March 28, 2024

Excellence Award for Pax’s PMA-260 Office

PMA-260
Frederick J. Stephany, acting assistant secretary of the Navy for Research, Development and Acquisition, presents the 2021 DoN Acquisition Excellence Sarkis Tatigian Small Business Award to CAPT Robert Burgess, PMA-260 program manager, at a ceremony at the Pentagon. (US Navy photo)

The US Navy’s Common Aviation Support Equipment program office (PMA-260) received a Department of the Navy acquisition excellence award for outstanding small business contracting achievements.

The Acquisition Excellence Sarkis Tatigian Small Business Award was presented during a ceremony on November 4 at the Pentagon.

The award is named after the Defense Department’s longest-serving civil servant, Sarkis Tatigian, who served for nearly 78 years. Sarkis Tatigian joined the Navy in 1943 at the age of 19 and died in 2020 at the age of 96.

In reflection of his many years of service and dedication, the Navy named the Sarkis Tatigian Small Business Award in his honor in 2012. It recognizes outstanding performance by a field activity in creating an organizational climate resulting in the advancement of small business opportunity through exceptionally managed small business programs and challenging initiatives and who has made significant contributions to the command and the DoN small business program.

The Navy selected PMA-260 as the winner of the 2021 award due to its commitment to leveraging small business as a strategic advantage.

Despite COVID-19, PMA-260 continued to increase the role of small business to support its mission and renewed its commitment to eliminating barriers that limit or preclude small business participation. These values are supported by PMA-260’s efforts to identify new sources and leverage the advantages of small businesses for whenever possible to promote inclusiveness.

“PMA-260 has always relied on small business’ for their creativity, rapid innovation and ability to deliver common support equipment to the Naval Aviation Enterprise rapidly,” said Mark Lysaght, PMA-260 principal deputy program manager.

Over the course of the year, program office leadership enabled small business opportunities through approaches such as emphasizing small business opportunities in all acquisition strategies; using simplified acquisition contracts; supporting the annual Lakehurst Small Business Forum virtually; briefing industry participants on planned future procurements and small business opportunities; personally meeting with representatives from small businesses to educate them on PMA-260’s mission and programs; and providing them with an introduction/connection to the NAVAIR Small Business Office.

“Small businesses play a major role in PMA-260’s ability to improve the reliability, maintainability, capability, and safety of over 250,000 fielded common support equipment end items,” said CAPT Robert Burgess, PMA-260 program manager. Small businesses contribute to PMA-260’s mission of reducing operations and support costs and fleet manning requirements to operate and maintain fielded common support equipment. “Common support equipment is critical to the readiness of the aircraft and the capabilities of our Navy and Marine Corps fleet to execute their missions on a daily basis.”

Small business contract awards last year included those to Service-Disabled and Veteran-Owned Small Businesses, Woman-Owned Small Businesses, Historically Underutilized Business Zone (HUBZone) Small Businesses, and Small Disadvantaged Businesses.

The program office executed 19 new funded contract actions across two different small business installation services providers for the installation of various aviation support equipment items at Navy and Marine Corps activities valued at more than $1 million. Additionally, nine simplified acquisition contracts were awarded to nine different small businesses with a total value $456,000 for materials in support of various aviation support equipment programs. The program office sponsored three active Small Business Innovative Research programs.

PMA-260 executed 46 contract actions for contract options/delivery orders against existing small business contracts with 22 different small businesses valued at more than $42 million.

Since fiscal 2018, PMA-260 increased funding to small businesses by 22%, and increased the number of small businesses receiving contracts by 62%.

“Small businesses across our country are the economic engine that powers our nation, and are a critical part of our defense industry base. PMA-260 has a culture that understands and maximizes the full potential of our small business vendors,” said Gary Kurtz, program executive officer, Aviation Common Systems and Commercial Services.

This article was provided by NAVAIR News.

The Navy’s Common Aviation Support Equipment program office (PMA-260) received the Department of the Navy Acquisition Excellence Sarkis Tatigian Small Business Award for outstanding small business contracting achievements. Pictured from left are PMA-260, Patuxent River, MD leadership team members, CAPT Robert L. Burgess, David Sutherland, Catherine Buchanan, and Mark Lysaght. (Not pictured: Richard Bazemore.) Pictured from PMA-260, Lakehurst, NJ, leadership are James Deffler and Christine Sager.

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