Remote Minehunting System: Root Cause Analysis

The Remote Minehunting System (RMS) is a mine reconnaissance system for the detection, classification, identification, and localization of bottom and moored mine-like objects in shallow and moderately deep water. In December 2009 the Navy notified Congress of a critical Nunn-McCurdy breach in both the Program Acquisition Unit Cost (PAUC) and Average Procurement Unit Cost (APUC). The Navy reported that the PAUC had risen 85.1 percent, from $12.1 million in the October 2006 Acquisition Program Baseline (APB) to $22.4 million. Over the same time span the APUC rose 51.2 percent, from $8.4 million to $12.7 million. A root cause analysis revealed three major reasons for the cost growth. First, the Navy reduced its planned procurement quantity from 106 to 52 as it decided to procure a different, more advanced system for the Littoral Combat Ship (LCS) Anti-Submarine Warfare modules. Second, there were significant failures of governance by the Office of the Assistant Secretary of the Navy (OASN) (Research, Development & Acquisition (RDA)). Third, the APB cost estimates used unreasonably optimistic production projections based on an erroneous first unit cost. The original document contains color images.