The Common Aviation Support Equipment program office (PMA-260) held a virtual industry day last month, in search of new and innovative ideas to support the future of the Naval Air Systems Command (NAVAIR) and PMA-260’s science and technology focus areas.

The program office held its industry day virtually to allow for increased participation across industry partners with current travel and health limitations due to COVID-19 in mind. More than 75 companies signed up to attend and approximately 150 non-government attendees signed on during the event.

“Virtual industry days will allow for us to work more closely with industry in developing technologies towards our support equipment platforms, while ensuring we are fully aware of the latest technologies that are available to us,” said George Lehaf, PMA-260 science and technology team lead. “We were able to describe what PMA-260’s role is within NAVAIR and share a high-level overview of our technology focus areas to help drive R&D efforts towards our needs,” he said.

The day began with a welcome message from Capt. Robert Burgess, PMA-260 program manager, providing an overview of the program’s technology needs and challenges. During the event, selected integrated product team leads provided additional briefs on PMA-260 portfolio focus areas to provide high-level details on the support equipment commodities that they manage, as well as areas for technology growth aligned to their gear. Following this, team leads provided details on how industry can communicate their technology developments, as well as the latest details on the small business innovation research program office and their process for science and technology proposals.

Burgess and select PMA-260 team leads ended the day with a question and answer session where industry was able to ask for clarification and additional details on areas of interest. At this time, industry may provide PMA-260 with technology quads described in the presentation that align with the focus areas presented, after which PMA representatives can follow-up for more information and have the opportunity to collaborate and coordinate on future technology developments. 

“We held a virtual industry day because we need to find a new way to improve our support equipment posture by increasing support equipment readiness. This is a monumental task, but we need to look at ways to mitigate obsolete components, take advantage of new and improved technologies in an attempt to make support equipment more reliable, and increase our support equipment inventory for future operations, said Burgess.

The Common Aviation Support Equipment program office (PMA-260) manages the procurement, development, and fielding of Common Ground Support equipment and Automatic Test Equipment. Additionally, PMA-260 manages the Metrology and Calibration (METCAL) program, the Foreign Object Damage Mitigation effort, and Mobile Facilities used to support Navy Expeditionary and Marine Aviation Logistics Squadron Intermediate-level maintenance.  PMA-260’s programs support most U.S. Navy and Marine Corps aircraft within the Naval Aviation Enterprise.

PMA-260 manages the acquisition and life-cycle support of common aviation support equipment required for the operation and maintenance of aircraft, aircraft weapons, related aircraft weapons subsystems, and miscellaneous ground support equipment.

Additionally, PMA-260 leads the way ensuring U.S. and foreign military sales of common aviation support equipment to include research and development, acquisition, sustainment, and configuration management of more than 277,000 discrete items of equipment.