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PDEP on-track, in development for AFGSC data-driven decisions

  • Published
  • By 1st Lt. Gerald Peden
  • Air Force Global Strike Command Public Affairs

Air Force Global Strike Command is working to implement state-of-the-art technology to advance the mission through the growth of the Portfolio-level Digital Engineering Platform, the command’s data-driven analytical processor that is in the next phase of development at the Cyber Innovation Center in Bossier City, Louisiana.

Lt. Col. Ryan Chmielewski, Chief of the PDEP Program Office at AFGSC’s Innovation, Analysis, and Leadership Development Directorate, also known as A9, said PDEP will support the command in evaluating and deciding which courses of action to take and then assessing how effective the decisions were based on data.

“For example, let’s say through the use of PDEP, the command predicts to solve aircraft availability issues it can move approximately 50 maintainers to one base from another,” Chmielewski said. “Then after this movement, we would use the data to evaluate if the operation is on track for the outcomes we predicted and adjust as necessary.”

The advancement of PDEP has been guided by Air Force Global Strike Command’s Science and Technology Directorate, also known as ST, where collaborative plans were made to facilitate PDEP program design and development through a Partnership Intermediary Agreement.

Through this agreement, the Institute for Defense Analysis analyzed AFGSC leadership intent and defined the plan for PDEP, working to find where the program would best fit in the command. The MITRE Corporation is leading architecture and infrastructure development of PDEP, and the Cyber Innovation Center is providing technological resources and assessments to build PDEP.

A demonstration of some of the platform capabilities took place Sept. 27, 2019, where command leadership had the opportunity to observe the interactive software and digital tools that will allow the command to analyze data sets to support decision makers.

Joe Kalis, a MITRE senior technical advisor at the United States Air Force Nuclear Command, Control and Communications Center at Barksdale Air Force Base, assisted with coordination between the MITRE Corporation and AFGSC directorates. Kalis said PDEP is currently in development at the Cyber Innovation Center with the next step being operational testing.

“The name of the game is data and determining how do we get it as well as maintaining it,” Kalis said. “We’re looking at data across AFGSC and deciding how we implement PDEP to facilitate data driven decisions to reduce risk and costs in operations.”

“When PDEP is operational, a working group can define what the command challenge is, while showing leadership what risk impact an adjustment to an operational course of action would be,” Chmielewski said. “It supports the action officer’s analysis by going through data to see what’s next instead of waiting for the challenge to come to us.”

After PDEP development is complete, the platform is expected to be implemented across various AFGSC organizations and bases. This continuous effort to develop PDEP is an additional piece in the goal of advancing innovation and collaboration to support the nation’s strike force and capability.

PDEP will also provide AFGSC an enhanced capability of using data gathered across the command and further build efficient processes for the command by combining the information and present leaders the opportunity to make data-driven decisions that will support current and future force capability, manpower and budgeting.