Erin Duffley

Erin Duffley serves as a key procurement professional within the Air Force Research Laboratory’s Physical, Engineering, and Life Sciences division, supporting the Department of the Air Force’s mission to accelerate innovation in autonomous sensing, target recognition, and next-generation microelectronics. She manages complex research and development contracts aligned with advanced defense technologies, ensuring alignment with strategic priorities in artificial intelligence, machine learning, and sensor exploitation for air and space domain dominance. Her acquisitions focus on high-risk, high-reward R&D efforts requiring technical precision and rapid prototyping, often involving interdisciplinary teams and classified environments. Duffley maintains longstanding relationships with leading defense technology contractors including Northrop Grumman Systems Corporation, Raytheon Company, and Matrix Research Inc., engaging them on multi-year, performance-based R&D initiatives. These partnerships are characterized by collaborative technical integration, agile contract modifications, and iterative development cycles tailored to evolving operational requirements. Her procurement approach emphasizes technical merit, innovation readiness, and mission-critical performance over cost alone, fostering deep vendor engagement in early-stage concept development. Duffley’s contracting portfolio reflects a strong preference for unrestricted competition, with 100% of awards issued under the No Set-Aside category. She does not routinely utilize socioeconomic set-asides such as 8(a), HUBZone, or SDVOSB programs, instead prioritizing technical capability and scale to meet the demanding requirements of advanced R&D in physical and engineering sciences. Her primary procurement focus is on NAICS 541715—Research and Development in the Physical, Engineering, and Life Sciences—encompassing advanced sensor systems, signal processing algorithms, autonomous decision architectures, and microelectronic component development. She consistently procures services involving computational modeling, hardware-in-the-loop testing, and AI-driven data exploitation, supporting the lab’s mission to field next-generation capabilities for the U.S. Air Force and Space Force.