House and Senate appropriators are pushing to add further guardrails to accelerated middle-tier acquisition authorities, raising concerns over the lack of transparency in cost and capability status tied to the rapid prototyping and fielding pathways. Included in the fiscal year 2023 bipartisan omnibus defense appropriations bill released this week, the language seeks to get a handle on the programs currently leveraging those avenues across the military services, while aiming to limit the instances in which research and development funds are...