Some news from the contract offices today: DLA canceled its solicitation for 168k (max) Advanced Combat Shirts.
Most likely the Army is just reacting to the budget by cutting a few liabilities, or maybe the combat shirt buy is being held until the Army decides on a camo pattern for the Afghan theater. We know that there's been a lot of back and forth on the UCP-D vs. MultiCam during high level meetings here in D.C. over the last week, but no decision has been made. Regardless of this cancellation, the fact that the decision wasn't announced by the end of January makes me think the photosimulation test wasn't a slam-dunk for UCP-D.
Also on the contract buzz today was Natick's notices that it's buying soft armor packages for testing from Safariland and First Choice Armor. Looks like this is related to an aircraft or aircrew protection program.
UPDATE: I just spoke with DLA/DSCP's spokeswoman Diana Stewart who explained the Advanced Combat Shirt is safe. In fact, they reafirm that every deployer is getting one. Steward told us the DLA/DSCP got a little ahead of themselves by putting out an open bid just as the Army decided to transition the program into its contract sustainment cycle. Part of sustainment means shifting the competitive procurement process to a mandatory procurement process.
Mandatory procurement means DSCP needs to write a new contract that ensures an uninterrupted supply of the item--likely handing over the bulk of the buy to NIB/NISH once they are approved to produce the piece. DLA/DSCP are also using the hiatus to give PEO time to pass off the latest technical data package since the Army has made a few tweaks to the shirt recently. We also have to mention that Massif, the shirt's designer, is likely involved somewhere in this process trying to maintain some of the revenue involved in the continued procurement of what began as their product.
