WASHINGTON – The Department of Defense's Office of Industrial Base Policy has awarded a combined $17.5 million in contracts to support two initiatives that will strengthen the resilience of the defense microelectronics industrial base – including a project to promote production of ultra-high density interconnects for PCBs.

The DoD, through its Manufacturing Capability Expansion and Investment Prioritization (MCEIP) office, awarded $11.5 million in the Defense Business Accelerator (DBX) and Printed Circuit Board (PCB) Market Catalyst project, which will harness private capital and commercial market forces to scale defense-relevant technologies and rapidly expand the industrial base.

The PCB Market Catalyst project will deliver a detailed plan for the creation of a new company that will stimulate demand for domestic production of ultra-high density interconnects for PCBs. The plan will then be presented to the DoD for a decision on whether to fund the creation of the new company. The PCB Market Catalyst will enable the US to surmount an impasse that has left it behind in the global PCB market. DBX leverages commercial market forces to accelerate the transition of emerging defense technologies into sustainable businesses to fill supply chain gaps. Both DBX and PCB Market Catalyst are being executed by the US Partnership for Assured Electronics in partnership with Advanced Technology International, with initial funding from MCEIP of $11.5 million over three years.

The Enterprise Parts Management System (EPMS) is a cloud-based enterprise-wide microelectronics parts management tool intended to enable parts management at program office levels across DoD throughout the entire parts lifecycle. EPMS will give DoD the ability to aggregate information on parts used in DoD systems and manage those parts at the enterprise level. This enhances insight into critical risks and enables rapid access to remediation measures that are vital to ensuring warfighter safety and mission success.

The $6 million investment will support the iterative design and development of the cloud-based platform. This tool will support Military Service and defense agency weapon system program offices; prime system developers and maintainers; and acquisition, sustainment, research, development, testing, and evaluation offices across the Department. JRC Integrated Systems, LLC of Washington, D.C. and Systems Innovation Engineering of Mullica Hill, New Jersey will execute the EMPS project.

"EPMS will provide an important 'whole-of-DoD' view of the microelectronics parts supply chain and enable better life-cycle management of this critical technology for DoD weapon systems," said MCEIP Director Anthony Di Stasio.

The two teams will assess DoD, Military Service, defense agency, and commercial capabilities to identify the best make-buy solution and then down-select to the best value in the iterative design and build of this innovative new system.

"These two awards directly support the Biden-Harris Administration's initiatives to strengthen America's supply chains as outlined in Executive Order 14017," said Assistant Secretary of Defense for Industrial Base Policy, Dr. Laura Taylor-Kale. "They will foster collaborative procurements, provide more visibility into global diminishing manufacturing sources and material shortages solutions, and facilitate the rapid dissemination of risk information such as obsolescence, evidence of counterfeit parts, and software vulnerabilities."