OSD ManTech selects three ARM Institute consortium member projects for Organic Industrial Base Challenge

The Advanced Robotics for Manufacturing (ARM) Institute recently announced that three consortium member projects were selected from over 100 proposals submitted to the Office of the Secretary of Defense (OSD) Manufacturing Technology (ManTech) Organic Industrial Base (OIB) Modernization Challenge held earlier in 2024.  

The ARM Institute is a DoD Manufacturing Innovation Institute and a member of the Manufacturing USA Network. Providing resources for U.S. manufacturers that utilize advanced robotics and AI, the Institute connects more than 400 member organizations across industry, government and academia.

OIB process took over a year before selection

The OSD ManTech Program hosted representatives from five Department of Defense Manufacturing Innovation Institutes (MIIs) and their consortium member companies for an OIB Modernization Challenge pitch event in February 2023.

Following an October workshop to identify crucial technological needs, OSD ManTech initiated the OIB Modernization project call through the MIIs, set to offer up to $2.5 million in OSD-sponsored government funding to five MII-member winners. This resulted in 104 proposal submissions from member companies.

Nine projects delivered their proposals to a panel of OIB experts, industry leadership and the OSD ManTech Director, Tracy Frost, based on their projected positive impact across the 47 DoD-owned OIB sites.  

“The ARM Institute and our Consortium Members truly appreciate the opportunity to both learn about OIB’s challenges and actively respond to solving them”, said Ira Moskowitz, ARM Institute CEO. “Continued interaction between the ManTech MIIs and the Department of Defense will increase availability of innovative solutions to meet the needs of our warfighter and the supporting manufacturing community.” 

The three selected projects were:

Robotic non-contact 3D inspection replacing hard gaging 

Organization: ARIS Technology 

ARIS Technology will replace manual hard gauging with robotically automated non-contact 3D scanning, qualifying parts with data instead of manual testing. The team will demonstrate a fully integrated robotic 3D scanning system at the Iowa Army Plant. 

Extended Reality and AI-Assisted Paint Masking  

Organization: GridRaster Inc. 

GridRaster will refine and deploy their extended reality tools to enable optimized paint masking work on a large Army vehicle in the operational environment at Letterkenny Army Depot. This effort is anticipated to lower masking errors and reduce masking time, both by more than 50%, according to the company.  

Maskless robotic painting with real-time control  

Organizations: Figure Engineering, Siemens, Lockheed Martin 

The team, led by Figure Engineering, and including Siemens and Lockheed Martin, will use artificial intelligence and machine learning to optimize Figure Engineering’s Signac collaborative robotic marking system to eliminate manual masking and stenciling on defense assets. The organizations will demonstrate this capability at Warner Robins ALC.