Incumbent Lockheed Martin said Monday it has teamed with the Purdue, New Mexico State (NMSU), and New Mexico Tech (NMT) universities to bid on the Sandia National Laboratories management and operations contract. The announcement clarifies the cooperative arrangement that was still unclear when Lockheed announced early last month its intent to bid to retain the contract.
The Sandia National Laboratories produce non-nuclear components for nuclear weapons and develop systems to ensure the reliability of the U.S. nuclear arsenal for the National Nuclear Security Administration. The lab, which has operations primarily in New Mexico and California, is also at the “cutting edge” of nonproliferation and other technology areas, according to a press release.
Lockheed Martin wholly owned subsidiary Sandia Corp. holds the current contract, worth approximately $2.9 billion, which is scheduled to expire at the end of next April. The new cost-plus-fixed-fee contract will involve a four-month transition, five-year base period, and up to five one-year extensions. The NNSA expects to award the deal by the end of 2016.
Personnel and facilities from all three institutions on the bidding team would support research and development activities at Sandia. The collaboration also “will allow students and faculty from the universities to interact more strategically at Sandia to promote collaboration, innovation and talent development,” Lockheed said.
Van Romero, NMT vice president for research and economic development, said in a telephone interview Wednesday the universities reached out to Lockheed to suggest forming a team, “and they were very favorable to the idea.” The partnership then formed during the spring and was sealed approximately a month before proposals were due, he said.
“Sandia is very interested in the ongoing relationship in the energetic materials area, so that is the primary thing that we will be focusing on in the partnership,” Romero said. NMT’s partnership with Sandia has included the labs’ use of the university’s Energetic Materials Research and Testing Center, as well as the university’s support for the NNSA’s Stockpile Stewardship program. Energetic materials include explosives and pyrotechnics.
Cybersecurity is another area in which NMT has collaborated with Sandia, Romero said, noting that cybersecurity support has been part of the university’s discussions on the teaming arrangement. Bioengineering is another emerging field, he said. NMT two weeks ago received approval for two new doctorate programs – one in bioengineering, the other in mechanical engineering with a focus on explosives. “We see these new Ph.D. programs as a real strong connection into Sandia,” he said.
Vimal Chaitanya, NMSU vice president for research, said by phone that NMSU’s focus in the teaming arrangement will be on research related to unmanned aircraft systems and electronic warfare countermeasures. The university’s Physical Science Laboratory for rocket technology research will take the lead on those areas, he said.
NMSU will also be involved in cybersecurity activities, as well as power electronics, “particularly focusing on smart grids for power distribution,” Chaitanya said, noting that the university’s ongoing research on the water-energy nexus is another contribution it would make under the teaming agreement.
Technology transfer is another aspect of NMSU’s involvement, namely through its Arrowhead Center, the university’s commercialization and economic development arm. Chaitanya said NMSU will consider the intellectual property developed by Sandia scientists to identify marketing possibilities.
“We’ll hope to do that with industries of New Mexico so that the technology that’s developed will stay in New Mexico and then we’ll have a commercial entity [resulting in] creation of jobs and creation of wealth in general,” he said.
Lockheed said in its announcement that Purdue will lead technology transfer initiatives for Sandia, partnering with entrepreneurs to license Sandia technology for commercial use.
Battelle and Boeing were the first to announce that they were bidding on the contract as a team, which also features the University of New Mexico, the Texas A&M University System, and the University of Texas System. Fluor did not submit a bid, while other potential bidders have remained silent on their intentions.
