The Air Force's technology innovation hub has asked technology companies, industry partners, academia, and others to "revolutionize" flight line operations. The effort—a “sequel” to AFWERX's 2020 base of the future initiative—is aimed at addressing challenges such as airfield maintenance and repair; aircraft maintenance operations; and ...
Blue Force Technologies expects a contract in the next month authorizing it to proceed with development of a stealthy, unmanned aerial system for Air Force fifth-generation fighters to train against. The company expects to build four aircraft for a demonstration program, with first flight in ...
Recent Department of the Air Force Small Business Innovation Research contracts include technology research and development projects ranging from artificial intelligence to edge computing to augmented reality. "We have bolstered our relationship with nontraditional industry since partnering AFWERX with our Small Business Innovation Research Center ...
The Air Force has long faced a silent crisis: It can’t train and retain enough pilots. And now, challenged to confront peer adversaries, rather than the insurgents it’s been engaging for the last 20 years, even the pilots the service can train aren’t getting the ...
A crew chief and production superintendent from Davis-Monthan Air Force Base, Ariz., took home the 3D-printed trophy in the Department of the Air Force’s Spark Tank innovation contest for a simple idea he predicts could “solve a lot of issues across the aircraft community.” Master ...
The Air Force’s Rapid Sustainment Office is again reaching out to industry for new approaches to three-dimensional scanning so it can replicate aircraft parts that are no longer in production. On Jan. 4, the RSO published a call for a “cutting-edge, automated 3D scanning system” ...
The Air Force’s science advisers say the service needs to make its approach to cutting-edge “Vanguard” programs more concrete and repeatable—and to ditch them when things don’t work out. USAF leaders asked the Air Force Scientific Advisory Board to grade how the Vanguard concept is ...
The Air Force will flight test the U.S. military’s first hypersonic missile this month, Air Force acquisition boss Will Roper said Dec. 14 at the inaugural Doolittle Leadership Center Forum. Speaking on the theme of “From Acquisition to Lethality,” Roper also described progress on the ...
The Air Force's technology incubator, which doles out more than 1,000 small research contracts worth up to $50,000 each year, unveiled an advance look at its 2021 programs during its virtual Accelerate event, Dec. 7-11—the first organized by the newly relaunched AFWERX 2.0. AFWERX 2.0 ...