The Army's acquisition executive and modernization chief are evaluating daily the potential impacts of the COVID-19 outbreak on the service's major programs and the contractors supporting them. They say while certain events have been paused or rescheduled, they are not yet expecting any significant schedule changes.
The Army is "still remaining fairly close to being on track," service acquisition executive Bruce Jette told reporters on a call today. "At this point, we think in the long run that we can resolve any of the challenges we have at hand."
Jette and Army Futures Command chief Gen. Mike Murray said they are looking every day at a "21-page analysis" of the industrial base that projects the impacts of the virus in 30-day increments up to three months from now.
Jette said most of the "Big 10" defense contractors have told him they've been able to overcome issues with them coming to work, but "testing is probably one of the areas where we have the most difficulty."
The officials named a few efforts that have been affected, including a pause in testing at Aberdeen Proving Ground, MD, a 10-day closure of Boeing's production facility in Philadelphia and testing for the Joint Assault Bridge program, which is being rescheduled.
APG testing, mostly vehicle maintenance, has been put on hold while the service can put safety measures in place related to contact between workers.
Jette said he spoke to Boeing Defense, Space and Security CEO Leanne Caret yesterday about concerns at the Philadelphia facility, which is closing for 10 days to "make sure it's clean." He said the company thinks it "can make up the difference in a relatively short amount of time."
"The rest of the major suppliers that have combat vehicles, wheeled vehicles, et cetera are still moving along," he said. "We do have a tracking system -- as I said, 21 pages -- of suppliers that I track on a daily basis with projections. At this point, all the primes that are associated with small subs do not believe they can't make up any shortfalls they're having to deal with for isolation . . . or quarantine. If that changes, I'll find out about it fairly early, and we'll then have to see what alternatives [exist, like using] alternative suppliers, rearrangement of delivery schedules . . . by swapping the work order sequence. We haven't had to go there, but we have anticipated some of the things we may have to do."
Jette added fielding of the Joint Light Tactical Vehicle would be done "in a lower density" which would have a trickle effect on the program, the effects of which are yet unknown.
Additionally, Murray mentioned a soldier touchpoint for the Integrated Visual Augmentation System scheduled for this summer may be interrupted, and the leaders are working on a contingency plan for that.
However, he does not expect fielding of the IVAS to be delayed.
Murray said of the six modernization priorities, he is most concerned about the air and missile defense programs the service is working on, which have evaluations coming up soon -- a limited user test of the Integrated Battle Command System is scheduled for May and a test of the Precision Strike Missile is scheduled for April -- both still on track at the moment.
Meanwhile, Jette said the Army has been able to complete hypersonic testing as well as stay on track with Bradley A4 production, is participating in the joint acquisition task force at the senior level and is supporting the Army Corps of Engineers in contracting and at the technical level.