The innovation arm of the Department of Defense has selected four inaugural members of a program meant to train acquisition professionals on the use of other transaction agreements and a merit-based selection process known as Commercial Solutions Opening when purchasing technology products from industry.
The Immersive Commercial Acquisition Program incorporates classroom, on-the-job and experiential learning methods at the Defense Acquisition University to help participants carry out prototype projects, the Defense Innovation Unit said Wednesday.
DIU expects the 2022-2023 cohort to create and apply a capstone training framework within their home organizations.
The ICAP fellows are:
- Mariluz Chan-Endres, U.S. Navy
- April Davison, U.S. Air Force
- Maj. Michael Gerbasi, U.S. Army
- Maj. Shamika Woodruff, U.S. Air Force
Cherissa Tamayori, director of acquisitions at DIU, said the agency aims to help government contracting professionals “speak commercial.”
“We know that the private sector has options on who they work with. It is in DoD’s interest to be an attractive business partner, otherwise we run the risk of losing out on commercially-developed, mission-critical and even life-saving technology,” Tamayori added.