DoD Looks to Cut Regulations, Processes for Rapid Tech Acquisition

The official managing the Department of Defense’s acquisition enablers initiative sets policy updates and less acquisition regulations and cybersecurity standards as top priorities to accelerate adoption of new military capabilities, National Defense Magazine reported Wednesday. 

“If we can create a more modular approach to the way that we buy capabilities, we can deliver them faster,” Stacy Cummings, principal deputy assistant secretary of defense for acquisition enablers, said at the Special Operations Forces Industry Conference. “We can get them in the hands of the user faster, we can test them faster and we can reuse them when it makes sense across [DoD].” 

She said her office wants to revise policies to reduce paperwork and acquisition oversight and to establish a solid acquisition strategy. The initiative would provide tailored acquisition processes and tools to help DoD bring capabilities faster to service members. 

The policy updates would also include a new cybersecurity certification process that would enable vendors to offer products to all DoD programs. Cummings’ office plans to work with Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory and Carnegie Mellon’s Software Engineering Institute to create the certification. The acquisition official plans to implement the changes across DoD in 2020.