{"id":42336,"date":"2017-09-06T21:34:52","date_gmt":"2017-09-06T21:34:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/defensenews\/uncategorized\/2017\/09\/06\/f-35-program-office-floats-new-agile-acquisition-strategy\/"},"modified":"2026-08-07T23:30:06","modified_gmt":"2026-08-07T23:30:06","slug":"f-35-program-office-floats-new-agile-acquisition-strategy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/defensenews\/smr\/defense-news-conference\/2017\/09\/06\/f-35-program-office-floats-new-agile-acquisition-strategy\/","title":{"rendered":"F-35 program office floats new \u2018agile acquisition\u2019 strategy"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

WASHINGTON \u2014 The F-35 joint program office is rolling out a new strategy that it hopes will make updates to the jet more efficient and agile, the head of the program announced Wednesday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Vice Adm. Mat Winter will bring a new plan to the U.S. Defense Department\u2019s top acquisition official for final approval in late October, Winter said during a keynote speech at the Defense News Conference<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe current acquisition strategy has us doing a serial [and] sequential design, develop, integrate, test [and] deliver strategy. I\u2019m not convinced that\u2019s the most efficient and effective way, most importantly, to deliver and continuously deliver capability to our war fighters … as we go beyond Block 3F,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n

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The program executive officer for the F-35, Vice Adm. Matt Winter, lays out the plan to begin modernizing the new aircraft as soon as it rolls off the line.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n

\u201cEnvision in your head: The pilot jumps in the jet, fires it up, the panoramic cockpit display comes up. We have different sensors on the airplane. One of them is an electro-optic system\u201d called EODAS for short, he said. \u201cEnvision a little window pops up and says: \u2018latest EODAS software update ready for download, yes or no?\u2019 Similar to what you do on your smartphone.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That will entail changing the F-35\u2019s acquisition strategy to allow for agile software development where development and testing happen concurrently, and incremental updates are continuously pushed out, he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This new way of doing business will allow the joint program office, or JPO, to field F-35s with 3F software \u2014 which expands the plane\u2019s flight envelope and allows it to use its full suite of weapons \u2014 and deliver 3F jets for operational testing on time. The major change is that it would now fix minor software deficiencies after the fact.<\/p>\n\n\n\t