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Army Renews ARCYBER’s Lost Limited Acquisition Authority

The authority enables rapid procurement of cyber technologies.

Army Sgt. Bryson Setser, communication systems sergeant assigned to V Corps Forward Company, prepares a Starlink satellite to acquire signals at Camp Kosciuszko, Poland, July 11, 2023. The Army recently renewed Army Cyber Command's limited acquisition authority, which helps the command to rapidly purchase and deploy innovative cyber technologies. Army Reserve Sgt. Peter Martinez

Assistant Secretary of the Army Doug Bush redelegated limited acquisition authority (LAA) to Army Cyber Command (ARCYBER). Because the authority had previously been delegated to Ronald Pontius, former deputy to the commanding general, the command’s authority was voided when Pontius retired in February.

In addition to renewing the LAA, Bush tweaked it, delegating the authority to the position of the commander rather than to an individual person. Lt. Gen. Maria Barrett currently leads the command and can further delegate the authority, for example, to a general officer or someone in a senior executive service position.

The LAA delegation provides ARCYBER the ability to acquire non-program of record cyber operations-specific equipment and capabilities aligned to operational requirements, Steven Rehn, ARCYBER’s chief technology officer, told SIGNAL Media in an email following up on a series of interviews with ARCYBER leaders. The authority is limited to $2.5 million, the same as under the previous authority granted in 2017 and will “allow ARCYBER to rapidly respond to emergent needs,” Rehn said. It is set to expire in June 2025, but the command can request to have it renewed once again.

Gen. Barrett touted the benefits of LAA in an interview prior to the official redelegation.
“We're pretty excited about the limited acquisition authority, especially when you start talking about the innovative capabilities that we may apply it to. I talked a lot about defense because honestly, it's hard for me to talk to you about the offensive side of the house, but this limited acquisition authority will—how I would probably frame it in a public forum is—the limited acquisition of authority will allow us to look at acquiring emerging capabilities.”

As the leader of the command’s Technical Warfare Center, which houses the Army Cyber Technology and Innovation Center, Rehn is largely in charge of acquiring those innovative cyber capabilities. “I've got lab authorities for research, but I also execute the limited acquisition authority that ARCYBER has to get very small capabilities—not big programs of record—but I get things quickly, directly off to the command,” he said.

Rehn also is in charge of the capabilities section, which uses the Army’s formal acquisition processes to ensure operational needs are met. “If you've heard the horror stories of that process, the horror stories that units are getting stuff they don't need or stuff that they need is delayed, we make sure that [process] is as timely and supportive of what the needs are for our command. I will tell you that that process has been very innovative,” he asserted. “It's the one process in the Army right now that I would say—at least the way we're executing it in cyber—really tightly couples the material developer, capability developer and the operating community to include the schoolhouse.”

Rehn also leads the data division, which oversees the Army’s big data platform known as Gabriel Nimbus, the Joint Cyber Training Enterprise Operations Group and the Development, Security and Operations (DevSecOps) Group.

Command leaders say they need computer architectures mathematically proven to work in contested environments, artificial intelligence on the network and continuous monitoring capabilities.

Army leaders will share more insights on the service’s cyber, signal and electronic warfare efforts at AFCEA’s TechNet Augusta conference, Augusta, Georgia, August 14-17.