What the FY2027 request buys
Verbatim from the R-2A exhibit for project 635280 of PE 0603680F. This is the budget justification's own description of work that has not happened yet — the one thing no other level of the budget carries.
- Continue the development of high demand manufacturing technologies including low cost for attritable systems, thermal protection materials for high temperature applications, and other manufacturing technologies geared toward realizing the future force through autonomous collaborative platforms, low-cost munitions, hypersonic weapons, and alternative position, navigation and timing solutions. Activities include: -- Delivery of improved manufacturing and quality processes to increase yield of Read Out Integrated Circuits (ROICs), which will result in increased production capacity of critical Infrared Search and Track systems. -- Accelerate manufacturing efforts for next generation hypersonic systems, such as reusable systems or responsive strike systems. These systems require scale-up in both rate and physical size of the components. -- Delivery of manufacturing prototypes of electronic front end components to enable affordable radar and communications capability traditionally limited to exquisite platforms. - Continue the development of manufacturing processes for substrates to enable quantum sensing. Activities include: -- Establishment of a domestic manufacturing capacity of quantum grade diamond substrates needed for sensors that provide operational magnetic navigation capability. - Continue the development of methodologies and tools to rapidly on-board non-aerospace industries into Department of the Air Force (DAF) supply chains for wartime production surge capacity. Research includes development of digital models and toolsets to rapidly qualify traditional civilian industries to enter defense aerospace supply chains. Activities include: -- Stand up a pilot line for composite forming of munition airframes that utilizes a commercially available composite material and is capable of high rate and low cost forming. - Commence the development of manufacturing approaches that (a) reduce the cost and time to produce specialized propulsion systems, (b) increase manufacturing efficiencies of low-SWAP (size, weight, and power) propulsion systems for enhanced maneuverability.
Funding in FY 2027 increased compared to FY 2026 by $8.674 million due to increased investment in manufacturing technologies for specialized propulsion and reusable hypersonics.
FY2026: the year under way
Prior-year accomplishments and current-year plans from the same exhibit. Context for the FY2027 plan, not a series — an activity partitions its project exactly in the request year, but can under-cover it in earlier years.
- Continue the development of high demand manufacturing technologies including low cost for attritable systems, thermal protection materials for high temperature applications, and other manufacturing technologies geared toward realizing the future force through autonomous collaborative platforms, low-cost munitions, hypersonic weapons, and alternative position, navigation and timing solutions. - Continue the development of manufacturing processes for substrates to enable quantum sensing. - Commence the development of methodologies and tools to rapidly on-board non-aerospace industries into Department of the Air Force (DAF) supply chains for wartime production surge capacity. Research includes development of digital models and toolsets to rapidly qualify traditional civilian industries to enter defense aerospace supply chains.
Three years, and no five-year plan
An R-2A activity publishes the prior year, the current year and the budget year. The FYDP outyears exist at project and program-element level and are deliberately absent here rather than inferred. Estimate types are colored and never summed into one figure.
| Fiscal Year | Estimate Type | Amount ($M) |
|---|---|---|
| FY2025 | Actual | 8.4 |
| FY2026 | Enacted | 9.4 |
| FY2027 | Request | 18.1 |
This activity is 18% of project 635280's FY2027 request and 18% of PE 0603680F's. In the request year the activities under a project sum to it exactly; in the current year they under-cover it in about 9% of cases, so an activity's delta can legitimately exceed its parent's and the two must not be compared row to row.
4 activities in project 635280
Every R-2A line of this project, largest FY2027 request first. Linked where the activity has enough of its own narrative to carry a page; the rest are shown in full on the program-element page.