A quick pre-holiday note to advise the life cycle logistics and product support manager community that the latest edition of the Defense Acquisition Research Journal (Defense ARJ) is now available online for your reading (and professional development) pleasure.

The theme of this new July 2020 issue of the Defense ARJ is “Return of Investment (ROI) of New Approaches to Defense Acquisition.” Published research papers in this edition include:

• Increasing Value and Savings in Shipbuilding with Innovative Technologies - The potential value and savings of adopting Three-Dimensional Laser Scanning (3DLS), additive manufacturing (AM), and Product Life-cycle Management (PLM) must be estimated to assess the value and capture the full benefits of these new technologies. Modeling and simulation, using Knowledge Value Added, demonstrates an innovative investment analysis approach and the potential for large savings and increased value.
• Studying Acquisition Strategy Formulation of Incremental Development Approaches - This is a study of the challenges that acquisition professionals confront in formulating the Department of Defense’s preferred acquisition approach incremental development and provides acquisition policy reform recommendations. The research includes a survey of acquisition professionals to formulate the components of a recommended acquisition strategy based on typical programmatic decision inputs (requirements, technology maturity, risk, urgency, and funding).
• A Model for Exogenous Learning on Department of Defense Procurement Programs - This article presents a numerical optimization model for projecting exogenous learning on DoD procurement programs. The optimization is based on an assessment of the expected return on investments, and simulated results reflect characteristics of Patriot Advanced Capability-3 (PAC-3) and F-22 Raptor Fighter Aircraft procurement programs.

By way of reminder, the Defense Acquisition Research Journal (ARJ) is a scholarly peer-reviewed journal published by the Defense Acquisition University (DAU). All submissions receive a blind review to ensure impartial evaluation. Articles represent the views of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the opinion of the DAU or the Department of Defense.