💰 GSA finds $1.2B in COVID fraud

The Navy has launched a new Robotics and Autonomous Systems Warfighting Development Center (RASWDC) to develop doctrine, tactics, training, and operational concepts for integrating unmanned systems across the fleet. The center will work closely with the Navy and Marine Corps’ new robotics acquisition office to speed feedback from testing and operations into fielding.

The US and Royal Navies just proved that a drone submarine can launch a heavyweight torpedo, completing the first-ever test firing of a US Mk 48 from the Royal Navy's XV Excalibur Extra Large Uncrewed Underwater Vehicle at BUTEC in Scotland. The 1.7-tonne Mk 48 carries a 645-lb warhead and can reach 55 knots at 800 meters depth. The program went from approval to test completion in seven months.

The Navy’s new maintenance chief says the service must become faster and more willing to accept calculated risk to get ships and submarines out of maintenance on time, after years of chronic delays across both public and private shipyards. His new Industrial Operations office is being tasked with cutting contracting and material bottlenecks, shifting resources more quickly, and making decisions earlier so the fleet gets ships back sooner.

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TRANSCOM’s commander said that the military's supply chain obsession with just-in-time delivery and predictable routing has created a "self-induced vulnerability" adversaries can exploit with AI. His answer is to use AI to randomize routes, build predictive demand planning, and reduce cognitive overload. He also warned that adversary AI could feed US logisticians "hallucinated intelligence" leading to catastrophic decisions.

In an unprecedented move, the Space Force's Joint Commercial Operations Cell signed a contractual agreement giving SpaceX exclusive access to SPACECOM's most detailed classified space tracking data, the High Accuracy Catalog, in exchange for data from SpaceX's Stargaze system, which uses 30,000 cameras on Starlink satellites to observe objects as small as half a meter. Commercial space monitoring firms are concerned the classified data could give SpaceX an unfair market advantage.

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DOE selected 31 grid-improvement projects for $1.9B in SPARK funding, designed to add 23 GW of transmission capacity without building new corridors. Project sponsors will reconductor or rebuild more than 1,500 miles of lines and deploy grid-enhancing technologies across nearly 21,000 miles of existing infrastructure. Sponsors are also contributing $3.4B of their own, bringing total investment to $5.3B.

The emergency ended in 2023. The contracts, apparently, did not. GSA says unnamed federal contractors kept collecting COVID-related funding long after the national emergency was cancelled, uncovering $1.2B in suspected fraud across five contracts and blocking $41M more. About 93% of the flagged funding has not yet been distributed.

DHS S&T officials say AI is making it easier to create novel biological threats, and current detection architecture wasn't built for that world. The deputy undersecretary called for a shift toward persistent, agent-agnostic biosurveillance spanning borders, maritime ports, urban areas, and critical infrastructure. The bigger problem is, she says, that every federal agency has bio data but won't share it. DHS has an active prize challenge seeking AI-assisted biodetection algorithms.

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D) $4.5 million — SBA generally permits sole-source 8(a) awards up to $4.5 million for most acquisitions and $7 million for manufacturing. But there's a fascinating exception: certain entity-owned 8(a) businesses, such as those owned by Alaska Native Corporations or tribes, can qualify for sole-source awards above those thresholds. (Source)