C5-25-1003 - C5ISR/EW Modular Open Suite of Standards (CMOSS) Mounted Form Factor (CMFF) Mounted Common Infrastructure (MCI) to members of the Consortium for Command, Control and Communications in Cyberspace (C5)

Active

Contract Opportunity

Army Contracting Command-NJ

Soldier Lethality Center

Subject: Request for Information (RFI) W15QKN-17-9-5555 Project C5-25-1003 for the C5ISR / EW Modular Open Suite of Standards (CMOSS) Mounted Form Factor (CMFF) Reference Architecture (RA), CMFF Digital Engineering (DE) Model, and Market Research Questionnaire

RFI Introduction:

** This RFI is for market research purposes only. The submission of information to the Government is not to be construed as a commitment by the Government to procure any items/services, or for the Government to pay for the information received. This CMFF RFI is part of a continuing market research effort by PM Mission Command to keep industry informed of CMFF design decisions and strategy. This RFI also includes a draft Statement of Work and Technical Demonstration Process for CMFF Mounted Common Infrastructure (MCI). **

To Respective vendors-RESPONSE - The Army Contracting Command (ACC), through Consortium Management Group (CMG), has released a Request for Information (RFI) regarding the Draft Statement of Need (SON) for project C5-25-1003, C5ISR/EW Modular Open Suite of Standards (CMOSS) Mounted Form Factor (CMFF) Mounted Common Infrastructure (MCI) to members of the Consortium for Command, Control and Communications in Cyberspace (C5). C5 Membership is required in order to respond to this RFI. For information on joining the C5 Consortium, please visit https://cmgcorp.org/c5/. RFI responses are due to CMG no later than 1700 EST 22 April 2024.

The Government requests that CMG only release the CMFF RFI 4 document marked (U) with the initial notification to CMG Members. Members who wish to gain access to the remaining documents (including CUI data) will need to 1) complete the Compliance Form, 2) sign the NDA, 3) supply proof of International Traffic In Arms Regulation (ITAR) compliance, and 4) self-certify that they are a member of the SOSA Consortium (the Government will verify against the known membership roster).

Members requesting access to the remaining data will need to submit the requested information through CMG for release to the Government via DoD Safe Drops. The Government will validate the provided data and inform CMG and the ACC if the Member is approved or denied access to the CUI data. Upon approval, CMG will be authorized to release the remaining information to the approved vendor via DoDSAFE. RFI responses and requests for technical documents to rwp@cmgcorp.org.

The Army has defined a suite of open architecture industry and Army standards to enable the reduction of Command, Control, Communications, Computers, Cyber, Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance (C5ISR)/Electronic Warfare (EW) system size, weight and power – cooling (SWaP-C) and ensure commonality across multiple platforms by enabling the sharing of hardware and software components among multiple C5ISR and Integrated Electronic Warfare System (IEW&S) missions (i.e. multi-mission/multi-function). In January 2021 the Army approved an Abbreviated – Capability Development Document (A-CDD) for C5ISR/Electronic Warfare (C5ISR/EW) Modular Open Suite of Standards (CMOSS) Mounted Form Factor (CMFF) to establish an initial set of Army requirements desired to develop and employ these standards in prototypes for operational assessment.

The CMFF A-CDD establishes requirements for a prototype that minimizes the need for platform specific integration, and enables the fielding of evolutionary capabilities without the need for additional cabling or mounts, or upgrades to the CMFF chassis. This CMFF capability is governed by the CMFF Reference Architecture which is guided and derived from technical requirements found in the CMOSS Interoperability Requirements Specification (IRS), specifically including the Sensor Open System Architecture (SOSATM), Future Airborne Capability Environment (FACE), Vehicular Integration for C4ISR/EW Interoperability (VICTORY), and the Modular Open RF Architecture (MORA). CMFF also includes requirements from the Standardized A-Kit Vehicle Envelope (SAVE) and the Mounted Mission Command (MMC) Environmental Specifications documents. These standards will enable CMFF to drastically improve the reliability, reusability, interoperability, and interchangeability of CMFF system components to include the chassis, payload cards, radio conditioning devices, radioheads, and key software modules.

Army Capability Manager Tactical Radios (ACM TR) has coordinated directly with representatives from Program Executive Office Command, Control, Communications – Tactical (PEO C3T), PEO Intelligence, Electronic Warfare and Sensors (IEW&S), and PEO Aviation for the development of Annexes to the A-CDD. These annexes included with the A-CDD provide initial performance parameters for development of CMFF payload card capabilities and supporting peripheral devices to enable tactical radio communications, electronic warfare (EW), positioning navigation and timing (PNT), mission command, data storage, local computing and switching infrastructure, and sensor capabilities for all mounted platforms, to include Aviation. CMFF systems and their payload cards will need to be simple and intuitive to install, operate, and maintain by Soldiers, and be resilient, reliable, and available to operate in all operational air and ground environments and against any enemy.

CMFF will move the implementation of C5ISR/EW capabilities away from costly and complex “stovepiped” federated legacy systems or line replaceable units (LRUs) on individual platforms. The layered standards within CMFF will make it simpler and more cost-effective to introduce new capabilities and keep pace with commercial technology by reducing complex integration challenges, eliminating proprietary interfaces, and enabling greater competition and reuse.

The RFI includes a revised Reference Architecture (RA) v0.8 whose intent is to provide Industry with updated guidance to continue refining and developing new products to provide suitable, survivable, and certifiable CMFF products to be used by the Army.

This RFI also includes a CMFF MagicDraw model that provides the authoritative source of requirements flowed down from SOSA to CMOSS to CMFF, as well as other requirements documents, and provides some notional logical and physical architectural views and products. The purpose of the CMFF MagicDraw model is to replace legacy .pdf style product specifications for future solicitations of CMFF. The model contains the technical performance requirements for the CMFF chassis and key interfaces to the Plug-In Cards (PIC). Plug in cards are intended to largely remain abstracted from this model, with only key interfaces documented from the chassis to the cards or between cards. The Army now requires that new contracts contain Digital Engineering (DE) requirements, and as such this model satisfies that DE requirement for CMFF. This release serves as an initial draft for industry comment.

The Army anticipates a future and separate release of a CMFF Mounted Common Infrastructure (MCI) Other Transaction Authority (OTA) Request for White Paper (RfWP) to acquire the hardware, software, and services described in the draft SOW from PM Mission Command. CMFF MCI under PM Mission Command is responsible for the chassis, power supplies, switches, cables/brackets, vehicle integration, and system of systems integration to bring payload capabilities from other PMs together in a holistic manner. However due to the prototyping nature of this initial capability the Government expects that the CMFF MCI contract will include complete systems aligned with at a minimum the Block 1 capabilities. Separate development and production contracts for payloads aligned with capabilities from future blocks are expected to be released and awarded separately from this effort. The army is also contemplating future production contract strategies.

The Army offers the below guidance for interested vendors:

Information Requested:

1. Provide comments, concerns, and constructive inputs to the DRAFT CMFF MCI SON, SOW, Reference Architecture (RA), MMC Environmental Specification, and CMFF MagicDrawModel. There is no limit to Comment Resolution Matrix (CRM)comments provided. Comments provided on the RAor Modelvia CRM will be reviewed by multiple Government Subject Matter Experts (SME), Federally funded research and development centers (FFRDCs), and support contractors and therefore should not include any proprietary content.

2.Provide comments to the draft technical demonstration process. Note that the draft CMFF Mounted Common Infrastructure(MCI)planned proposal process includes CMOSS compliance testing, functional demonstration, and limited environmental testing of proposed CMFF solution during the evaluation process.

a. Would you be able to demonstrate a minimum of two(2) fully operational CMFFMCI systems, including supporting ancillaries, which are Technology Readiness Level (TRL) 6 /Manufacturing Readiness Level(MRL)6, with your proposal 45 days after the RWP release date for technical demonstration and CMOSS compliance testing? If not, please explain the obstacle(s), reason(s) and estimated delivery time.

b. Would your operational CMFF MCI systems be capable of limited environmental testing within 45 days after RFwP release date as part of the technical demonstration?

c. Has your CMFF MCI system gone through environmental testing previously and can you provide test data or reports showing compliance to the MMC Environmental Specification for the common Ground and Aviation requirements? Ifyes, please provide the date, test location and name of the Test Agency that conducted the test.

3.Answer Targeted Questions:

a. Do you currently have production representative CMFF units available? If so, please indicate their state and how many.

b. Please identify high or medium risk areas in the CMFF MCI SOW.

c. Can your proposed CMFF solution meet all the SHALL requirements contained in the draft CMFF Model? If not, please explain the obstacle(s) and reason(s).

d. Please identify any performance requirements that cannot be met or maybe difficult to meet with your offered system. Please describe in detail the known or expected challenges that would prevent your system from being compliant with the requirements in the CMFF Model.

e. Are there any requirements that would cause substantial cost increase in the delivered price of your offered system due to either the cost of design modifications or increased production costs?

f. Explain any Internal Research and Development(IR&D) and/or technology insertion efforts that will enhance the offered system capabilities in order to meet the CMFF Model requirements, either prior to or following CMFFOTA contract award. Provide the scope of the development effort required to perform the modifications including estimated develop mental cost and schedule.

g. If your proposed CMFF solution is not currently NSA Type 1 certified, when is your proposed system expected to obtain the NSA Type 1 certification? Where is it in the process today?

h. Has your proposed CMFF solution received an Authorization to Operate (ATO) by the Risk Management Framework? If the system currently has an ATO please provide the date the ATO was granted and the DoD service component that provided the ATO. Please list, if any, inherited security controls from the host platform required to preserve a secure state for the radio platform interface.

i. Has your proposed CMFF solution been evaluated for airworthiness in accordance with DO-178C Level C objectives or equivalent? If not as a complete system, please provide the components (e.g., Chassis, Operating Environment (OE) software, etc.) evaluated and what the results of the evaluation were.

j. Has your proposed CMFF solution been tested in an operationally representative environment with a government test agency (ATC, OTC, ATEC, DOT&E, etc)? If yes, please provide the date and test location, and describe the operational environment test.

k. Do you have reason to believe your proposed CMFF solution cannot meet any of the Mean Time Between Failure (MTBF), Mean Time to Repair (MTTR), reliability, or availability requirements due to potential causes such as known hardware or software design deficiencies, hardware component limitations, and product intolerance of required environment, immature production processes, or an immature level of testing?

4. The Government is also asking Industry to provide their interest in allowing visits to their facilities that produce the CMFF MCI Chassis. The purpose of the site visit is for CMFF market research and to provide vendors an opportunity to demonstrate CMFF technology, the status of CMFF MCI Chassis non-developmental activities, and manufacturing capabilities. The Government is interested in demonstrations that support the questions above and that assist answer the TRL/MRL 6 assessments. Vendors interested in hosting the Secure Signal Infrastructure (S2I) Product Office representatives at their facilities will need to contact cynthia.a.grove.ctr@army.mil, PdM S2I in order to schedule the visit. The Government will only be available from April through June of 2024 to conduct site visits, and reserves the right to refuse invitations based on limited availability.

5. Provide Costing/Budgetary data - Because of the budgetary importance of current cost estimates, it is again requested that vendors provide anticipated unit costs for relevant products that provide the capabilities described above in quantities ranging from 1-49, 50-249, 250-499, categorized and broken down by the following major components:

a. System of Systems / Lead Prototype Integrator roles and responsibility cost estimates contained within the DRAFT SON and SOW.

b. CMFF Chassis (not inclusive of power supply unless embedded) to include common ground and air solutions.

c. Switch Cards (that include support for dual enclaves, PTP, and TSN)

d. Any Necessary Crypto Subsystem (CSS) Cards to support proposed SDR cards

e. Power Supply Cards

f. IO Intensive Single Board Computer (SBC) Cards

g. Payload SDR or SBC Cards which run current Tactical Radio Waveforms described in the CMFF RA blocking strategy or envisioned for future multi-mission operations.

h. APNT / Timing Radial Clock Cards with tightly coupled sensor fusion blending M-Code, ALTNAV and/ or external sensor solutions capable of being used on Ground or Aviation Platforms

i. Digital Radioheads capable of utilizing MORA that support the SDR cards and waveforms required by the blocking strategy.

j. VICTORY converters for streaming audio to a vehicle intercom device.

k. Low Cost ruggedized smart displays to provide the UI for CMFF Chassis payloads

l. Provide anticipated lead times after receipt of order (ARO) for the above components.

m. Provide current Technical Readiness Levels (TRL) and Manufacturing Readiness Level (MRL) of the proposed components listed above, including any products currently being fielded for DoD programs in a tactically relevant environment.

INSTRUCTIONS FOR ACCESS TO CMFF TECHNICAL DOCUMENTATION:

CMFF Technical Documentation access is limited to companies who are members of the SOSA Consortium. The Army also anticipates that the future RfWP will be limited to only those parties who are current members of the SOSA Consortium. To receive CMFF Technical Documentation, interested parties must supply proof of International Traffic In Arms Regulation (ITAR) compliance by submitting a copy of their Department of State, Defense Trade Controls Compliance (DDTC) registration statement with valid date (vendor may redact vendor registrant code), sign the PM Mission Command Non-Disclosure Agreement (NDA), and sign the Technical Documentation Access Compliance Certification form.

Upon receipt and verification, the CMFF Technical Documentation will be released to the interested party’s point of contact.

Additional information about the required open standards can be referenced at the following links:

• OpenVPX (http://www.vita.com)

• SOSA (http://www.opengroup.org/sosa)

• CMOSS, VICTORY, and MORA (https://sam.gov/opp/889a0f920a5f4e8db99b9ee5d35d329c/view)

• SAVE, and FACE (https://apntoil.army.mil/standards-and-specifications)

RFI Feedback:

The Government reserves the right to contact any or all of the RFI respondents for additional information if necessary. All information must be submitted and received no later than 1700 EST 22 April 2024. Submissions and other technical documentation shall be submitted back to the Government via encrypted SAFE drop.

**THIS IS A MARKET SURVEY REQUESTING INFORMATION ONLY. THE SUBMISSION OF THIS INFORMATION IS FOR PLANNING PURPOSES AND IS NOT TO BE CONSTRUED AS A COMMITMENT BY THE GOVERNMENT TO PROCURE ANY ITEMS/SERVICES, OR FOR THE GOVERNMENT TO PAY FOR THE INFORMATION RECEIVED. NO SOLICITATION WILL BE ISSUED AGAINST THIS NOTICE.**

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