Planning for a national challenge competition program to examine and advance a range of drone-centered capabilities and operations is in-the-works at the National Institute of Standards and Technology.
The agency intends to negotiate and award a firm-fixed-price purchase order to Kansas State University for the work through “a contract with a size standard of $27 million in annual receipts,” according to a special notice published this week. In it, NIST offered interested entities that might wish to design, host and run the challenge until Dec. 7 to express interest in doing so.
NIST ultimately aims to work out whether competitive procedures could be used for the acquisition—and if they’re not, the agency estimates it’ll issue an award to the university by Dec. 8.
Through its Public Safety Communications Research Division’s Open Innovation Program, NIST steers “challenge” prize competitions that bring together a unique array of collaborators from across the planet to solve some inarguably complex problems that involve emerging technologies. It’s launched two prior drone-advancing programs.
This initial selection of the University of Kansas to host this specific work follows an original sources sought opportunity NIST released in September.
“The need to properly test, validate, and standardize the use of [unmanned aircraft systems, or UAS] for first responders is necessary to protect both public safety personnel and citizen communities,” NIST officials wrote at the time. “Develop ..
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