Geurts: Navy went from using 8 to 42 OTAs in a year

By Mallory Shelbourne / March 28, 2019 at 4:39 PM

The Navy is increasing its use of other transaction agreements, going from eight to 42 in a one-year time period, according to Hondo Geurts, the service's acquisition executive.

Geurts told the House Armed Services intelligence, emerging threats and capabilities subcommittee today the service is working to "maximize the tools" at its disposal to invest in science and technology.

In addition to the OTAs, Geurts cited the Navy's use of Cooperative Research and Development Agreements, or CRADAs.

"Last year we had 478. We already have 266 new ones. So we're continuing to see that rate increase," he told the panel of lawmakers, referring to the CRADAs.

Testifying about the Navy's science and technology fiscal year 2020 budget request, Geurts said the service is also working to create "a clear path from discovery all the way through to deployment."

"And so, we've reorganized the back end of our R&D portfolio to really focus on two things: future naval prototypes, which is a path in terms of getting that [science and technology] pipelined into the programs of record so we can get it into our acquisition programs," he said.

"And then also, innovative naval prototypes: things where we don't have requirements yet, ideas, things we want to challenge, take high risk and move that into the system," Geurts added.

The acquisition chief said the Navy's FY-20 request included $2.3 billion in "basic and applied research." The Navy is asking for a total of $20.4 billion for research and development.

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