The Corporation Of Mercer University

The Corporation of Mercer University, doing business as Mercer Engineering Research Center (MERC), is a non-profit, tax-exempt subsidiary of Mercer University that delivers aircraft sustainment engineering, structural analysis, avionics support, and software development services to the U.S. Air Force and Navy as a prime contractor (94% of recent awards). MERC operates exclusively in the unrestricted, full-and-open federal market with no small business set-aside posture — all recent prime awards carry no set-aside designation, reflecting open competition across the defense engineering sector.

MERC's customer concentration is heavily concentrated in Air Force platforms and sustainment hubs. The Department of the Air Force and its component commands account for 83% of awards by count: the Air Force (108 awards, $976.2 million), Warner Robins Air Logistics Complex (67 awards, $707.9 million), and AFLCMC Robins AFB (72 awards, $298.4 million) anchor the footprint. However, the top-customers-by-potential-value ranking reveals a significant outlier: the Department of the Navy Naval Sea Systems Command holds only 4 awards but carries a combined potential value of $5.28 billion, suggesting large-dollar naval engineering contracts that dwarf the typical Air Force sustainment order. Recent representative prime work includes a $9.9 million delivery order for U-2 Aircraft Structural Integrity Plan engineering (Warner Robins Air Logistics Complex, September 2025), a $11.7 million delivery order for aging bomber engineering services under AFLCMC Robins AFB (January 2025), a $24.6 million delivery order for Electronic Warfare & Avionics Integration Support Facility (EWAISF) engineering services (AFLCMC Robins AFB, May 2022), and a $1.06 million delivery order to support and sustain the Airworthiness/Configuration Management web-based tool for the C-17 Globemaster III program (Air Force Materiel Command, September 2025).

MERC holds four significant Indefinite Delivery/Indefinite Quantity contracts that funnel the bulk of its delivery orders. The $975 million Rapid Sustainment Office Multi-Award Contract (RO MAC, Air Force Life Cycle Management Center, July 2024) and the $100 million single-award Sustainment Engineering Services for SOF C-130J contract (Warner Robins Air Logistics Complex, August 2024) both carry extended periods of performance through 2029 and 2033 respectively and anchor MERC's Air Force sustainment footprint. The $46 billion Eglin Wide Agile Acquisition Contract (EWAAC, multiple-award, AFLCMC Eglin AFB, September 2023) provides access to Air Force rapid prototyping and weapons development procurement. Most recently, MERC was awarded a seat on the OASIS+ Unrestricted Multiple Agency Contract (December 2024, GSA Federal Acquisition Service, multi-award, $999,999,999,999 placeholder ceiling through December 2029), a governmentwide vehicle enabling task-order competition across federal agencies. Five parent vehicles generated over 100 task orders cumulatively: indefinite delivery contract FA853020D0001 (40 task orders, $204 million), FA850408G0001 (24 task orders, $43.1 million), FA850407D0002 (18 task orders, $45.8 million), and FA853017D0001 (18 task orders, $45.5 million).

Activity has grown year over year from 7 awards in 2022 to 22 in 2025, with a recent spike suggesting sustained pipeline momentum. Ten awards worth a combined $81.7 million reach ultimate completion inside the next twenty-four months, presenting recompete risk for MERC and recompete opportunity for competitors on maturing sustainment and engineering contracts. Across SCI-reportable federal service contracts (FY2022–FY2024), MERC invoiced $33 million in combined prime revenue across 51 FTEs in FY2024, reflecting a stable workforce trajectory from 45.8 FTEs in FY2022. Government-paid hourly rates on SCI-reportable prime contracts ran a median of $103.66/hr, with a range from $93.12/hr (10th percentile) to $114.42/hr (90th percentile), positioning MERC in the mid-tier technical labor market. SCI data shows only 3% average sub-hours share across prime contracts and only 2 named subcontractors reported, indicating MERC builds most of its delivery teams in-house rather than heavily outsourcing.

In its subcontractor role, MERC delivers engineering services to Northrop Grumman Systems Corporation on multiple 2025 sub-awards for AN/ALQ-161A electronic warfare system engineering supply and block cycle upgrade work, and served as a subcontractor to Emory University on a Community Vital Signs ERASE MM community vital signs project sub-award (March 2025). On prime contracts, MERC engages a stable roster of specialty subs: Nuwaves RF Solutions (veteran-owned small business providing Vampire RF modules and RF components), Systel Inc. (minority-owned ruggedized computing hardware), Keysight Technologies and Rohde & Schwarz USA (electronic test equipment), and Curtiss-Wright Acra (strain survey non-recurring engineering equipment). Place of performance for MERC's core Air Force work is Warner Robins, Georgia (home to Warner Robins Air Logistics Complex), though some work spans Macon, Georgia, Dayton, Ohio, and other locations as task order specifications require.

MERC operates as a subsidiary of Mercer University (parent entity, headquartered in Macon, Georgia), a private non-profit educational institution. The organizational structure and tax-exempt status position MERC as a Federally Funded Research and Development Center, a designation explicitly cited in source material and enabling sole-source contract authority in specialized technical areas where MERC holds unique expertise and proprietary tools.