Mission Computer

Added: Jan 23, 2015 9:41 am Special Notice:

After extensive market research, the Technology Applications Contracting Office (TAKO) intends to negotiate and award an Indefinite Delivery Indefinite Quantity (IDIQ) contract for developmental engineering services and manufacturing to design, test, qualify, and produce a mission computer for the A/MH-6M Block 3.0 aircraft on an other than full and open basis to Rockwell Collins, Inc., 400 Collins Road NE, Cedar Rapids, Iowa, 52498. The mission computer is part of the avionics upgrade for the A/MH-6M Block 3.0 Program and will run Avionics Management System (AMS) software which is a Common Avionics Architecture System (CAAS) derivative. The contract is expected to be for a period of seven years for both development and integration of AMS and production of mission computers. There is no anticipated follow-on to this contract.
The Government's proposed use of Rockwell Collins, Inc. for development and procurement is based upon its estimate that there are significant costs in using another source that will not be recouped through competition. Market research determined that use of a source other than Rockwell Collins (RCI) (the current CAAS/AMS Software Operational Flight Program (OFP) developer) would generate significant additional software development costs that would not be recovered through competition. The Government estimates $4,000,000 of additional costs on the RCI Post Deployment Software Support contract during rehosting and integration of the AMS OFP software into a mission computer using a source other than RCI. The $4,000,000 in cost is due to significant foundation software effort and potentially re-worked board and chip support packages in the operating system layer required to make the mission computer work with the AMS OFP software. Further, if a vendor were required to provide a functional mission computer and address these issues, the vendor would need proprietary information from RCI. RCI is willing to sell US Government Purpose Rights for drivers and foundation software to run CAAS OFP for $10,000,000; however, it is not the Government's intent to procure CAAS GPR for this program.
After review of the industry responses to a published request for information and draft specifications, and consultation with Government technical experts, the Government determined; (i) no existing mission computer met all requirements, (ii) some hardware and software development was required, (iii) portions of the specification intended to facilitate integration of AMS software with the mission computer appear to have either precluded some existing mission computers being suitable and/or have driven higher development costs for the mission computer, and (iv) re-hosting of AMS software into a mission computer using other than the CAAS LynxOS 178 operation system and the optimal PowerPC processor architecture will generate significant additional cost to the Government not likely to be recouped through competition.
In addition, the Government's cost and schedule estimate for rehosting the AMS software into another source's mission computer and integrating it with another source's mission computer operating system, processor, and board support package is $4,000,000 on the RCI PDSS contract and additional development time of nine months. The Government does not anticipate, based upon the limited number of mission computers remove required, that these costs would be recouped through competition.
This notice of intent is not a request for competitive proposals and no solicitation is currently available. A determination by the Government not to compete this proposed effort on a full and open basis is solely within the discretion of the Government.
The point of contract that pertain to this synopsis Mr. Anthony Ciccariello, (Contract Specialist) at anthony.ciccariello1.civ@mail.mil.