The Military Acquisition Decision Support System (MADSS)

Acquisition managers in Premilestone I Acquisition activities face the task of identifying, defining, adn selecting system concepts, and predicting which technologies will best support future acquisitions. A requirement exists for an automated tool which will gather and organize information, facilitate documentation of alternative concepts, tie the components of these alternatives to other information, and support prioritizing these concepts. LGA has developed an approach to automated planning for R&D organizations, called the Roadmap Information Management System (RIMS). RIMS provides graphical and hierarchical representations of user-defined concepts called Concept Roadmaps. The Concept Roadmaps permit decision makers to document current capabilities, goal capabilities, and subgoals that have to be accomplished to reach the goal. Alternative concepts are represented either as "alternate paths" in a single Roadmap or in separate Concept Roadmaps within a single roadmap set. Concept Roadmaps are tied to a database containing other decision-related information. We are proposing to modify the approach used for RIMS to support the additional requirements identified for military acquisition decision support. The proposed Military Acquisition Decision Support System (MADSS) will consist of Concept Roadmaps and linked databases augmented with expert systems to assist in setting priorities and deciding among alternatives.