Getting into the DOW Drone Marketplace

Five actions, five different results

The Maritime storefront on drones.mil sits inside a Department-wide marketplace that runs under an Army Commercial Solutions Opening. The Navy decides what appears there by issuing calls, and the one open in October 2026 covers Phase II medium unmanned surface vessels. Every other move a maritime firm can make, from the PAE RAS Front Door to a solution brief to consortium membership, produces something else, and none of them places a product on the storefront.

The open call has its own traps. Its call number duplicates the number on an Army Group 3 aircraft call, it refers to a placemat template that was not among the posted attachments, and it contradicts itself on how the first step is rated. The offeror pays for the sea demonstration, and a listed vessel carries no minimum order.

What the paper answers

• Who runs the Maritime storefront, and under which authorities does it operate?
• Does your vessel meet the seven requirements in the Navy's MUSV call?
• How far may a production vessel differ from the one demonstrated at sea?
• What must the demonstration show to earn a pass?
• What can a firm do when no call covers its product?
• How do end users choose among listed vessels once the agreement is in place?

What's inside

• A comparison of five actions open to a maritime firm: who each is open to, its status, what it takes and what it can lead to.
• The three qualification steps in the Navy call, with format rules, grading and results.
• Eligibility and registration requirements, including the conflict-of-interest analysis submitted with the initial package.
• The call's internal inconsistencies and the questions to put to the Agreements Officer before relying on a reading.
• Seven recommendations and 12 references to the calls, notices and official pages.

Every required demonstration event

The paper sets out each event the sea demonstration must cover, including:

• Sustained speed, maneuverability and fuel burn at the advertised range speeds
• An unmanned mission of at least 24 continuous hours, 24 waypoints and 300 nautical miles
• Keep-in and keep-out zones, and navigation from chart data around charted objects, shallow water and land
• At least 20 contact interactions under the collision regulations, including overtaking under Rule 13(d)

Who it's for

• Builders of medium unmanned surface vessels weighing the Navy's open call.
• Makers of maritime payloads, autonomy software and subsystems with no category call of their own.
• Unmanned undersea vehicle firms looking for a way into the Navy's robotic and autonomous systems portfolio.
• Capture leads choosing between the Front Door, a solution brief and consortium membership.

About the author

Chris A. Grable is founder and CEO of Up Doppler Consulting LLC, a Veteran-Owned Small Business in Leonardtown, Maryland. A Navy veteran with more than 45 years in DOW operations and acquisition, he retired from federal service as Senior Experiment Designer at the Naval Air Warfare Center Aircraft Division. UDC helps technology companies find, shape and win DOW work.