Advance Notice - OUSD BAAs

The Naval Information Warfare Center (NIWC) Atlantic, in collaboration with the Office of Undersecretary of Defense Research & Engineering, plans to release three Broad Agency Announcements (BAAs) in Fiscal Year 2021, starting in the second quarter. These BAAs aim to advance 5th Generation mobile network (5G) technologies across three primary focus areas. The first BAA, OUSD 5G Open, targets accelerating the use of innovative applications such as smart facilities, spectral agility, seamless connectivity between terrestrial and satellite networks, as well as advanced topics including enhancing network resilience through redundancy and implementing zero trust architectures. The second BAA, Operate Through, emphasizes securely operating indigenous 5G networks to meet mission security requirements, accredited modifications, and strategies to mitigate market manipulations over untrusted networks. The third BAA, Innovate 5G, seeks to demonstrate next-generation technologies focusing on distributed MIMO networking, scaling MIMO for millimeter-wave frequencies, and enabling extreme spectral freedom. Each BAA will contain specific submission requirements and evaluation criteria upon release. The technical point of contact for these efforts is Colin Thomas, while Vandy Inman serves as the contracts contact. This initiative supports the Department of Defense’s efforts to maintain technological superiority in 5G networks, ensuring secure, resilient, and advanced communication capabilities for military and defense applications. The contract falls under NAICS code 541715 and is managed out of NIWC Atlantic’s office in North Charleston, South Carolina.