Thornberry’s Buying Bill Adds Bureaucracy, Helps Biz With IP

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http://breakingdefense.com/2016/03/thornberrys-buying-bill-adds-bureaucracy-helps-biz-with-ip/

Thornberry’s Buying Bill Adds Bureaucracy, Helps Biz With IP
By Colin Clark on March 17, 2016 at 4:01 AM

CAPITOL HILL: Rep. Mac Thornberrry’s proposed legislation to help fix Pentagon procurement was unveiled with a background press briefing by staff members, who touted its benefits of “transparency” and “accountability.” But some staff believe the chairman of the House Armed Services Committee’s legislation may not be as exciting or as fundamental as was said in the briefing. In fact, the bill actually introduces more bureaucracy, they argue.

“The big area of disagreement is the overall weight of new micromanagement and bureaucracy the bill includes. For example, the DoD already has authority and the ability to do open systems designs and prototyping. On open systems, the bill mandates a ‘one size fits all’ approach to weapon system design, in statute, rather than leaving the services flexibility to use open systems when they need to, and not use it when they don’t,” one Hill staffer writes.

“Open systems isn’t a panacea or a magic wand; it is simply one design approach that isn’t applicable in all cases. By adding mandates and certifications regarding open system design, it will just clog up an already painfully slow acquisition process,” the aide predicts.

The Defense Department has pressed hard for new authorities to allow them to build prototypes to test technology in the early stages of a weapon system, and Thornberry’s bill proposes what it casts as new authorities. While the proposed bill would apply only to “component prototypes” and not the entire weapon, the staffer argues that the Pentagon, “already has lots of authorities, and funding, to do prototypes.” Some of those are enshrined already in the most recent National Defense Authorization Act but those “haven’t even been implemented yet.” Thornberry’s bill places new restrictions on what the Defense Department is already doing by placing a time limit of three years and funding limits of a pretty paltry $5 million, though it does grant the Defense Secretary the authority to grant a waiver of up to $25 million. It also mandates a new “board” in each military service to supervise component prototypes.