TOOLS FOR EVOLUTIONARY ACQUISITION: A STUDY OF MULTI-ATTRIBUTE TRADESPACE EXPLORATION (MATE) APPLIED TO THE SPACE BASED RADAR (SBR)

Evolutionary acquisitions (EA), by contrast to P3I, involves several full cycles of
the traditional engineering process, each building on the last and providing some incremental capability. Products that function as networks are ready examples: evolutionary acquisition of a network of sensors might, in its first iteration of the design cycle consist of one sensor, placed in a strategic location. Further iterations would augment this capability, adding more or better sensors to the network. These iterations are commonly called “spirals” and are meant to be a full iteration of the engineering processes of design, construction, and testing. Each cycle is intended to be performed faster than the overall project would be, since each provides only an incremental capability.