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CONTACT:   Contracting Officer, Joetta A. Bernhard, (315) 330-2308, email, mailto:Joetta.Bernhard@rl.af.mill.

AFRL/IFEA Program Manager, Mr. Robert E. Macior, (315) 330-2480, email: Robert.Macior@rl.af.mil; Technical Point of Contact: Jon Jones, (315) 330- 1665, e-mail, Jon.Jones@rl.af.mil, 315-330-1665; Mark Pronobis, (315) 330- 3072, e-mail, Mark.Pronobis@rl.af.mil.
 

Introduction:   The Information Directorate of the Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL) at the Rome Research Site is seeking firms to conduct applied research and development for innovative concepts and techniques to Find, Fix, Track, Target, Engage and Assess (F2T2EA) stationary and moving surface targets.  Under the Targets-Under-Trees (TUT) program, the Information (IF) Directorate is partnered with three other AFRL Directorates, including the Sensors (SN) Directorate and Human Effectiveness (HE) Directorate at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base (WPAFB) and the Munitions (MN) Directorate at Eglin AFB. The TUT program management team is led by AFRL/SNAA with deputy program managers from AFRL/IFEA and AFRL/SNRR and will be executed with coordinated procurements from four AFRL Directorates: SN, IF, MN, and HE.  The principal solicitations are those from AFRL/SN, entitled “Targets Under Trees (TUT) Family of Systems and Supporting Technologies” and this solicitation from AFRL/IF.  The AFRL/SN solicitation is concerned with the overall TUT systems engineering, development for the Foliage-Penetrating (FOPEN) radar, its associated technologies and other support functions, including modeling and simulation. The weapon fuze technology development is being conducted through AFRL/MN, whereas, the human-system interface technology development and design is being conducted by AFRL/HE. This AFRL/IF solicitation is concerned with the fusion of intelligence data from multiple ISR sensors to find, fix and track mobile ground targets in the open and hide. This includes an extensible system architecture to accommodate intelligence data and advanced fusion algorithms, data base integration including geo-registration, and reasoning technologies to reduce target location errors and identification uncertainties.  The desired system will produce target quality location, identification and kinematics.  This AFRL/IF solicitation addresses Intelligence Fusion and its supporting technologies. The TUT program is chartered to develop a capability for performing the Find, Fix and Engage portions of the kill chain process on targets employing concealment with camouflage and foliage. The TUT concept is to find and identify concealed mobile ground vehicles using multi-sensor fusion and Very High Frequency (VHF) Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) employing Change Detection techniques. The targets will be identified by associating the detections with fused intelligence information products and held at risk while in hide with upgraded foliage penetrating munitions. The TUT program will employ and exploit existing technologies to provide early demonstrations and potential transitions to operational units.  It will also enhance existing and maturing technologies and provide a roadmap of continued spiral development over the three - year program. The developments required to meet the TUT objectives involve FOPEN radar with Change Detection, information fusion, geo-registration, terrain characterization, weapons fuze and human-system interface technologies.   In addition to direct technology developments, the TUT program will support other complementary activities including, test and evaluation, modeling and simulation, data collection and management, and a distributed collaborative engineering environment.  Finally, an overall system engineering effort will assist the Government in managing the distribution of functionality and performance requirements across the contributing technologies.  The TUT program is sponsored by the Air Force Aerospace Command & Control and Intelligence, Surveillance, Reconnaissance Center (AC2ISRC).

Objective:   The level of complexity addressed by this PRDA varies from stationary and moving targets in open environments to targets that are partially to fully obscured by foliage and camouflage. However, the TUT Intelligence Fusion System (TUT IFS) focuses on the ability to locate and identify targets employing concealment with camouflage or foliage, while minimizing false alarms and the impact of terrain obscuration and platform outages.  The problem being addressed by this procurement is the development of an overall TUT IFS architecture and the interface and integration of specific contributing systems. The TUT IFS will fuse various types of intelligence information to produce actionable information including targetable locations and identification for mobile ground vehicles in hide. The developed system will be transitionable to the Distributed Common Ground Station (DCGS) and/or as applicable, the Combined Air Operations Center - Experimental (CAOC-X).

Technical Background:  The Air Force Research Laboratory Fusion Technology Branch is developing an open, distributed, object-oriented architecture for information fusion under their Adaptive Sensor Fusion (ASF) program.  This program includes support for multiple interoperable fusion components and a public Application Programmer’s Interface (API) that is suitable for inserting new fusion components into the system. Fusion component interoperability is based on a shared description of the battlespace and shared data exchange and persistence mechanisms. Through the implementation of a common interface and a common battlespace ontology, new and legacy fusion engines and capabilities can be encapsulated and become interoperable components within a common architecture. Given this stable environment for test and development, the performance of legacy and new fusion engines can be rapidly inserted, evaluated and consistently quantified.

PRDA Organization:  The overall objective of this PRDA is to develop, integrate, demonstrate and transition system technologies required for locating, tracking and identifying targets in both open and obscured environments. The PRDA is presented in two sections.  The first section addresses proposal requests for the Intelligence Fusion System Integrator (IFSI) for the TUT IFS, which includes technologies needed for the identification and location of targets in hide while rejecting false alarms.  In addition, the IFSI must coordinate and interface with other efforts that are being addressed within this PRDA, and other TUT efforts within the total TUT program. These efforts will be addressed at the Pre-proposal Briefing and include the FOPEN sensor development, the Family of Systems Integrator (FoSI) and other related technology development contracted by AFRL/SN. The FoSI effort will provide the overall TUT program systems engineering, including Family of Systems (FoS) architecture, concept of employment, FoS goals, and a TUT FoS workstation. The second section of this PRDA addresses Multi-Intelligence (Multi-INT) Fusion for TCTs (MIFT) White Paper requests for supporting technical development related to the identification and tracking of targets in the open.  The solicitation seeks technologies to enhance the ability to provide continuous track, location and identification of ground moving targets through the fusion of multiple sensors.

IFSI Proposal Solicitation:  The AFRL, Information and Intelligence Exploitation Division (AFRL/IFE) is soliciting proposals from potential Intelligence Fusion System Integrators to develop an open, unclassified and government owned, system architecture and Multi-INT fusion capability using ASF Core Services Framework. The Intelligence Fusion System Integrator (IFSI) shall develop a scaleable, open, and flexible architecture that is compatible with the targeted transition system. The IFSI shall also interface with the FoSI for integration into the TUT FoS workstation.  This architectural framework shall enable rapid insertion of new and legacy fusion components and technologies, and a dynamic schema framework that directly supports system evolution.  The IFSI shall provide a total system architecture; establish and manage the infrastructure, interfaces, algorithms and databases, coordinate software development and integration of fusion modules; and integrate multiple-sources of sensor and intelligence reports into an architecture capable of solving the TUT problem.  The IFSI shall provide a detailed description of the Intelligence Fusion System Architecture to be implemented using the ASF Core Services. The IFSI shall provide a highly dynamic, geo-registered, distributed database that provides the ability to store and to efficiently access the large volume of data anticipated for this program.  A key challenge is the development of database technology and services that efficiently store, query, update, report, and synchronize access to the TUT data.  The proposals in this area should give consideration to using an object-oriented or object-relational DBMS, indexing mechanism to allow efficient access to data, data scalability, performance, object modeling, query, extensibility, supportability and upgradability. While the ultimate goal of the TUT IFS is to have a fully automated capability, it is expected that the system developed during this phase of the program will require minimal interaction with human operators. Performance criteria for the TUT IFS will include system throughput, target location and ID uncertainty, and other performance measures. Specific values will be developed in cooperation with the government and other TUT coordinated procurements. The interface must be user definable to take into consideration the fact that current human analysts are experienced with specific information displayed in certain ways. The output of this system shall be targeting quality locations and identifications (IDs) of concealed ground mobile targets. The IFSI shall provide a program schedule of capabilities outlining the milestones (including content, capability, benefit to the Warfighter and risk) for software delivery, test and integration into the AFRL Fusion Facility and spiral transitions. (Details on the AFRL Fusion Facility will be presented at the Pre-proposal Briefing). The program schedule should contain spiral developments and deliveries of the TUT IFS capabilities.  The spirals should be frequent, three (3) to six (6) month cycles, and should consist of software builds, training, and integration into the AFRL Fusion Facility for testing and analysis. In addition, the program plan should include spiral delivery to the FoSI for integration into the TUT Workstation for demonstrations and evaluations.  Major spirals containing new capability are expected to be transitioned for test and evaluation into the Distributed Common Ground Station (DCGS) and/or as applicable, the Combined Air Operations Center - Experimental (CAOC-X), every ten (10) to twelve (12) months at Langley AFB. This will require software to be in compliance with, at a minimum, DII COE Level 5, with design considerations for DII COE Level 7 and Air Force DoDIIS Infrastructure (AFDI) compliance. The following web sites can be accessed for additional information:

http://diicoe.disa.mil/coe

http://www.rl.af.mil/programs/asf

http://extranet.if.afrl.af.mil/afdi/
 

Technology Integration:  The TUT IFS shall be designed to process, fuse and display the following types of information, as a minimum: VHF SAR images employing Change Detection (CD), Ground Moving Target Indicator (GMTI), Signal Intelligence (SIGINT) and Imagery Intelligence (IMINT). These data will be made available primarily from the following collection platforms: Joint STARS, U-2, Global Hawk, Rivet Joint, Guard Rail, NTM and FOPEN radar systems.  It is anticipated that the majority of the above data will be available through the Data Access Layer (DAL) of the DCGS at the time of transition. The design of the system shall not preclude the potential ingestion of other intelligence data, for example, Video, EO/IR, MSI/HSI, MASINT (seismic, acoustic, magnetic), HUMINT, or data fusion algorithms and capabilities which are the focus of the Multi-INT fusion for TCT White Papers. The IFSI should address the extensibility of their proposed TUT IFS by discussing the magnitude of the integration effort and associated risks of inclusion of at least three of these additional intelligence fusion capabilities. The TUT IFS design and documentation shall also include the capability of interfacing to other information systems such as: Intelligent Preparation of the Battlefield (IPB), Joint Targeting Toolbox (JTT), ISR Management Systems and terrain analysis/delimitation.

Program Reviews, Transitions and Demonstrations:  Bi-Annual program reviews shall be conducted to track technical, financial and schedule performance and risk. These reviews are expected to be conducted in conjunction with other TUT reviews within the AFRL partner organizations. An architectural design review shall be conducted approximately one month after contract award. The IFSI shall be required to coordinate with other complementary TUT program efforts and attend and participate in periodic System Engineering Team (SET) meetings. The SET meetings are expected to be held at least, on a quarterly basis. The IFSI will also be expected to participate in periodic integration, transitions and demonstrations. The TUT program expects to demonstrate partial or entire system capability at major DOD exercises such as, JEFX. Offerors should anticipate supporting at least one DoD exercise per year. Demonstrations at these exercises will be the primary responsibility of other contractors, but support will be required of the IFSI.

IFSI Award:  This announcement seeks to acquire the technologies and systems necessary to prosecute the TUT problem. Capability is sought that can be fully developed and transitioned to operational units as rapidly as possible. Since many applicable technologies exist today, offerors are encouraged to leverage technology from these other programs, as applicable.  It is anticipated that offerors will investigate, apply, exploit and modify existing COTS and GOTS technologies. Deliverables will include technical reports, user’s manuals, training manuals and delivery and integration of robust software prototypes into the AFRL Fusion Laboratory. The IFSI shall also deliver software prototypes with documentation, to the FoSI and assist with the integration into the TUT workstation for demonstrations and evaluations.   In addition, the level of maturity must be adequate to transition to the user community by integration and demonstrations into the DCGS and/or as applicable, the Combined Air Operations Center - Experimental (CAOC-X).

A single award for the IFSI is anticipated. Contractor teaming is highly encouraged to minimize the amount of new developments and focus the majority of the effort on integration and enhancements of existing algorithms into a common infrastructure.  Associate Contractor Agreements (ACAs) will be required with related TUT technology developers, AFRL Fusion Laboratory in-house contractors and others, as required. Total funding for the IFSI portion of this PRDA is approximately, $9.5M.  It is anticipated that the funding profile for the IFSI award will be approximately, $2.1M in FY02, $4.3M in FY03, and $3.1M in FY04.

Evaluation of proposals will be accomplished using the following criteria: (l) overall scientific and technical merit, including the rationale and approach for the proposed technology development, (2) potential contribution and relevance to this effort, (3) related experience and capabilities and extent to which the offeror demonstrates technology and domain knowledge, (4) soundness of proposed technology transition approach, and (5) reasonableness and realism of proposed costs and fees. In addition, the Government will consider other factors, such as past and present performance on recent Government contracts and the capacity to perform the requirements of the effort.  No further evaluation criteria will be used in selecting the proposal.  Options are discouraged and unpriced options will not be considered for award.

Award for the IFSI portion of this PRDA are expected 2Q FY02.  The majority of the work to be performed will be at collateral SECRET; however, a portion of work may be performed at a higher level. Work to be performed will require a TOP SECRET facility clearance and safeguarding capability.  Key personnel identified for assignment to the IFSI effort must have an active TOP SECRET clearance at the time of award and be cleared for access to SI/TK information within three(3) months after award.  A principal investigator clause may be required on this effort.

THIS ANNOUNCEMENT CONSTITUTES THE ONLY SOLICITATION FOR THE IFSI.  PROPOSALS ARE REQUESTED.

Offerors are required to submit an original plus three (3) copies of their proposal, which include separate Technical, Cost and Statement of Work volumes, to AFRL/IFEA, ATTN: Robert Macior, Ref PRDA 02-02-IFKA, 32 Brooks Road, Rome, NY 13441-4114 by 7 December 2001 by 4:00PM, EST.  Technical proposals are limited to a total page count of seventy-five (75) pages and shall be double-spaced with a font no smaller than 12 pitch. Offerors must mark their proposals with the restrictive language stated in FAR 15.609(a).  Proposals shall be at the unclassified level, but may contain a Secret Addendum if required.  However, any addendum will be included in the proposal 75-page limit.  Proposal preparation instructions may be found at:
http://www.if.afrl.af.mil/div/IFK/prda/prda-main.html.
 

MIFT White Paper Solicitation:  In addition, AFRL/IFE is soliciting White Papers that provide innovative solutions to the Find, Fix and Track portions of the TUT kill chain.  The IFSI is not precluded from submitting White Papers. It is expected that within the technical requirements for this PRDA, there will be additional technologies that need to be addressed.  As part of the AFRL Fusion program addressing MIFT, technologies will be addressed leading to a more robust fusion system.  These technologies will be considered for inclusion into the IFSI effort as the technologies are matured.   In order to provide funding for development of promising technologies, AFRL/IFE is soliciting White Papers that address the following specific areas and must be implemented as an ASF component: (1) reasoning technologies that establish target attributes and ID; (2) optimization of Multi-INT fusion techniques; (3) identification of stationary and moving targets employing sensor cueing and cross-cueing; (4) robust techniques that provide adequate target identification for continuous tracking in open and obscured environments; (5) advanced fusion and reasoning techniques that reduce target location error and ID uncertaintanty; and (6) other data fusion technologies relevant to solving the TUT problem, such as; Video, EO/IR, MSI/HSI, MASINT (seismic, acoustic, magnetic), HUMINT.

Awards:  Multiple awards for the MIFT initiative are anticipated.  The principal funding of the White Papers and the anticipated awards as a result of this PRDA will start in 2Q FY02, and will be in the form of contracts, cooperative agreements, or other transactions depending on the nature of the work proposed.   Contractor teaming is encouraged. Individual awards will normally range from 6 to 32 months with dollar amounts typically ranging from $100,000 to $1,000,000, per award.  Total funding for the MIFT portion of this PRDA is approximately, $3.6M.

AFRL requires innovative, yet demonstrable and usable solutions to meet the needs of this PRDA.  Technical solutions should emphasize the use of open systems that accommodate distributed, modular, and extensible approaches.  Deliverables will be technical reports, robust software applications that utilize ASF Core Services and demonstrations with levels of maturity adequate to transition to the IFSI and be integrated into the TUT IFS architecture. Integration and demonstration utilizing the AFRL Fusion Laboratory at the Rome Research Site is required under this PRDA. Associate Contractor Agreements (ACAs) will be required with the IFSI, AFRL Fusion Laboratory in-house contractors and others, as required.

Evaluation of proposals will be accomplished using the following criteria: (l) overall scientific and technical merit, (2) potential contribution and relevance to this effort, (3) innovativeness of the proposed approach and/or techniques, (4) offerors capabilities and related experience, and (5) cost and fee realism and reasonableness. In addition, the Government will consider other factors such as, past and present performance on recent Government contracts and the capacity to perform the described effort. Criteria 1 through 4 above will also be used to determine whether White Papers submitted are consistent with the intent of this PRDA and of interest to the Government. No further evaluation criteria will be used in selecting the White Papers. White paper evaluations will be based on acceptability or unacceptability without regard to other submittals/awards under this PRDA. Options are discouraged and unpriced options will not be considered for award.

Work to be performed will require a SECRET facility clearance and safeguarding capability.  Also, personnel identified for assignment must be cleared for access to SECRET information, at the time of award.  However, a TOP SECRET facility clearance and key personnel cleared for access to SI/TK information prior to award may be required dependent upon the work to be performed and information utilized. A principal investigator clause may be required on these efforts.

THIS ANNOUNCEMENT CONSTITUTES THE ONLY SOLICITATION FOR MIFT. DO NOT SUBMIT A FORMAL PROPOSAL AT THIS TIME.

Offerors are required to submit an unclassified original plus (3) copies of their White Papers for the Multi-Intelligence Fusion for TCTs portion of this PRDA to AFRL/IFEA, ATTN: Robert Macior, Ref. PRDA 02-02-IFKA, 32 Brooks Road, Rome, NY 13441-4114 no earlier than 17 December 2001. White Papers are limited to a total page count of ten (10) pages and shall be double-spaced with a font no smaller than 12 pitch.

White Papers must contain a cover letter indicating whether the offeror is a large, small, woman-owned, small disadvantaged, veteran-owned small, or HUBZone small business, or a Historically Black College or University, or Minority Institution. Small business only should send one (1) copy of the cover letter only (1st Class Mail, Unclassified Only) to ATTN: Ms Janis Norelli, Director of Small Business, AFRL/IFB, 26 Electronic Parkway, Rome, NY 13441-4514. The White Paper will be formatted as follows: Section A: Title, Period of Performance, Cost of Task, Name of Company; Section B: Task Objective; and Section C: Technical Summary. Offerors must mark their White Papers/proposals with the restrictive language stated in FAR 15.609(a). Multiple White Papers may be submitted in different areas of technology. White Papers will be accepted until 30 Sept 2004. It is recommended that White Papers be received early in each Fiscal Year to maximize the possibility of award. However, White Papers will be accepted at any time, but it is more likely that funding will be available during the early portion of each Fiscal Year.  The purpose of the White Paper is to preclude unwarranted effort on the part of an offeror whose proposed work is not of interest under this PRDA. Those White Papers found to be consistent with the intent of this PRDA may be invited to submit a technical and cost proposal. Such invitation does not assure that the submitting organization will be awarded a subsequent award. White Papers submitted will be evaluated as they are received. Individual White Paper evaluations will be based on acceptability or non-acceptability without regard to other White Papers submitted under the announcement.  Additional White Paper preparation instructions may be found at:  http://www.rl.af.mil/div/IFK/bp-guide.html

Government Furnished Information/Equipment (GFI/GFE):  Information on ASF will be provided by the government to the IFSI and MIFT contractors for use under this program. The necessary hardware required for the software integration into the AFRL Fusion Facility and targeted transition facility will be provided as Base Support.  However, the IFSI and MIFT contractors shall be required to provide hardware at their own facility for architecture development and integration during the contract period-of-performance.  This hardware shall be compatible with the targeted facilities. No GFE will be provided to the IFSI or MIFT contractors for development use in their facility. The IFSI offerors shall specify, and provide if awarded, any reference image or display background required for the geo-registration/time synchronization for the fusion of the multi-spectral data. Other required GFI data shall be specified in the proposal for evaluation.

Pre-proposal Briefing:  An unclassified briefing for all interested U.S. firms and personnel will be held on 8 November 2001, at The Beeches Conference Center, 7900 Turin Rd, Rome, NY 13441, from 0830 to 1700 hours.  If you plan to attend the Pre-proposal Briefing, pre-registration is required. Participants who do not pre-register will not be allowed into the briefings. The cutoff date for registration is 5 November 2001. Please register at:

http://www.rl.af.mil/programs/tut/

The briefing(s) and attendance roster will be posted at:  http://www.if.afrl.af.mil/div/IFK/prda0201/TUTbriefing.ppt

Questions should be e-mailed directly to the Contracting Officer, Joetta A. Bernhard, at: Joetta.Bernhard@rl.af.mil with a copy to Robert E. Macior at: Robert.Macior@rl.af.mil.  Questions and answers will be posted to http://www.if.afrl.af.mil/div/IFK/prda0201/TUTQ&A.html within 48 hours after collection, thereby providing adequate time for the response. This allows for anonymous questions.  Questions will be accepted for five (5) business days after the Pre-proposal Briefing.

The total value for all awards under this PRDA shall not exceed $24,900,000. Foreign participation is not authorized for this acquisition.  Data subject to export control constraints may be involved and only firms on the Certified Contractor Access List (CCAL) will be allowed access to such data. The cost of preparing proposals in response to this announcement is not an allowable direct charge to any resulting contract or any other contract, but may be an allowable expense to the normal bid and proposal indirect cost in FAR 31.205-18.

An Ombudsman has been appointed to hear significant concerns from offerors or potential offerors during the proposal development phase of this acquisition. Routine questions are not considered to be "significant concerns" and should be e-mailed directly to the Contracting Officer, Joetta A. Bernhard, at: (315) 330-2308. The purpose of the Ombudsman is not to diminish the authority of the Contracting Officer or Program Manager, but to communicate contractor concerns, issues, disagreements and recommendations to the appropriate Government personnel. The Ombudsman for this acquisition is Linda W. Reed, Deputy Chief, Contracting Division, AFRL/IFK at (315) 330-7748.  When requested, the Ombudsman will maintain strict confidentiality as to the source of the concern.  The Ombudsman does not participate in the evaluation of the proposals or in the source selection process.

This PRDA is open and effective until 30 September 2004. All responsible firms may submit proposals or White Papers, as appropriate, which shall be considered.  Respondents are asked to provide their Commercial and Government Entity (CAGE) number with their submittal(s) and reference PRDA 02-02-IFKA. Only Contracting Officers are legally authorized to commit the Government.


Last Reviewed: 14 November 2001
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