PM TRASYS Focuses on Warfighter Readiness and Technology Advancement

By Kate Finkel, Staff Writer

 

Central Florida Tech Grove hosted a “Juice Bar” event featuring Marine Corps Program Manager for Training Systems (PM TRASYS), Sept. 18.

 

PM TRASYS is Marine Corps Systems Command’s executive agent assigned to manage acquisition and life-cycle support of Marine Corps ground training systems, devices, and training support services. By delivering advanced nonstandard ground weapons and information technology training systems, they improve expeditionary readiness and combat effectiveness across all domains, ensuring Marines are fully prepared to address various operational challenges.

 

John Taylor, deputy program manager for PM TRASYS, started his presentation outlining the program manager’s top five priorities.

 

“Those five include staying warfighter-focused, continuously improving our culture daily, speed of relevance, innovative organization, [and] improve communication and collaboration,” Taylor said. “The vision is Marines having the training systems [range, synthetic and warfighter] they need to prepare to fight and win against any adversary in any clime and place.”

 

Taylor explained that as technological advancements accelerate and the need for new technologies increase, transforming research into deployable technologies is crucial. Armed forces need to leverage cutting-edge innovations on the battlefield, ensuring they maintain a strategic advantage and can effectively respond to evolving threats.

 

“Everyone talks about this ‘valley of death…’ when you are in the time between a ‘promising’ concept/prototype and the transition into an official program of record/operational use,” Taylor said. “One of the ways to get out of the ‘valley of death,’ is to use a road map; you have to be able to map what your effort is to what the requirement is. You can have the greatest thing since sliced bread, but if you don’t have the requirement for it, you’re in a hard place of ‘how can I take that down the road further?’.”

 

A recommendation to enter the acquisition cycle will depend on quite a few factors, according to Taylor. Some of these important factors the Milestone Decision Authority considers are military utility as determined by the operational user, the existence of a validated requirement, and technological maturity level.

 

“Working prototypes are great, but one that appeals to multiple stakeholders is better,” Taylor said. “If it’s an integrated prototype that also appeals to multiple stakeholders, [that’s] even better because we work and stay engaged really closely with the Navy and the Army… so we can take advantage of it. We are the smallest service and sometimes we have to just sit back and watch because we don’t have the resources like they do. At the end of the day, it has to be about how does it improve the warfighters outcome.”