Rhonda L. Powderly

Rhonda L. Powderly serves as a Contracting Officer within the Air Force Research Laboratory’s Propulsion Directorate (FA8650), where she manages complex research and development acquisitions critical to advancing U.S. air and space dominance. Her portfolio centers on next-generation aerospace propulsion systems, hypersonic technologies, and high-performance functional materials, ensuring the timely delivery of cutting-edge solutions through competitive, performance-based contracting. She plays a pivotal role in executing the agency’s mission to accelerate innovation by structuring solicitations that attract top-tier technical expertise and foster collaboration between government and industry. Her acquisitions typically involve cost-reimbursement, time-and-materials, and fixed-price incentive contracts under the authority of FAR Part 35 and DFARS Subpart 235. Powderly maintains enduring relationships with leading aerospace and defense contractors including UES INC, General Electric Company, DCS Corporation, Spirit AeroSystems Inc, and Advanced Thermoplastic Composites LLC. These partnerships are characterized by long-term, technically demanding engagements focused on propulsion system integration, adaptive flight control software, and advanced composite material development. She consistently engages these vendors through broad agency announcements, cooperative research agreements, and other flexible contracting vehicles designed to accommodate high-risk, high-reward R&D efforts requiring specialized engineering capabilities. Her procurement activity reflects a strict focus on open competition, with 100% of her awards issued under no set-aside provisions. While she does not prioritize socioeconomic set-asides such as 8(a), HUBZone, or SDVOSB programs, her approach emphasizes technical merit and mission readiness over socioeconomic categorization, ensuring that the most capable entities—regardless of size or certification—are selected to meet urgent national security requirements. Powderly’s contracting activity is exclusively aligned with NAICS 541712, Research and Development in the Physical, Engineering, and Life Sciences (except Biotechnology). She procures advanced materials, propulsion test hardware, computational fluid dynamics modeling services, and hypersonic flight validation systems, requiring deep domain expertise in aerospace engineering, thermodynamics, and materials science. Her work directly supports the development of next-generation propulsion architectures essential to maintaining U.S. technological superiority in air and space domains.