For the seasoned government contractor and acquisitions professional, the not very tightly held secret is the Other Transaction Agreement (OTA) is the only formal mechanism currently available for the U.S. Government to keep up with exponential technology development and the centralized resource allocation capabilities of the Chinese government in a great power competition.  The good news is the OTA is showing up in heads lines this Q1 of 2024 – with the recent Space Development Agency’s (SDA) Other Transaction Authority (OTA) agreements – totalling $2.5 billion – awarding “three prototype agreements to build 54 satellites to establish the Tranche 2 (T2) Tracking Layer.

Also very recently:  the Department of Defense (DoD) launched the Distributed Bioindustrial Manufacturing Investment Program (DBMIP) Which seeks “to strengthen domestic supply chains and sustain America’s global prominence in biotechnology. The DBMIP will execute investments through the Defense Industrial Base Consortium (DIBC) Other Transaction Agreement (OTA), which helps lower barriers to allow DoD to work more expeditiously with small, non-traditional, and large businesses.”  Details here – including an opportunity for the private sector to submit proposals for DBMIP funding.

DOD Launches Distributed Bioindustrial Manufacturing Program to Bolster Domestic Supply Chains

“The DIBC OTA helps enable more rapid execution of Defense Production Act funding and can also allow for other federal agencies with similar investments to separately or jointly invest in projects awarded by DoD.”
– Dr. William LaPlante, Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition and Sustainment.

The Department of Defense announced new opportunities for American businesses to advance biotechnology as part of President Biden’s efforts to strengthen and build the resiliency of America’s defense industrial base and secure its supply chains. Biomanufacturing has the potential to support the U.S. military and our allies and partners by generating needed materials — from fuels and chemicals to food and medical supplies — where and when our forces need them has significant implications for our military.

This Request for White Papers (RWP) for the Distributed Bioindustrial Manufacturing Investment Program (DBMIP) seeks to strengthen domestic supply chains and sustain America’s global prominence in biotechnology. The DBMIP will execute investments through the Defense Industrial Base Consortium (DIBC) Other Transaction Agreement (OTA), which helps lower barriers to allow DoD to work more expeditiously with small, non-traditional, and large businesses.

This RWP lays the foundation for a new era in U.S. bioindustrial manufacturing industry, as directed by President Biden’s Executive Order 14081, “Advancing Biotechnology and Biomanufacturing Innovation for a Sustainable, Safe, and Secure American Bioeconomy.” It is the first of many opportunities that support the Department’s planned investments over the next five years to catalyze the establishment of a bioindustrial manufacturing base, which were announced in September 2022 following President Biden’s Executive Order.

What Next?

DBMIP Award Schedule

• The Department expects to announce awards in May for approximately 30 proposals, which will each receive up to $2 million to deliver a business and technical plan detailing how they intend to build a U.S. bioindustrial manufacturing production facility.
• Selected proposals will be eligible for follow on efforts as part of the OUSD A&S five year investment plan for the Department’s bioindustrial manufacturing base.

To submit a white paper, please visit https://www.dibconsortium.org/

Abotu the Defense Industrial Base Consortium (DIBC) Other Transaction Agreement (OTA)

• The DIBC OTA is unique in that it allows DoD to rapidly execute prototypes under the authority of 10 U.S.C. § 4022, research projects under 10 U.S.C. 4021, and production OTs under 10 U.S.C. § 4022(f).
• These non-medical investments will build domestic capabilities across the U.S. and will mitigate supply chain risks in five defense material priority areas:  Food, Fuel, Fitness, Fabrication, and Firepower.

Additional OODA Loop Resources

The Inaugural U.S. National Defense Industrial Strategy: The first-ever National Defense Industrial Strategy (NDIS) was released last week by The United States Department of Defense (DoD). THE NDIS “offers a strategic vision to coordinate and prioritize actions to build a modernized defense industrial ecosystem.” Details here.

The Current Debate on ‘Forging the Defense Industrial Base for the Digital Age’:  Overall, the war in Ukraine has acted as an accelerant in a clash between a wide range of points of view in the debate surrounding the future of war and the future of the defense industrial base.  A sampling of various voices on the issues is captured here which have been curated from an archive of sources from Q422  (a timeframe which appears, in hindsight, to have been a crucial period in the debate) along with a vital hearing from just last week.

The Disintermediation and/or Self-cannibalization of the Defense Industrial Base:  A strategic suggestion to organizations if they are experiencing disintermediation is to aggressively self-cannibalize, with ecosystems and platforms as the new value creation and capture architectures of a new business model (or – to start – a standalone, but scalable business unit).  Exponential Organizations’ (ExOs), platforms, ecosystems, and sources of new value creation are based on the disintermediation (innovation that undermines established or incumbent structures) of a market, organization, or industry sector.

Designing, Quantifying, and Measuring Exponential Innovation:  The Exponentials Framework is a proven framework for the design of a technology ecosystem built to sustain the exponential scale and speed of the current technological and scientific era.  Exponentials are not futurist high-level concepts.  They are not intellectual bugs, but the central organizing feature of the technological road ahead.

The Future Now: The State of the Bioeconomy in 2023:  The Bioeconomy in 2023 is showing clear signs of opportunities for advantage created by the exponential disruption of the industrial base (including that of defense), coupled with exponential biotechnological innovation to build the bioeconomy of the future.  The State of the Bioeconomy in 2023 includes:  Exponential Organizational Ecosystems at Speed and Scale; Blockchain Technologies; Artificial Intelligence in Biotechnology, Genomics, Healthcare and Medical Tech; Biomanufacturing in Cislunar Space; andHealth Security and Cybersecurity Challenges.   Details of current breakthroughs and strategic directions for each category can be found here.

Innovative Blockchain Technology Case Studies (by Industry Sector) – Blockchain Technologies in The Bioeconomy, Biotechnology, and Healthcare:  Over the course of 2022 and 2023, The OODA Loop Blockchain Series has explored blockchain disruption in the market and new opportunities created by blockchain technologies in both the public and private sectors.  Innovative blockchain technology efforts (by industry sector)  – with a focus on how the blockchain enables new business models, opportunities for innovative value proposition design, and decentralized governance – are listed here.

Exponential Innovation and Building the Bioeconomy of the Future:  Last year, we launched the Opportunities for Advantage Series to explore how exponential disruption and innovation require organizations to focus efforts to gain advantage. In a recent review of the series, we found that there were patterns and groupings which deserved to be highlighted to jumpstart the series for this year. To start, We found that the future of biotechnology was a cluster in the series, pointing to the opportunities for advantage created by the exponential disruption of the industrial base (including that of defense) coupled with exponential biotechnology innovation to build the bioeconomy of the future.  The following posts are a primer on the potential of such an effort  – including the challenges, threats, risks, and opportunities ahead for your organization in this technology and business ecosystem of the future.

The New Tech Trinity: Artificial Intelligence, BioTech, Quantum Tech: Will make monumental shifts in the world. This new Tech Trinity will redefine our economy, both threaten and fortify our national security, and revolutionize our intelligence community. None of us are ready for this. This convergence requires a deepened commitment to foresight and preparation and planning on a level that is not occurring anywhere. The New Tech Trinity.

The Revolution in Biology: This post provides an overview of key thrusts of the transformation underway in biology and offers seven topics business leaders should consider when updating business strategy to optimize opportunity because of these changes. For more see:  The Executive’s Guide To The Revolution in Biology

Materials Science Revolution: Room-temperature ambient pressure superconductors represent a significant innovation. Sustainability gets a boost with reprocessable materials. Energy storage sees innovations in solid-state batteries and advanced supercapacitors. Smart textiles pave the way for health-monitoring and self-healing fabrics. 3D printing materials promise disruptions in various sectors. Perovskites offer versatile applications, from solar power to quantum computing. See: Materials Science

Planning for a Continuous Pandemic Landscape: COVID-19’s geopolitical repercussions are evident, with recent assessments pointing to China’s role in its spread. Regardless of the exact origins, the same conditions that allowed COVID-19 to become a pandemic persist today. Therefore, businesses must be prepared for consistent health disruptions, implying that a substantial portion of the workforce might always operate remotely, even though face-to-face interactions remain vital for critical decisions. See: COVID Sensemaking

“AI for Enterprise”: Lessons Learned from Healthcare, Hugging Face and Clinical Language Models:  Healthcare is already in the midst of an AI revolution – with an applied technology market maturity which outpaces most other industry sectors which are in a reactive mode to the AI hype cycle.  Explore these AI healthcare use cases and apply them to your organization using design and systems thinking.

The Future of Biosafety and the Global Gain-of-Function Research Ecosystem:  Researchers from the the Center for Security and Emerging Technology (CSET) recently mapped “the gain- and loss-of-function global research landscape.”  We contextualize the CSET findings relative to the biosafety levels in U.S. biomedical laboratories. A looming question:  do other countries have the adequate commitment to health security and biosafety measures in their high risk pathogen research?

An OODAcast Conversation – Joe Tranquillo on the Revolution in Biological Science:  Joe Tranquillo is a Professor of Biomedical Engineering at Bucknell University and a provost at the school.  He is also and author and speaker with a knack for helping make new and at times complex subjects understandable. In this OODAcast we discuss many aspects of the revolution in biological sciences with Joe including topics like:  New ways of delivering medicines that target specific tissues; Discovery of the structure of almost every human protein; Methods to synthesize biomolecules, which can result in ways to manufacture a wide range of materials like therapeutics, flavors, fabrics, food, fuels; and New ways of growing food that are more productive and take fewer pesticides and fertilizers.

AI-powered Genomics: The convergence of machine learning, deep learning and genomics, especially in the area of AI-powered genomic health prediction, while remarkably promising will also present remarkably challenging unintended consequences.  A recent report suggests areas which need to be explored  – : starting now –  as “the issues posed by the…technologies become harder to predict, more complex and more numerous.”

For more OODA Loop News Briefs and Original Analysis, see OODA Loop: Biotechnology | Genetics | Genomics | Healthcare | Medical Tech