Armaments Group Revamps To Aid Military Prototyping.

• Author: Harper, Jon

The National Armaments Consortium--with a portfolio that runs the gamut from small caliber ammunition to long-range missiles--is making changes to handle a growing caseload of Pentagon-sponsored prototyping efforts.

The organization, also known as the NAC, is one of the consortia that the Defense Department is increasingly leaning on to help speed the development of new capabilities for the military and bring nontraditional companies into the fold. It leverages other transaction authority agreements, a contracting mechanism that enables Pentagon agencies and industry to bypass some of the bureaucratic red tape associated with the traditional acquisition system.

Other transaction authority agreements, or OTAs, have become increasingly popular in recent years after Congress passed the 2016 National Defense Authorization Act which included provisions designed to encourage their use. When the military develops a requirement for a new capability, it can issue solicitations to consortia, which then disseminate it to their members. Companies and universities have an opportunity to respond with white papers, which can quickly lead to an OTA contract award.

The Summerville, South Carolina-based National Armaments Consortium, which was established in 2000, now boasts more than 900 members of industry and academia throughout the United States. It has seen a major uptick in activity in recent years. However, the growing caseload has been taxing its system.

"It became, quite frankly, a victim of its own success," NAC Executive Director Charlie Zisette said in an interview. "It started yielding as many as 345 requirements at a single collaboration event, which was generating about 1,500 proposals, and that just became a bow wave and it really wasn't tenable. And so we knew we had to work closely with the Department of Defense and do... a process reset and take a look at how can we streamline this" to meet the growing demand.

To get at the problem, NAC leaders teamed with other partners including Army Contracting Command, the DoD Ordnance Technology Consortium (DOTC), and consortium management firm ATI to make several major adjustments.

One change is to move away from an annual solicitation cycle because under that construct there "just wasn't enough battle rhythm," Zisette said.

"We're going to move to a monthly solicitation cycle," he said. "Our members know on the last Thursday of the month, we will publish whatever requirements [and solicitations] are...