With apparent frustration with another program, Space Force acquisition chief Frank Calvelli asked, “What I don't get… [is] why would somebody want to have this sort of reputation-ruining stain in the papers all the time?”
The continuing delays in making the GPS jam-resistant M-Code signal available to military users "increase risk that U.S. and allied warfighters will be unable to conduct successful operations in future contested environments due to the lack of access to modernized GPS position, navigation, and timing (PNT) information," the 2023 Annual Report of the Director of Operational Test & Evaluation finds.
The Space Force has made some visible progress in its "pivot" towards resiliency, but acquisition reform remains a hard slog.
"Big software developments fail," said Air Force space acquisition czar Frank Calvelli. "You have to go to smaller systems."
If contractors are put on the Contractor Responsibility Watch List for failure to meet cost and schedule performance goals, the Space Force has "the ability at that point not to award them any new contracts."
“These albatrosses [have been] dragging the department down for decades. This is the year we are going to get these programs delivered," said Frank Calvelli, space acquisition head.