Requests for Information (RFI) For Networking for Autonomy

Solicitation Number: RFI-RIK-17-01 Notice Type: Special Notice Synopsis: Requests for Information (RFI) For Networking for Autonomy FEDERAL AGENCY NAME: Department of Air Force, Air Force Materiel Command, AFRL - Rome Research Site, AFRL/Information Directorate, 26 Electronic Parkway, Rome, NY, 13441-4514 1.0 GENERAL INFORMATION 1.1 THIS IS A REQUEST FOR INFORMATION (RFI) ONLY. This RFI is issued solely for information and planning purposes and does not constitute a Request for Proposal (RFP) or a promise to issue a RFP in the future. This request for information does not commit the Government to contract for any supply or service whatsoever. Further, the Air Force is not at this time seeking proposals and will not accept unsolicited proposals. Responders are advised that the U.S. Government will not pay for any information or administrative costs incurred in response to this RFI. All costs associated with responding to this RFI will be solely at the interested party's expense. Not responding to this RFI does not preclude participation in any future RFP, if any is issued. If a solicitation is released, it will be synopsized on the Federal Business Opportunities (FedBizOpps) website. It is the responsibility of the potential offerors to monitor this site for additional information pertaining to this requirement. 1.2 FEEDBACK. Submission of an abstract is voluntary. Respondents are advised that AFRL is under no obligation to provide feedback with respect to any information submitted under this RFI. 1.3 REGULATORY GUIDANCE. This publication constitutes a Request for Information (RFI) as defined in Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) 15.201(e), "RFIs may be used when the Government does not presently intend to award a contract, but wants to obtain price, delivery, other market information, or capabilities for planning purposes. Responses to these notices are not offers and cannot be accepted by the Government to form a binding contract." 2.0 REQUEST FOR INFORMATION (RFI) The Air Force Research Laboratory, Information Directorate (AFRL/RI) is seeking information to better understand existing vendor offerings and the landscape of research and development (R&D) towards tactical airborne networking for autonomous systems. The Air Force is investigating networking and communications technologies to enable future autonomous manned/unmanned teaming capabilities. It is interested in solutions across all layers of the protocol stack, but is primarily focused on protocols for the application, transport, and network layers. As such, this RFI is requesting information to better understand existing vendor offerings and the landscape of research and development (R&D) towards tactical airborne networking for autonomous systems. Technical Challenge: Network requirements of future autonomous machine-to-machine (M2M) and manned/unmanned teaming (MUM-T) applications will differ drastically from requirements for current applications. New networking paradigms will be required before we can successfully implement these autonomous M2M and MUM-T systems. Additionally, future autonomous systems will need to reliably operate in highly contested environments. Therefore, we will need new protocols across all layers of the protocol stack that will be able to achieve the latency, bandwidth, reliability, and quality of service (QoS) requirements of autonomous applications. We will also need to consider both the topology and the information exchange patterns necessary for M2M and MUM-T applications. Current commercial and military networking protocols are designed based on unicast or limited multicast information exchange paradigms in which one client (or a small set of clients) has a need for some information. For example, ISR collects and PPLI both require information from multiple sensors to be "collected" at a small number of processing nodes. Autonomous systems differ in that the information from one autonomous node often needs to be disseminated to as many other nodes as possible. These systems often use learning engines. The performance of these engines is often dependent on the amount, quality, and timeliness of the information about the rest of the nodes in the network. In other words, the quality of the autonomous system as a whole is partially dependent on the quality of the network. Finally, we must also consider size, weight, power, and cost (SWAP-C) requirements for these systems. These M2M and MUM-T networks will likely be highly heterogeneous. They will likely include high end nodes such as 5th generation fighters as well as attritable small unmanned aerial systems (SUAS) with severe SWAP-C constraints. Trade-Space Considerations: There are several technical objectives that must be balanced to create future networking capabilities for autonomous systems including, but not be limited to: - Application Layer: New application layer protocols to meet the requirements of emerging autonomy applications. - Transport Layer: Maintain congestion control and maximize end-to-end reliability with severe latency restrictions, fairly share resources across multiple data flows with different requirements - Network Layer: Multipath and/or pathless routing, low overhead routing and network management, flexible QoS and admission control, routing in highly dynamic environments - Link and topology control: distributed topology control for omnidirectional and directional systems, link-layer reliability, and topology agility in the presence of intentional interference. - System architecture: Readily extensible & evolvable architecture, distributed fault-tolerant network interoperability, and synchronized operations across multiple missions. - Dynamic nodes: The nodes in the network are rapidity changing in relationship to each other in terms of distance and joining/leaving the network. For each proposed technology, the respondent should indicate its current Technology Readiness Level (TRL). For the to-be-designed technologies, the respondent should provide the timeframe and rough cost estimate (non-binding) needed to reach TRL-6 with an implementation on hardware. 3.0 REQUEST FOR INFORMATION (RFI) ABSTRACTS 3.1 CONTENT NO CLASSIFIED INFORMATION SHOULD BE INCLUDED IN THE RFI RESPONSE. 3.2 FORMAT All abstracts shall state that they are submitted in response to this announcement. The abstracts will be formatted as follows: Section A: A cover page identifying the company or organization, street address, and the names, emails and telephone numbers of the point of contact. In the case of partnerships, please provide the appropriate information for the lead POC. Also provide a short summary statement of the company's or party's experience/capabilities and a short summary of the organization's experience in the areas described above. This section is not included in the page count. Section B: Technical Summary. The Government is assessing the current state-of-the-art and future directional networking solutions. The RFI responses should describe the product solution proposed, address coverage of the requirements stated in this RFI by the proposed solution, explain the potential advantage to the Air Force, and provide a rough order of magnitude for the cost of the proposed solution. The abstracts shall be limited to 8 pages. All abstracts shall be double spaced with a font no smaller than 12pt font. All responses to this announcement must be addressed to the POCs, as discussed in Section 6.0 of this announcement. Respondents are required to submit at least one electronic copy to the Government technical point of contact (TPOC) in Microsoft Office Word. 3.3 ADDITIONAL INFORMATION. The submitted documentation and content thereof becomes the property of the U.S. Government and will not be returned. No solicitation documents exist at this time. This is NOT an Invitation for Bid (IFB) or a Request for Proposal (RFP). The Government does not intend to award a contract on the basis of this request. This is a request for information announcement for planning purposes only. The Government will not reimburse costs associated with the documentation submitted under this request. Responders are solely responsible for all expenses associated with responding to this inquiry. Although proposal terminology may be used in this inquiry, your response will be treated as information only and will not be used as a proposal. This announcement is not to be construed as a formal solicitation. It does not commit the Government to reply to information received, or to later publish a solicitation, or to award a contract based on this information. 3.4 PROPRIETARY INFORMATION. This notice is part of Government market research. Information received as a result of this request will be considered as sensitive and will be protected as such. Any company or industry proprietary information contained in responses should be clearly marked as such, by paragraph, such that publicly releasable and proprietary information are clearly distinguished. Any proprietary information received in response to this request will be properly protected from unauthorized disclosure. The Government will not use proprietary information submitted from any one source to establish the capability and requirements for any future acquisition, so as to inadvertently restrict competition. 4.0 INDUSTRY DISCUSSIONS. AFRL/RI representatives may or may not choose to meet with potential offerors. Such discussions would only be intended to get further clarification of potential capability to meet the requirements. 5.0 SPECIAL CONSIDERATIONS. Multiple abstracts within the purview of this RFI announcement may be submitted by each responder. 7.0 SUBMISSION. RFI abstract due date is March 1, 2017. 8.0 AGENCY CONTACTS. Verification of government receipt or questions of a technical nature can be directed to the cognizant technical points of contact (TPOCs): Primary TPOC Secondary TPOC Dr. Scott Pudlewski Kurt Turck Telephone: 315-330-4405 Telephone: 315-330-4379 Email: scott.pudlewski.1@us.af.mil Email: kurt.turck@us.af.mil Questions of a contractual/business nature shall be directed to the cognizant Contracting Officer, as specified below: Gail Marsh Telephone: (315) 330-7518 Email: gail.marsh@us.af.mil