Characterizing the Uncrewed Systems Industrial Base

The Division of Protection (DoD) has hypothesized that the demand sign for uncrewed methods (UxS) within the coming years will pressure the capability of the U.S. protection industrial base (DIB). DoD requested the RAND Company to discover this chance and assemble related dangers, points, and alternatives to assist ongoing DoD actions, together with complying with statutory necessities to supply annual experiences to Congress. The scope of the request coated many varieties of UxS, together with uncrewed aerial methods (UAS), uncrewed floor methods (UGSs), and maritime platforms — particularly, uncrewed floor autos (USVs) and uncrewed underwater autos (UUVs).

The authors consulted quite a lot of knowledge sources and performed interviews with officers from army UxS program places of work, representatives from business entities, and material specialists. They examined fragility indicators, resembling monetary outlook, DoD gross sales, the variety of companies in related sectors, and dependence on overseas sources of provide; and examined criticality indicators, resembling protection uniqueness, design necessities, expert labor wants, facility and gear availability, supplies and elements with lengthy lead instances, and availability of alternate options. This report comprises an evaluation of required ranges of autonomous UxS to fulfill DIB necessities, knowledge on DIB classes and particular element components inside these classes, an evaluation of the posture of the DIB to supply and maintain ranges of UxS platforms as required by DoD, the outcomes of a comparative evaluation of near-peer nation-states China and Russia, and suggestions on strengthening the DIB.

This analysis was sponsored by the Workplace of the Below Secretary of Protection for Analysis and Engineering (OUSD[R&E]) and performed throughout the Acquisition and Expertise Coverage Middle of the RAND Nationwide Safety Analysis Division (NSRD).

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