DOD launches new project to field microelectronic prototypes

By Briana Reilly / October 24, 2022 at 5:12 PM

The Pentagon has launched a new project focused on fielding microelectronics modernization prototypes that recently reached production under a years-old initiative.

The new pilot, called the Stimulating Transition for Advanced Microelectronics Packaging project, or STAMP, seeks to accelerate the next phase of the existing State-of-the-art Heterogeneous Integrated Packaging endeavor. Under the latter effort, known as SHIP, Intel and Qorvo won awards in 2020 to develop next-generation multichip packages intended to advance DOD microelectronics systems.

Through STAMP, officials want to find “a strong and swift transition path that enables DOD to access these technical specs as quickly as possible to secure our military devices,” according to an Oct. 21 NSTXL press release announcing the pilot. The effort will give the defense industrial base the ability to identify where those MCPs developed through SHIP should be integrated, begin analysis and test ahead of the planned transition, the release notes.

STAMP’s start comes as those MCPs “have just hit prototype production,” Doug Crowe, the other transaction authority director of the Strategic and Spectrum Missions Advanced Resilient Trusted Systems, told Inside Defense.

Specifically, the release notes that Intel’s MCP1 is currently in prototype production, while MCP2 is slated to begin the process “in the near-term.” Delivery of those packages is expected in 2023.

Intel will be executing STAMP in light of officials’ completion of a contract modification dating back to the end of September, Crowe said. Officials are currently developing resources ahead of an industry day planned for early 2023.

Crowe declined to say how much money is behind the pilot, which he said lasts until July 2024.

SHIP falls under the office of the under secretary of defense for research and engineering’s Trusted and Assured Microelectronics program.

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