The Air Force asked industry for feedback on its wide-field-of-view hosted payload project that seeks to place a staring overhead persistent infrared sensor on a commercial communications satellite. The Space and Missile Systems Center’s hosted payload office at Los Angeles AFB, Calif., would like to issue a request for proposal for the WFOV HP in March 2014 and issue the contract for it in March 2015, according to the Aug. 5 solicitation posted at the Federal Business Opportunities website. It envisions a payload with a three-to-five-year mission life that is delivered within three years of contract award, all for a cost of less than $42 million, states the notice. The feedback will help service officials gauge whether those cost and schedule goals are feasible.
A new report from the Government Accountability Office calls for the Pentagon’s Chief Technology Officer to have budget certification authority over the military services’ research and development accounts—a move the services say would add a burdensome and unnecessary layer of bureaucracy.
