Douglas A. Macgregor's Blog, page 14

Next-generation C2 won’t be next-gen without the network transport

The Army’s Next Generation Command and Control (NGC2) effort aims to provide more robust data transport and analytics capabilities with expanded network connectivity to higher echelons, while also supporting emerging requirements like ground/air robotics and sensor integration.

Up until today’s time, though, the design of the Army’s mission command systems were primarily function specific. They weren’t intended to integrate and share data in an intuitive fashion across formation staff functions or even with coalition partners, which meant that data aggregation to ensure teammates received the right data and permissions for their mission was challenging. 

According to the Army, NGC2 will provide capabilities that bring large, rich mission command and data packages across all echelons. 

Of equal importance and a priority in enabling the right data to reach the right location, notes Thales Defense & Security, Inc. (TDSI), is the network transport layer. The pipes for all manner of C2 data – from terrestrial to space – should, in part, build upon invested infrastructure such as advanced secure waveforms, resilient satellite connectivity, and advanced network management tool kits, while also incorporating new innovative and less complex capabilities. 

More importantly, the network transport layer should also leverage a hybrid architecture for NGC2 combining tactical radios, 5G, WiFi, and multi-orbit satellites. 

“Army leaders have recognized over the last few years that 5G capabilities and WiFi are tools in the toolbox,” said Gary Kidwell, vice president of communications systems at TDSI. “There’s not any one particular technology – even the HMS handheld, manpack and small form fit radios that we provide today – that is the be-all end-all for every network globally. 5G has its place in the architecture the same as WiFi does.”

Leveraging commercial communication options mixed with secure resilient systems will give commanders multiple communication options to share information with coalition forces in a variety of environments. What this means for warfighters is that pushing more data across a unified network will support multi-domain operations where shooters can access sensors that may not be directly on their network and can get battle-damage assessment in a continuous loop on the same network in real time.

Soldiers from elements of the 3rd Infantry used satellite terminals and EDGE network kits in a variety of missions, including fires and on the move mission command. (Photo courtesy of Thales Defense & Security, Inc.)

A gateway for agnostic comms and C2

A key to helping the Army solve NGC2 data transport challenges will be agnostic communications solutions and a gateway to link new and legacy communications systems. Network kits solutions should allow general-purpose users to plug-and-play any network communications system from current radios to coalition radios, commercial radio, and SATCOM. Kits must also provide robust 5G and LTE communication options to allow for prioritized data package transmissions across division echelons. 

Transformation In Contact (TIC) unit feedback and independently conducted Soldier Touch Points have emphasized the need for compute/store and resilient communications capability to be packaged into the smallest of form factors to allow commanders to receive and transmit data packages while on the move. Communication kits should allow network connectivity to be a force multiplier not a burden on maneuver units, and provide cross domain and gateway capability for formations to choose whatever radio or commercial communication pathway is appropriate for the operational environment. 

TDSI is already providing such capabilities through its expeditionary EDGE and EDGE-Lite command post kits, which were designed with these principles in mind. Already provided to some US Army and Special Operations forces, the EDGE (Expeditionary Data and Gateway Equipment) family of kits provide not only PACE communications network management tools but network resiliency by cross-banding all military and some commercial capabilities like 5G/LTE, while providing a plug-and-play baseband for a variety of SATCOM terminals. The same agnostic radio architecture accepts, in the case of the full EDGE variant, up to three different tactical radios of any vendor model for maximum interoperability.

As part of an iterative design process, TDSI continues to make kit refinements based on user feedback such as giving commanders a local store and compute capability at the edge and in EW-disrupted environments when they can’t reach back to the cloud, plus network management software applications to ensure ease of use. 

EDGE was tested recently with the 3rd Infantry Division out of Fort Stewart, GA, as part of Combined Resolve 25-2 in Germany, where the emphasis was on commander and formation desire to leverage systems that provide networked command/control on-the-move. Ease of system use to include initialization by general purpose users was also stressed. 

For Combined Resolve, EDGE and EDGE-Lite kits were in use at the brigade main command post and at certain battalion levels to maintain network connectivity and command/control on-the-move. EDGE kits, supported by ESA SATCOM terminals and tactical data radios, facilitated connectivity supporting the brigade’s ability to monitor the movement of mounted and dismounted formations and provide direct messaging and location information of nodes for the brigade commander and staff. 

Additionally, the fires unit leveraged EDGE capability for its fires operators to conduct mission command and provide needed compute/store capability at the headquarters.

Soldier feedback from exercises during Combined Resolve 25-02 was used to help inform next generation command control related capability options. (Photo courtesy of Thales Defense & Security, Inc.)

Leveraging LEO, MEO, and cloud

In addition to agnostic communication kits, the Army has indicated that it will strongly leverage proliferated Low Earth Orbit (LEO) satellite comms technologies. EDGE provides organic connectivity to both Iridium Mission Link and Starshield constellations. 

Satellite terminals such as the robustly fielded Thales Tampa Microwave parabolic family will make use of new easy to install certified kits to achieve MEO connectivity, while new electronically steered array (ESA) terminals such as the GetSat DUO terminal  will provide on-the-move multiband and multi-orbit connectivity. As the Army has stated, the goal is to give commanders diverse transport options to allow them to make threat-informed, risk-based decisions about which tool they will use to move their data at which point in the fight.

Cloud capabilities are also front and center for NGC2, and each EDGE configuration includes the necessary compute to enable NGC2 cloud services. For transport-required capabilities, EDGE’s compute and transport capability enable connection to cloud services in an NGC2 environment by supporting latency-sensitive services that include real-time data and analytics, cloud services that can span various layers, and compute capabilities that allow access to the various services according to a mission’s needs.

Both AI and ML models require compute capabilities for data collection and training, performing, and processing. Depending on the scale, AI and ML workflows rely widely on compute for their training to create patterns and learn from the data. To perform, the models would then rely on compute to relay the information in real-time from various sources such as drone feeds or sensor solutions. 

With the ability to take EDGE kits virtually anywhere a mission is driven, TDSI provides compute to ensure that any variety of features and applications can be included when considering the overall design of the mission. Continued processing of all functions certainly relies on the ongoing compute that is among the capabilities provided by EDGE.

As the Army’s NGC2 program continues to solidify, the agnostic transport network made possible by TDSI’s EDGE kits can efficiently and cost effectively enable the vital transport function needed.

What is SBIR? Four things to know about industry funding now frozen in Congress [VIDEO]

The Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) program is one of the Pentagon’s favorite tools to help fund small companies, either startups looking to get off the ground or firms that produce parts used only by the Department of Defense. And as of Sept. 30, the program is effectively paused, as Congress failed to pass a reauthorization.

Why? It’s a more complicated — and heated — situation than you might think. But Valerie Insinna, Congress reporter for Breaking Defense, is here to walk you through what you need to know about SBIR and where the program may end up.

Featuring insights and analysis from our team of reporters, The Congressional Roundup is here to make sure you know what’s going on inside the halls of the Hill as news happens, all wrapped up in a tight package.

To make sure you don’t miss the latest episode — and that you’re getting all of our coverage from the Hill — subscribe to our congressional newsletter below.

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Wilsbach declines to commit to congressional ‘intent’ for reconciliation money

WASHINGTON — Air Force Gen. Kenneth Wilsbach today declined to pledge to follow lawmakers’ guidance on how to spend billions of dollars of reconciliation funds, despite similar commitments from other top Defense Department officials. 

Facing the Senate Armed Services Committee for his nomination hearing today, Wilsbach was asked by Chairman Sen. Roger Wicker the same question Wicker had asked a parade of Pentagon nominees before him: Would Wilsbach commit to uphold “congressional intent” on the reconciliation package, known as the One Big Beautiful Bill, which furnished the Pentagon with an extra $150 billion?

“I will carry out the funding in accordance with the law, and I will strive to do my best with the intent of Congress as well,” Wilsbach replied.

“So that’s not an explicit answer, is it?” said a visibly displeased Wicker. “No,” Wilsbach then conceded, “but I definitely will follow the law, senator.”

Wilsbach’s response was a departure from others who have appeared before the committee and offered unqualified affirmatives. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth eventually did the same at a hearing in June, though after some back and forth with Wicker.

Like other federal agencies, the Defense Department is typically bound to congressional intent for government spending by appropriations spelled out in annual, fiscal year budgets. But the One Big Beautiful Bill puts defense dollars in uncharted territory. Not all funding in the reconciliation bill is tied to specific programs, giving the Pentagon more flexibility to move funds around despite the wishes of congressional leadership. 

Attempting to get ahead of the issue, Wicker and his counterpart in the House outlined their vision for how the reconciliation money should be spent in a July letter to the Pentagon, with Wicker separately asking DoD officials to uphold lawmakers’ guidance in hearings. Lawmakers directed the Pentagon to respond with its own implementation plan for the $150 billion pot in August, but nothing so far has been produced.

Today when asked if DoD planned to abide by Congress’ wishes, a Pentagon spokesperson said they “don’t have anything” to offer and referred questions to the White House.

Wilsbach’s exchange with Wicker marked the only somewhat contentious exchange in an otherwise subdued hearing, where the general mainly fielded questions about his priorities, approach to readiness challenges and at times parochial interests of lawmakers on the committee.

The hearing also dipped into Hegseth’s push for what he describes as merit-driven rewards in the DoD, when Indiana Republican Sen. Jim Banks asked Wilsbach whether he “support[s] Secretary Hegseth’s push to only select and promote airmen based on their merit and achievement.” Wilsbach responded in the affirmative. 

In a scrum with reporters following his hearing, Wilsbach also left the fate of a wide-ranging overhaul of his service called “reoptimization” up in the air. Asked whether he wanted to continue those efforts that have stalled under Trump officials, Wilsbach said that while he has had “private conversations” on the topic, the decision is up to Air Force Secretary Troy Meink. He declined to answer Breaking Defense’s follow-up questions.

Based on Wilsbach’s warm reception on the Hill, it seems the general may have a smooth path to confirmation, at least according to Republican Sen. Kevin Cramer. 

Discussing the possibility of shifting more Air Force assets into his home state of North Dakota, Cramer told Wilsbach, “We’ll talk more about that not if, but when you’re confirmed. I look forward to helping that happen.” 

Qunnect announces Air Force contract for quantum networking over conventional fiber

WASHINGTON — New York City-based startup Qunnect has won an award from the Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL) to refine its quantum networking technology, the company announced today.

Awarded in May for an undisclosed amount, the 18-month contract from AFRL is a notable vote of confidence from a US military lab in an idea that no less an authority than the National Security Agency publicly poo-pooed just five years ago: quantum communications.

AFRL has made several other significant moves in this area in the last 12 months, including a $2.1 million award to IonQ to build a local quantum network at its Rome, NY facility and $5.8 million award to Rigetti to work on superconducting quantum networks. But Qunnect argues its approach is unique, with a track record of successful test runs over existing fiber optic cables rather than the “dedicated … special purpose … unique” infrastructure NSA saw as limitations of earlier versions of the technology.

Qunnect’s approach — which it calls “second-generation” quantum networking — “overcomes many of the [flaws] which the NSA had found in the generation-one tech,” CEO Noel Goddard told Breaking Defense ahead of the company’s announcement about the contract. “But the damage was done when the NSA released this [assessment] in 2020.” With the nation’s premier cryptographers advising against investment, she said, “all of the research funding dried up, and we stopped as a country really developing [quantum networking] technologies” — even as China ramped up.

While rapid advances in quantum computers threaten to crack critical encryption systems, quantum communication, while still in its relative infancy, offers the potential to improve security. That’s because quantum particles are so tiny, delicate, and sensitive to outside interference that anyone intercepting them will cause them to “decohere,” which makes the message unreadable — to eavesdropper and intended recipient alike — and makes the attempting eavesdropping obvious to the intended target, Goddard explained.

This is the infamous observer effect: “If somebody looks at it, it changes,” she said. “If someone disturbs it in any way, it changes.”

One practical problem, however, has been that quantum particles are so super-sensitive it’s not just enemy action that induces decoherence, but minor network glitches and natural phenomena. China’s experimental quantum communications satellite, called Mozi, only works on moonless nights, because even moonlight can overpower the quantum signal, according to RAND. Meanwhile, quantum signals sent over fiber optic lines have been hopelessly disrupted by workers using a jackhammer somewhere along the path.

That fragility has forced quantum-communications experiments to use expensive, highly specialized equipment, including elaborate cryogenics to cool everything to far below freezing.

RELATED: Air Force Research lab awards PsiQuantum $10.8M for experimental quantum chips

Qunnect, however, says it has successfully tested quantum networks on commercial fiber in New York, Berlin, and Montana.  The company recently raised $10 million from high-profile investors including Cisco and Airbus Ventures, largely on the strength of the suite of products underpinning these networks, called Carina.

The core of Carina is a hot-pink box of high-tech electronics, able to slot into existing server racks. To send a message, Carina fires tiny lasers at rubidium atoms, forcing them to emit pairs of “entangled” photons with very precisely tuned characteristics. That fine-tuning, in turn, allows one photon of each pair to shoot down a conventional fiber optic cable — alongside which Qunnect also installs a highly sensitive error-correction system that detects the subtle fluctuations that could disrupt the quantum signal and automatically corrects for them. All this technology works at room temperature, without refrigeration.

In the near term, like her AFRL sponsors, Goddard said she sees the quantum tech as a way to secure communications. Not only does the observer effect make it obvious when someone tries to eavesdrop, but the sender and recipient can compare their quantum particles to confirm the match between both halves of each entangled pair. This application is relatively low-hanging fruit because it only requires sending a handful of photons with each message, which authenticate it and act as canaries in the coalmine that warn of attempted interference; the rest of the message can be conventionally encrypted.

So far the tech is limited in scale, but in the longer term, as the technology becomes able to send larger numbers of photons over longer distances, Goddard believes it could become an essential part of future quantum computers. That’s because you need some kind of quantum network to connect multiple quantum processors into a single super-computing cluster: If you connect quantum computers over a conventional network, they can’t share quantum information, which means they can’t work together any differently than conventional computers do, which defeats the point.

Qunnect says it has already tested a repeater that extends the range of its quantum signals through conventional fiber (using a process called entanglement swapping) and plans a real-world demonstration soon, the company said.

“Near-term use cases are security-based,” Goddard said. “[At AFRL], they’re interested in security applications first because it’s the DoD, not surprisingly… . But the longer-term vision [is] to empower other quantum tech.”

At a conference this week, “we spent the morning listening to Microsoft and AWS and others all talking about the scaling problem” involved in linking multiple small quantum processors into one powerful quantum super-computer, Goddard said. “The only way to connect them is with a network that supports quantum information between them.”

The questions that warfighters ask the most are now answered with data analytics

After years and decades even of individual services being unable to share data at unclassified, classified, and secret levels, the long-standing goal of tearing down silo walls is at hand.

In this Breaking Defense eBRIEF, we examine how data analytics platforms are ingesting data from hundreds of systems to solve warfighter problems, with an emphasis on the Chief Digital and Artificial Intelligence Office’s Advana platform and the Army’s Vantage program.

Breaking Defense thanks Booz Allen for supporting this editorial E-Brief.
Sponsorship does not influence the editorial content of the E-Brief.

Who’s Who in Defense: Elizabeth Warren, Ranking Member, Senate Armed Services (SASC) Subcommittee on Personnel

Ranking Member, Senate Armed Services (SASC) Subcommittee on PersonnelSenator Elizabeth Warren, D, Massachusetts

Responsibilities

The Senate Subcommittee on Personnel sets the total number of military personnel allowed each year. Its legislative authority reaches across all branches and encompasses the roughly 1.32 million full-time, active-duty members, the roughly 2 million service members, and the nearly 790,000 civilians invested in the Armed Forces, according to the Department of Defense’s Defense Manpower Data Center and Pew Research Center survey, March 2025. In working to safeguard the health, general morale and welfare of DoD servicemembers and civilian personnel, the nine-member subcommittee oversees DoD schools; child care and family assistance; personnel compensation and benefits; nominations; and POW/MIA issues. It’s tasked with military recreation, commissaries and exchanges, and with implementing the DoD’s Military Lending Act. It also oversees the Armed Forces Retirement Home.

Quote

“If military families can’t find child care, they just may not be able to serve,” said Warren, referencing the staffing shortfalls in child care services and its effect on the overall readiness of the forces.

Committees

Ranking Member of: Subcommittee on Personnel; and Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs.Member of: Committee on Finance; Subcommittee on Readiness and Management Support; Subcommittee on Strategic Forces; Subcommittee on Financial Institutions and Consumer Protection. She is also on the following subcommittees: Digital Assets; Economic Policy; Housing, Transportation, and Community Development; National Security and International Trade and Finance; Health Care; Securities, Insurance, and Investment; International Trade, Customs, and Global Competitiveness; Aging; and the Subcommittee on Taxation and IRS Oversight.

Political/Professional/Academic Career

Elected to the US Senate in November 2012. Re-elected in 2018 and again in 2024.Became a Democratic candidate for the presidential nomination in 2020 that former President Joe Biden won.Held several economic advisory roles in government, and served on The Congressional Oversight Panel formed after the crash of major US financial institutions in 2008. Advocated for and helped to create the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau in 2011. Appointed special adviser to Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner by former President Barack Obama in 2010. A member of the FDIC (Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation) Advisory Committee on Economic Inclusion from 2006 to 2010.A practicing lawyer and law school professor for more than 30 years, specializing in commercial law, contracts, and bankruptcy. Penned articles, papers and national best-selling books including This Fight Is Our Fight, A Fighting Chance, The Two-Income Trap, and All Your Worth. 

Education

Graduated from Rutgers University with a J.D. in law in 1976.Graduated from University of Houston with a B.S. degree in Speech Pathology in 1970.

Personal

Born Elizabeth Herring on June 22, 1949, to Donald and Pauline Herring, in Oklahoma City, OK. The youngest of four children, she grew up “on the ragged edge of the middle class,” as she puts it, her father having suffered a heart attack.Graduating from high school at age 16, she went on to attend George Washington University on a debate scholarship. After two years, she married and moved to Texas, earning the first of her degrees.Married to Bruce Mann for more than 41 years. They live in Cambridge, where they met while he was teaching at Harvard Law School. They have three grandchildren.

Germany signs off on $4.4 billion Eurofighter Typhoon deal

BELFAST — The German budget committee approved a long-planned order of advanced Eurofighter Typhoon fighter jets today, greenlighting the €3.75 billion ($4.36 billion) procurement of 20 additional aircraft, designed to the Tranche 5 standard.

In a translated statement, the German Ministry of Defense (MoD) said that the combat jets will be equipped with E-scan radars with deliveries set to run from 2031 to 2034.

“The Eurofighter is the mainstay of the German combat aircraft fleet,” the statement added. “The procurement of Tranche 5 [aircraft] serves to gradually transfer the capabilities of the aging Tornado fighter jet in the area of ​​Electronic Combat and Reconnaissance (ECR) into a future-proof platform with which Germany will continue to” honour its NATO objectives.  

As previously reported, Berlin first announced a plan to place the newly approved Eurofighter Tranche 5 order in June, as a complement to a separate purchase of 38 units already on contract with Airbus, under the Project Quadriga acquisition program. 

The Eurofighter consortium is made up of four home nations: Germany, Italy, Spain and the UK.

The latest Typhoon order is the most lucrative of seven weapon system acquisitions rubber stamped by the budget committee, which also includes estimated funding of €412 for Eurofighter simulators to support pilot training. A project to upgrade the electronic warfare capabilities of Germany’s Typhoon fleet, at a cost of roughly €1.13 billion and dedicated specifically to “suppression of ground-based air defense” capabilities, has also been signed off.

“The Eurofighter is to be optimized with the [Saab produced] AREXIS self-protection system and corresponding air-to-ground guided missiles and further enabled for electronic warfare,” added the German MoD statement.

Arexis was originally selected by Berlin for an electronic attack requirement in 2023, and it is the “default configuration” for Swedish Air Force Gripen E/F jets, Mikael Corp, sales director of fighter electronic warfare at Saab, told Breaking Defense in May. He also noted at the time that deliveries of the EW sensor to Airbus, ahead of the planned integration of the equipment on German Typhoons, had already taken place.

Elsewhere, the budget committee decided to approve contracts for armor-piercing ammunition, medium range boats for naval special forces and minehunting sonar systems for Class 332 vessels.

Space Force taps Muon for 3 prototype weather satellites

WASHINGTON — The Space Force today announced a contract with commercial weather satellite operator Muon Space for three prototype birds to provide data such as cloud forecasting for terrestrial and maritime operations.

The $44.6 million Phase III Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) award is a follow on to a December 2024 contract to Muon to further develop an electro-optical/infrared sensor to “provide comprehensive cloud characterization and theater weather imagery.”

It also follows the company’s March launch of its first prototype for a planned 50-satellite FireSat constellation primarily aimed at monitoring wildfires — an effort developed in partnership with the Earth Fire Alliance, a nonprofit coalition backed by Google Research, the Environmental Defense Fund and other philanthropic organizations.

“The contract leverages the company’s existing commercial mission and builds upon the successful outcomes of its previous FireSat prototype launch,” Space Systems Command (SSC) said in the press release.

The Nipigon 6 fire in Ontario, Canada, on June 15, 2025, visualized by the Muon Space/Earth Fire Alliance FireSat prototype. The images were produced by Mid-, Long- and Short-Wave Infrared sensors, as well as Near-Infrared and visible light sensors aboard the satellite. (Photo credit: Muon Space and Earth Fire Alliance)

Only five years old, the Silicon Valley startup has branched out from its initial focus on commercial tracking of wildfires to weather monitoring for military purposes — including things like cloud cover over hot spots, Muon CEO Jonny Dyer told Breaking Defense in a May interview.

In a press release issued by Muon today, Dyer stressed the flexibility of FireSat’s dual-use approach.

“This mission demonstrates the power of dual-use design — we’re not just adapting existing technology, we’re creating a platform that excels at both missions simultaneously,” he said. “By building on our commercial FireSat foundation, we can deliver operational value immediately while proving scalability for future defense missions.”

Under the Other Transaction Authority award, SSC’s System Delta 810 “will work to mature and integrate the payload technology and plans to launch three satellites, through prototype demonstrations, for further commercial environmental monitoring Data as a Service integration and evaluation,” the release explained.

An SSC spokesperson told Breaking Defense today that the “projected launch timeline for the first two demos is late 2027 and the third in early 2028.”

System Delta 810 is the Space Force’s acquisition unit responsible for Space-Based Sensing & Targeting programs. The delta’s Data as a Service strategy is looking at opportunities to buy commercial data and information services rather than build new, service-bespoke satellites in order to more rapidly on-board new capabilities and save money.

The Space Force has been struggling to fill gaps in weather coverage by its own dedicated satellites — gaps that are expected to widen with the Trump administration’s planned funding decreases for weather monitoring by partner organizations NASA and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

Specifically, the new award to Muon will fund modification of the company’s multispectral infrared imaging payload, Quickbeam, “to add additional spectral bands, creating the Quickbeam-S variant to meet the unique environmental monitoring mission needs” of the joint force, according to the SSC release. Quickbeam-S will be “a cross-track scanning multispectral imager, with nine spectral channels spanning, visible through infrared spectral regions.”

Muon’s prototypes will support missions such as “aviation flight planning, maritime ship routing, satellite launch operations, and theater ground and airborne operations, where tracking of weather phenomena like fog, precipitation, dust and sandstorms can be critical to mission success,” the SSC release explained. In a press release from Muon today, Dyer stressed the dual-use capabilities of FireSat.

While the Defense Department’s legislation authorizing its use SBIR grants lapsed with the end of the 2025 fiscal year on Oct. 1, an SSC spokesperson said that the award to Muon was signed on Sept. 12, using FY25 funding.

‘Clean those bastards out’: Small business fund used by DoD teeters on the edge

WASHINGTON — While all eyes were on the efforts to avert a government shutdown at the end of September, a lesser known tool used by the Pentagon to support small companies was left fighting for its own life: the Small Business Innovation Research program.

As of eight days ago, funding for SBIR lapsed, and while it could be restored, lawmakers are at a hard impasse about whether it should be — at least in its current form.

The program, launched in 1982 and administered by the Small Business Administration, provides seed funding to small businesses for technology development, with the Defense Department as the largest participant of the program. 

Proponents say it’s an initiative with a proven track record of success, and that allowing funding to lapse permanently or enact reforms too aggressively will do irreparable damage to the small defense business ecosystem. But critics say it is not fulfilling its mandate, and that changes are needed to bring in new entrants and ensure repeat awardees eventually “graduate” from the program. 

“You look at the DoD in particular … 25 companies sucked up 18 percent of the [SBIR] funding at DoD and are not really producing,” Sen. Joni Ernst, chairwoman of the Senate Small Business and Entrepreneurship Committee, said in September at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. “It’s really like a negative investment strategy, because we’re pumping the money in but not getting anything back out.”

For now, the Pentagon has given guidance to companies stating that while current contracts “remain valid unless otherwise directed,” new solicitations are paused and pending awards will only proceed if fiscal 2025 funding is available, a department official told Breaking Defense in a statement.

“While the War Department’s Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) and Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) programs’ authorization lapsed, that does not mean ongoing work has been terminated,” the official said, using a secondary name for the Defense Department. “Until reauthorized, we encourage our small business partners to use this pause to assess how their capabilities align with Department needs. Once restored, the program and its functions will swiftly resume.”

It’s the longer term future of the program that appears most murky, in part because of a split in industry and its congressional supporters about how SBIR has, or has not, been exploited by some firms. 

At the center of the debate is the Investing in National Next-Generation Opportunities for Venture Acceleration and Technological Excellence (INNOVATE) Act proposed by Ernst, R-Iowa. The INNOVATE Act imposes new rules meant to root out the risks of foreign nations like China gaining control of US technology, and shifts some money from the Small Business Technology Transfer (SBTT) program to a new “Strategic Breakthrough” initiative aimed at helping companies bridge the timeline between developing a new technology and producing it.

However, the bill’s most controversial provision would create a $75 million cap on SBIR funds a company could win throughout its lifetime — a measure meant to force companies to move on from the program and find a wider market for their products in the commercial sector. 

Ernst and the venture-backed startup community contend that there are so-called “SBIR mills”— research and development firms that have historically specialized in winning SBIR contracts but do not typically compete for larger defense programs. Those firms, the critics say, soak up most of the funding made available, at the expense of new entrants who could use that money to scale technologies for mass production.

But defenders of the program state that eliminating longstanding SBIR winners would punish companies who have a track record of successfully developing and producing technology for the Defense Department.

“All that we’re saying is that, why can’t everybody compete?” said Jay Rozzi, vice president and principal engineer for Creare, a research and development company that could be forced out of the SBIR program under an award cap. “Why can’t the market be open for everyone?”

A Political Stalemate

The House passed a clean, one-year extension for the SBIR/STTR programs in mid-September. But although that bill was backed on a bipartisan basis by members of the House Small Business Committee, the Senate has yet to vote on the measure.

On Sept. 30, with just hours counting down before the program lapsed, Massachusetts Sen. Ed Markey, the top Democrat on the Senate Small Business Committee, took to the Senate floor to seek agreement to bring the House bill up for a vote, defending the ability for companies to win multiple SBIR awards.

“These programs work because of their merit-based competition nature. Darwinian, paranoia-inducing competition,” he said. “Kicking successful companies out of these programs would be like cutting your highest scorers after winning the NBA title.”

However, Ernst made clear she would oppose any effort to pass a clean extension of the program and offered her own substitute proposal: A 30-day extension, during which the $75 million lifetime cap on awards would be in effect.

“If my colleagues truly oppose even basic safeguards, then this SBIR set-aside charade should end, and taxpayer dollars should be restored to the agency’s R&D budgets where they will better serve our warfighters and strengthen our nation’s competitiveness,” she said in a speech on the floor. “Instead of recklessly extending the status quo for another year, these set aside dollars would simply be returned to each agency. And small businesses can continue to compete for those awards.”

In the end, both Ernst and Markey objected to each others’ proposals, effectively cancelling each other out and leaving the SBIR program in limbo.

RELATED: The $35 billion question: Is SBIR funding delivering for America’s warfighters?

In the wake of the failed vote, bipartisan leaders from two House committees called on the Senate to pass a short-term extension.

“The House came together across party lines to pass a one-year extension that would provide certainty to Main Street while Congress worked toward a strong, long-term reauthorization. Without it, research could be delayed, innovation diminished, and America’s competitive edge on the world stage eroded,” said House Committee on Small Business Chairman Roger Williams, Ranking Member Nydia M. Velázquez (D-NY), House Science, Space, and Technology Committee Chairman Brian Babin and Ranking Member Zoe Lofgren in a Sept. 30 statement.

In a statement to Breaking Defense, a Democratic spokeswoman for the Senate Small Business Committee said that Markey continues to support a one-year extension of the program, which would allow time for both parties to negotiate a longer extension. Otherwise, she said, the SBIR and STTR programs will end.

“Senator Markey will continue to show up to the table and negotiate with Senate Republicans on SBIR/STTR, but the uncertainty for small businesses will be detrimental to innovation,” she said. “By being the only Republican leader to not support the one year extension, R&D funds would go back to the participating agencies, forcing small businesses to compete with bigger businesses. She [Ernst] is leaving small businesses behind.”

A Republican congressional aide responded, “The reason small businesses and others are unable to access funding right now is because of the Schumer Shutdown.” (While the government shutdown is also complicating funding for the SBIR program, SBIR reauthorization can occur independently of solving the shutdown.)

Industry groups and SBIR recipients said there doesn’t appear to be a clear path forward to end the stalemate.

“It does seem to be that there is an impasse,” said Eric Blatt, the executive director of the Alliance for Commercial Technology in Government, which represents startups and the commercial tech sector. “My sense is that there really has not been much progress toward the middle.”

 A Need To Reform SBIR? 

While the debate on repeat winners of SBIR funds has overwhelmed the discussion over the INNOVATE Act, which the Alliance supports, Blatt said the industry group does not see that issue as its most important reform. Rather, he pointed to the new Strategic Breakthrough initiative meant to help firms transition technologies into production as the “breakthrough reform.”

The SBIR award cap “was priority number five or so in our goals for SBIR reauthorization this year,” he said. “So our viewpoint is that we should find something between massive reforms that kick all these companies out of the program and no reforms at all.”

At the same time, Blatt said that SBIR authorization needs to come with an updated commercialization benchmark that all firms must meet to receive funds.

“There is a lot of resentment in the [startup] community that goes after SBIR awards, that 20 percent of the money is going to companies that are just doing research and development and are not able to create, whether by intent or just lack of capacity, they are not creating products and services that are competitive on the open market,” he said.

However, Alliance chairman Warren Katz noted that some of the organizations’ members want to see Ernst continue her aggressive posture toward rooting out repeat SBIR winners.

“Our constituencies are going to be greatly harmed by the SBIR either being delayed or canceled. The SBIR mill community will actually be positively decimated. They’ll be killed off entirely,” he said. “Now, if you ask some of our membership: Would you just bite the bullet and take whatever deal you can get to get the SBIR program back on track and let the SBIR mills stay in the system, and let them continue to be parasites? Half of our constituency would probably say yes to that question. 

“The other half would probably say, ‘Fuck it. Finally clean those bastards out. Get rid of them. I’ll take the hit for a year.’”

When There’s ‘No Commercial Market’

Executives at firms who have repeatedly won SBIR contracts argue that their firms fill a particular niche in the program, as they are scoped to develop and produce low-volume, military-specific technologies for which there is no commercial market — opportunities that venture-backed startups for dual-use tech would not be interested in.

For example, Physical Sciences Inc. is working on specialty battery technology that can be used by the Navy in undersea applications, said William Marinelli, CEO of the Massachusetts-based research and development company. Because those batteries must conform to stricter safety standards than those used in electric vehicles, no commercial option is readily available.

Another such product, created by Creare and sold to the Navy, allows the sea service to repair the landing cables aboard aircraft carriers while at sea, Rozzi said.

“There’s no commercial market for this. There’s no commercial supplier that you could go to find it. There’s no one that you could ask to do the NRE [non-recurring engineering] to develop it, because you’re only going to sell 30 of them, or 36 of them when you make them,” Rozzi said. “That’s where companies like Creare and many of the multiple award winners step in. They have the infrastructure. They can build these things. They can go through the difficult qualification processes. They can withstand the often fickle and non-linear procurement process at DoD.”

Both Marinelli and Rozzi also noted that their companies’ ratio of SBIR work and production contracts has shifted over time. Marrinelli said about 59 percent of PSI’s revenue currently comes from SBIR contracts. However, it used to be the opposite, and will shift again once PSI’s current development contracts switch to their production phase, he said.

Meanwhile, Creare gets “substantially more” of its revenue from non-SBIR sources, Rozzi said, a change that he attributed to the military services making improvements to carry technologies from development to production.

All three SBIR awardees who spoke to Breaking Defense expressed concern about how a long lapse in SBIR/STTR authorization could impact businesses.

“If I were a much smaller company and a startup where I was looking at maybe one or two or three awards that were supporting my company, I would probably be very concerned right now about what’s happening with the program,” Marinelli said. “Assuming that the current state continues for a while, the people who are going to be hurt the most in the short term are going to be the people that INNOVATE seems to want to elevate.”

One CEO from a small technology startup that recently won its first SBIR contract, who asked not to be identified to speak freely about his firm’s financial status, said that the company’s other revenue streams would be enough to keep it going during the government shutdown and reauthorization pause. However, he described the situation as “frustrating,” noting that the lapse had delayed future contracting opportunities that are pivotal for startups seeking to scale.

“For small startups like us, SBIRs are a critical influx of cash, and also they show investors interest from the DoD,” the CEO said. “Especially when the DoD is your main customer, those SBIRs are a lifeline.”

But when asked whether he would like to see Ernst continue to hold out against a clean-sheet reauthorization, the CEO acknowledged that there was no easy answer.

“I would love to see something to start preventing the SBIR mills from taking advantage of the program. But, I mean, I know there’s a lot of nuance to it,” he said.

As US military boosts posture in Caribbean, how does Venezuela’s navy stack up?

WASHINGTON — In response to an American buildup in the Caribbean, Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro has pledged there is “no way” the US could invade the South American nation, as the nation was well prepared to defend its sovereignty.

And while Maduro may be handing out weapons to civilians to aid any fight on land, the potential for conflict — and the presence of US Navy ships in the region — also raises the question of Venezuelan capabilities at sea.

While official statistics are hard to come by, videos and statements uploaded by the Venezuelan government and military, as well as analysis by experts, provide an idea of what works. Or rather, floats.

The analysts told Breaking Defense that what’s formally known as the Bolivarian Navy of Venezuela likely has limited capabilities in the open water, as questions remain regarding the fleet’s marquee vessels like submarines and frigates.

The service likely has “brown and green water capabilities, so [the fleet] can conduct operations at a limited range,” Andrea Resende, a maritime security scholar and professor of international relations at Belo Horizonte University in Brazil.

Most recently, the coastal defense Exercise Luisa Caceres de Arismendi took place last weekend, and a video uploaded by the service shows transport vessels Los Llanos and Goajira transporting amphibious landing vehicles.

In September, the Navy conducted Exercise Sovereign Caribbean 200 (Caribe Soberano 200) close to La Orchila Island, during which Los Llanos also participated, as well as the amphibious landing ship Capana. Also in September, Exercise Cumanagoto 200 took place. The service announced in a social media video that the exercises featured the Capana, the transport ship Los Hermanos, the coastal patrol vessel Serreta, and what appeared to be three Iranian Peykaap II speedboats. Each exercise was carried out in coastal waters, not in the high seas.

Those exercises, like others in recent years, however, did not show bigger ticket vessels Venezuela is known to have sailed in the past, such as submarines or frigates.

Resende said the subs are probably “not operative, as far as scholars and analysts know.” On paper, the service has two submarines that were built in the 1970s, Sabalo and Caribe. A video uploaded to the Navy’s social media account in April appears to show a sub identified as the Sabalo in a hangar at the Dianca shipyard.

Another unknown is that status of the fleet’s main surface ships, the Mariscal Sucre-class frigates, which were acquired from Italy in the early 1980s.

Defense news agencies Defensa.com and Infodefensa reported in late 2022 that frigate Almirante Brión was in a Dianca dry dock undergoing maintenance. In January 2023, the shipyard released a photo of a ship bearing Almirante Brión’s hull number, F-22. Neither the shipyard nor the Navy have announced if the warship formally returned to service.

Caracas has not issued statements regarding the status of the heaviest warships and no reliable image of any frigate at sea appears in social media channels reviewed by Breaking Defense.

The two main Venezuelan shipyards, Dianca and Ucocar, announced the successful repair and return to service of some smaller ships in the last few weeks, including the combat patrol vessel Victoria, the transport vessel Los Frailes and the patrol ship Yavire.

Andrei Serbin Pont, president of the CRIES think tank, noted that even if a ship is seaworthy, it is not necessarily well equipped. The Guaqueri-class oceanic patrol vessels (also classified as corvettes) “were never properly armed and today depend on improvised solutions like the integration of C-802 missiles, or an Iranian variant” and the installation of a “ZU-23 anti-aircraft gun, which is unfit for naval operations,” Serbin Pont said. (In 2024, Venezuelan Defense Minister Vladimir Padrino López inaugurated the Navy’s center for CM-90 missiles of Iranian origin.)

Some Venezuelan vessels are known to have been lost or compromised in non-combat operations. The patrol vessel Warao hit reefs during exercises with Brazil in 2012, and there are no confirmed reports that it ever returned to service. More recently, the patrol vessel Naiguatá sank in 2020 after colliding with the luxury cruise ship Resolute during a bizarre incident in the Caribbean.

This does not mean that the Navy lacks some coastal deterrence capabilities, like the Peykaap III speedboats with missile launching capabilities acquired from Iran. Moreover, in 2022, the Venezuelan navy released online two sets of photos appearing to show the Iranian Fajr-1 multiple rocket launch system installed aboard Damen Interceptor 1102 speedboats (and a Tiuna tactical vehicle).

Still, protecting the Venezuelan sea of any maritime invaders will be the responsibility of aircraft, not ships. “The new UAVs produced with Iran’s assistance may assist in defensive measures against foreign threats,” Resend theorized, but ultimately, they “are not enough to create maritime deterrence.”

A similar opinion was shared by Serbin Pont, who said he believes “most anti-surface capabilities” among the Venezuelan armed forces are found in the Air Force, not the Navy. The “real deterrence power” of the South American nation are their Sukhoi warplanes, equipped with Kh-31 missiles, he added.

“I consider the Venezuelan Navy at the verge of obsolescence,” Resende concluded.