Navy Acquisition Lead Details Plans to Accelerate Modernization

The U.S. Navy’s top acquisition official wants to speed up the acquisition process, lower costs, new talent and industry partnerships to support the service’s modernization efforts, Defense News reported Monday. 

James Geurts, assistant secretary of the Navy for research, development and acquisition, is fixing the service’s slow acquisition system. He said he wants to change transactional requirements with industry and technical experts to bring capabilities faster to the fleet. Geurts noted the changes will focus on cost and time.

“We’re looking at reducing government inspections by 50 percent,” he said. “We need to set the standards for shipbuilders in the ship repair world, and then let them go so that we are not unnecessarily holding up maintenance activities as they’re ongoing.” 

Contract vehicles would also help the Navy modernize its fleet. Geurts said the Navy’s future contract strategy will utilize multiple contracts to work with different vendors.