Wide Field of View Testbed Program Research & Development

Wide Field of View Testbed Program Research and Development - Pre-Solicitation Notice for Development Planning Directorate Extension of Infrared Sensor Systems and Hosted Payload Research and Development effort General Information Contracting Office Address Department of the Air Force, Air Force Space Command, SMC - Space and Missiles System Center/XRC, 483 North Aviation Blvd, Suite 1037-A2, El Segundo, CA, 90245-2808 Contracting Officer Kathleen E. Scholefield, SMC/XRC, 310-653-9679 General Information Point of Contact Shelby C. Sommer, SMC/XRC, 310-653-9650 Description Classification Code: A - Other Space - Advanced Development NAICS Code: 541380 - Testing Laboratories (except medical, veterinary) Notice #: 14-021 Procurement Type: Special Notice - Notice of Intent to Sole Source THIS IS NOT A REQUEST FOR COMPETITIVE PROPOSALS. The Department of the Air Force, Space and Missile Systems Center (SMC) intends to extend a sole source contract to Space Dynamics Laboratory (SDL), a University Affiliated Research Center (UARC), at Utah State University for the research and development of sensor systems. SMC/XR awarded this contract to SDL on 1 May 2009. The Government intends to extend the current SDL contract period of performance for an additional five years in order to complete on-going efforts and ensure available support for emerging infrared and hosted payload projects. The period of performance extension will increase the contract cost ceiling by $37M. Additionally, this contract modification will update the Statement of Work (SOW) by removing the Third Generation Infrared Surveillance (3GIRS) specific wording in accordance with the original acquisition plan. This contract modification will provide SMC support in the following specific areas: - 1. Increasing the Technology Readiness Level of full-earth Wide-Field-of-View (WFOV) Infrared (IR) systems, related components, and supporting architecture through test and evaluation, software development, data processing, and hosted payloads. - 2. Software development and data processing efforts including data compression/decompression, data visualization, data exploitation, data fusion, data processing, handling, and analysis. Current efforts in this area include, generating, implementing, testing, and performance assessment of potential new signal processing algorithms. - 3. Modeling and simulation related to optics, structures, thermal characteristics, controls systems, pointing, contamination, orbit propagation, image processing, and scene generation. Over the past five years providing UARC support to SMC on the Third Generation Infrared Surveillance (3GIRS) and follow-on programs, SDL has consistently demonstrated its ability to meet Government requirements across a broad spectrum of technical disciplines. Any interested Party must demonstrate its capabilities in the following areas of expertise: - 1. The ability to design and develop; fabricate, assemble, handle, and integrate; and analyze, test, and evaluate sensor systems and components. This includes the ability to design, manufacture, test, and model cryogenic systems and thermal design; - 2. Electronics assembly, including: cable and harness assembly, box and electronics assembly, integration, and inspection. - 3. Vibration isolation and jitter control methods; - 4. Sensor calibration, characterization, testing, and evaluation. Must have capability to do both environmental testing and sensor calibration, including facilities capable of accomplishing environmental testing such as thermal-vac, vibration, and EMI/EMC - 5. Ability to perform relative spectral responsivitiy using Fourier transform spectrometry and cryogenic IR sensor calibration equipment. - 6. Development of test plans and analysis of test data. To accomplish future program objectives and meet near-term program milestones, Interested parties must be intimately familiar with WFOV IR staring sensors, have prior experience in the calibration of staring WFOV OPIR sensors with large format focal plane arrays, and also familiar with the current industry efforts in infrared sensing and hosted payload portfolios. Interested parties must be capable of supporting full environmental testing in and sensor calibration in Q1/Q2 of fiscal year 2016. Interested parties must operate facilities at and employ personnel cleared with Secret, TS and TS/SCI. SMC requires access to an institution with the following core competencies: 1) Knowledge of and expertise in space-flight hardware development, integration, test, and delivery enabling optimization of sensor designs for highest mission performance (e.g. contamination control, stray light mitigation), lowest schedule risk (e.g. minimizes sensor redesign), and ability to accommodate/test hardware in existing calibration facilities. 2) The ability to design, implement, and execute NIST traceable calibration campaigns to enable the collection of high fidelity sensor and facility (truth) data. Expertise is required in analyzing and generating calibration products derived from this ground and on-orbit collected spatial, spectral, and radiometric data. These products are delivered to mission data processing centers to enable on-orbit processing. 3) Sensor simulation is necessary for algorithm development, test and validation. Simulated raw data is generated from a cohesive sensor model which includes performance of all the sub-systems (e.g. thermal, optical, structural, detector, electronics noise, contamination, and jitter). Models and simulation also provide predictions of on-orbit conditions which must be replicated during ground calibration to provide a representative environment. 4) The capability to develop both calibration and mission algorithms for wide field-of-view sensors (e.g. CHIRP). Experience with developing a mission data processing capability to prototype, tune, and validate algorithms for real-time processing. The information contained herein is based on the best information available at the time of publication, is subject to revision, and is not binding on the Government. This notice is for informational purposes only and is not a request for competitive proposals or a solicitation of offers. Interested parties, including small and small disadvantaged businesses, may identify their interest and statement of technical capabilities, and submit information. Information shall not exceed 10 one-sided pages in length, must be in MS Word 2002 or higher or PDF format, and font no smaller than 12 point. A minimum DoD security clearance of Secret is mandatory. Interested parties must show capability to fulfill the Government's immediate need for the effort described above. The capabilities statement should address why the company believes that the sole source justification is not valid. This notice expires 15 calendar days after publication. The NAICS code for this effort is 541380 and the small business size standard is $14 Million. Classification code A applies. Contractors interested in subcontracting opportunities are encouraged to contact SDL directly. The Government will not reimburse interested parties for any costs associated with submission of information or reimburse expenses incurred. Matters pertaining to this notification may be directed to Ms. Kathleen Scholefield at kathleen.scholefield@us.af.mil or to Mr. Shelby C. Sommer at shelby.sommer@us.af.mil.