a policy assessment for selected scenarios. Each selected scenario shall be evaluated in terms of strengths and weaknesses against current national and international science and technology policy objectives. For this evaluation, the vendor shall also:

• Assess current national and international policies by researching and synthesizing data from policy documents such as congressional committee notes and reports, budget authorizations, and GAO reports as well as platforms and statements from appropriate senators, congresspersons, and other national leaders, review of relevant statements and policy from the offices of the president and vice-president.

• Evaluate strengths and weaknesses of each scenario and assess the scenarios against synthesized policy data and

• Elicit expert opinion from subject matter experts including, but not limited to, former OSTP staff and DoD general officers

4. Phase 2: Forecast demand for prioritized future scenario

a. Upon completion of Phase 1, Langley will down select scenarios and related capabilities for deeper analysis in Phase 2. Phase 2 shall assess potential future demand in the context of the down selected future scenarios (not to exceed 3) and related capabilities (not to exceed 6 total across scenarios). This phase shall examine customer segments in each scenario and forecast a picture of demand in terms of customers and missions over the next 20 years and market size presented as a rough order of magnitude (ROM). Phase 2 shall also further examine LaRC’s role within each of the scenarios.

b. The Vendor shall use its extensive intellectual property related to the future of the aerospace industry along with internal senior subject matter experts to forecast demand for the scenarios.

c. For each selected future scenario, the vendor shall provide:

• A 20-year projected growth in demand in number of missions and customers and ROM market size growth over current based on U.S. and international government plans and budgets, commercial aerospace investment and market trends, changing geopolitical environment

• Competitive assessment of dynamics and shifts in the market, including a high-level evaluation of companies and other government agencies within the ecosystem and their ability to adapt to future trends. This assessment shall focus on the emergence of commercial aerospace capabilities – this is critical as these players could become both customers and competitors for LaRC research and technology.

• For markets that are primarily commercial, the vendor shall determine what roles LaRC can play in supporting commercial activities over the next 20 years

• A characterization of key capabilities, and infrastructure required for future missions

• A characterization of the workforce requirements such as degrees and skills to meet future demand

d. The forecast shall provide a look at the Center’s current capabilities and requirements in the future, as well as an assessment of what is required in workforce and infrastructure in the future to inform discussion of the strategic evolution of NASA Langley team to share results.

5. Phase 3: Partnership Opportunities The vendor shall conduct deep dives into selected LaRC capabilities and facilities to identify specific partnership or relationship roles for LaRC to undertake related to each capability. The vendor shall use internal technology experts along with external subject matter experts to assess:

• Technology evolution over next 20 years including discussion of key parameters, testing requirements, and barriers to development

• Gaps and opportunities within the technology field, that NASA, and LaRC expertise specifically, is well suited to filling

• Current supplier environment make-up and evolution to determine the role of NASA and other government agencies

• Effects of international technology development and supply chain on US development and shall synthesize the results of these assessments to provide NASA LaRC with strategic insight for determining its specific partnership or relationship posture for each capability.

6. Deliverables, Schedule, and Milestone Payments

All deliverables shall be delivered with unlimited rights.

1. Status Reports: Monthly reports/power point presentation $TBD Reports due October 2023 through January 2024

2. Kick-Off meeting: Power point presentation $TBD

Due: February 2024 +/- 30 days

3. Phase 1: 20-year Outlook: $TBD Due May 2024 (+/- 30 days)

- A PowerPoint presentation summarizing the analysis and results to include all elements stated above in Phase 1, briefing(s) to LaRC executive team

4. Phase 2: Forecast demands for Scenarios: $TBD

Due July 2024 (+/- 30 days)

- PowerPoint presentation of market forecast analysis and findings for all elements stated above in Phase 2, including briefing(s) to LaRC executive team

5. Phase 3: Partnership Opportunities: $TBD Due August 2024 (+/- 30 days)

-PowerPoint presentation of all elements stated above in Phase 3, including briefing(s) to LaRC executive team.