St System Developement

(U) The Offensive small Unmanned Aircraft System (O-sUAS) program fills critical capability gaps by rapidly generating a family of sUAS capable of executing Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance (ISR), Electronic Warfare, and precision strike in permissive, contested, and denied environments. Funding supports operationalizing the AF O-sUAS strategy and force-present emerging systems, including exquisite, attritable, and expendable platforms for collaborative operations within permissive, contested, and denied environments. This Program received $58.6 million due to a Rapid Acquisition Authority adjudicated requirement in FY2025 as a result of a classified Urgent Operational Need. The FY2026 spend plan amount for RDT&E includes $4,917 thousand of discretionary and $12,000 thousand of mandatory (reconciliation) for a total of $16,917 thousand. Items requested in FY2027 are representative of but not limited to system development and program support. Items developed during execution may change based on critical equipment needed to support current Air Force mission requirements. Due to the rapidly changing threat environment, the acquisition program manager has the authority to prioritize funding as necessary to meet current and emerging requirements for operational units. O-sUAS funding also supports innovation activities to include studies, analyses, requirements definition, intelligence and data management activities, and quick-reaction capability prototypes/demonstrations to accelerate planning for technology transition, technology insertion, and future acquisition programs. Commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) hardware and software solutions will be leveraged when able to meet the technical needs of implementing O-sUAS and Command and Control (C2) capabilities in operational environments when applicable. Software will support a wide variety of sUAS, targeting, radio systems and other emerging systems to be employed by AFSPECWAR, SOF, and other Air Force users in the future. Technical maturation efforts will be necessary to maintain interoperability with conventional joint force capabilities including but not limited to joint fire support systems and emerging data networking waveforms.