The NAS consists of a wide assortment of technologies operated by FAA, other federal agencies, such as DOD, and industry participants such as airlines. Technology transfer may be defined as the process by which technology or knowledge developed by one entity is applied and used by another. Technology transfer may involve the transfer of equipment, research, architecture, knowledge, procedures, or software code, or involve data integration. Technology transfer also encompasses the process by which research is transitioned from one entity and then developed and matured by another through testing and additional applied research until ultimately deployed. This report focuses on the mechanisms used to transfer research and technology between partner agencies and private industry and FAA, which can include the transfer of FAA and partner agency research to the private sector to develop a technology, or the transfer of research or technology developed by partner agencies or the private sector to FAA. Since the origination of the NextGen effort, several mechanisms intended to facilitate coordination and technology transfer among FAA and partner agencies have been established. Congress created JPDO within FAA as the primary mechanism for interagency and private-sector coordination for NextGen. JPDO’s enabling legislation states that JPDO’s responsibility with regard to technology transfer is “facilitating the transfer of technology from research programs such as the National Aeronautics and Space Administration program and the Department of Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency program to federal agencies with operational responsibilities and to the private sector.” JPDO developed an Integrated Work Plan that recommends primary and support responsibilities to partner agencies for research and development of various technological aspects of NextGen. (See fig. 1.) JPDO is also responsible for overseeing and coordinating NextGen research activities within the federal government and ensuring that new technologies are used to their fullest potential in aircraft and the air traffic control system. The memorandums of understanding among the partner agencies also require that the partner agencies have the mechanisms in place to coordinate and align their NextGen activities, including their NextGen-related budgets, acquisitions, and research and development. The legislation also directed the Secretary of Transportation to establish a Senior Policy Committee, to be chaired by the Secretary, to provide NextGen policy guidance and review, and to facilitate coordination and planning of NextGen by the partner agencies. To help implement the responsibilities described in the legislation, each partner agency assigned a liaison to JPDO—as well as staff to JPDO in some cases. In addition, several working groups were created to facilitate collaboration between partner agencies and the private sector, and the NextGen Institute was created to be a forum for private industry involvement in NextGen planning and other activities. As initial NextGen planning was completed, and the focus turned to implementation, JPDO’s role has changed to focus on long-term research past 2018. Furthermore, in 2010 a new JPDO Director was appointed (the office’s fourth Director in its 7 years of existence) and JPDO was moved organizationally within FAA to raise its prominence within FAA and enable it to better serve as a mechanism for interagency collaboration. Because NextGen implementation also requires expertise, research, and technology from the private sector, FAA has developed processes and mechanisms for interacting with the private sector. FAA views its Acquisition Management System (AMS) as the primary mechanism for transferring research and technology from the private sector. FAA’s AMS establishes policy and guidance for all aspects of the acquisition lifecycle, and the AMS contracting process is designed to help FAA procure products and services from sources offering the best value to satisfy FAA’s mission needs. election, assignment, nd chedling of ircrft to rnw to imltneously optimize opertion crossltiple irport. created four research transition teams as mechanisms to transition the complicated technologies that do not fit within a single FAA office’s purview under FAA’s structure. The teams cover approximately half of all research and development activities conducted by NASA’s Airspace Systems Program—a group assigned to directly address fundamental NextGen needs. Each team addresses a specific issue area that (1) is considered a high priority, (2) has defined projects and deliverables, and (3) requires the coordination of multiple offices within FAA or NASA. Involving planning and operational personnel early is meant to avoid making decisions in isolation that may waste resources and time. Consistent with key practices that can help enhance and sustain interagency collaboration, these teams identify common outcomes, establish a joint strategy to achieve that outcome, and define each agency’s role and responsibilities, allowing FAA and NASA to overcome differences in agency missions, cultures, and established ways of doing business. Each research transition team develops and documents a plan that defines the scope of its efforts and the products to be developed. The plans outline a delivery schedule and the maturity level to which products will be developed. They also identify how products will be used by FAA in its investment decision process, describe what NASA will provide to FAA, and what FAA’s involvement will be related to the conduct of research. For example, one team’s plan includes development of a decision support tool to help manage the assignment and scheduling of runways at multiple airports to optimize operations. For this product, NASA is scheduled to deliver technical papers in 2012 and a software prototype in 2013. At the time of the scheduled transition to FAA in 2014, the tool should be at a prescribed level of technical maturity and FAA will make an implementation decision later that year. Most of the four research transition teams have not yet delivered products and, while stakeholders are optimistic, whether technologies developed by these teams are ultimately implemented will largely depend on how well coordination occurs across multiple FAA offices involved in implementation. Research transition teams’ products identified for development are expected to be transferred to FAA predominantly from 2012 through 2015. As of April 2011, NASA has delivered two final products and several interim informational products to FAA—including concept feasibility papers, an algorithm related to efficient flow in congested airspace, and data from a joint simulation. Going forward, stakeholders and participants with whom we spoke generally expressed optimism about the research transition teams’ ability to transfer NASA work to FAA and into NAS. However, some stakeholders noted that success requires high-level commitment from each agency and effective team leads. Specifically, one NASA official noted that FAA’s research transition team leads do not have the authority to make final decisions about the implementation of a given technology. Therefore, the success of the team’s product will ultimately depend on that team lead’s ability to work across various FAA offices to negotiate and coordinate a solution. FAA and NASA also use other technology transfer mechanisms—including interagency agreements and test facility demonstrations—which have historically faced challenges at the point where the technology is handed off from NASA to FAA, but have nonetheless resulted in successful transfer and implementation of technology. Past technology transfer efforts between NASA and FAA faced challenges at the transfer point between invention and acquisition, referred to as the “valley of death.” At this point in the process, NASA has had limited funding at times to continue beyond fundamental research, but the technology was not matured to a level for FAA to assume the risks of investing in a technology that had not yet been demonstrated with a prototype or similar evidence. FAA and NASA officials have said the transition is still a challenge, but both are working to address this issue through interagency agreements that specify a commitment to a more advanced level of technological maturity of research than NASA has conducted at times in the past. Both interagency agreements and test facility demonstrations were used in the development and transfer of the Traffic Management Advisor, a program NASA developed, which uses graphical displays and alerts to increase situational awareness for air traffic controllers and traffic management coordinators. Through an interagency agreement, the two agencies established the necessary data feeds and two-way computer interfaces to support the program. NASA demonstrated the system’s capabilities at the NextGen test facility in North Texas where it also conducted operational evaluations. NASA successfully transferred the program to FAA, which, after reengineering it for operational use, deployed it throughout the United States. In some instances, the mechanisms FAA and NASA use to collaborate and transfer technologies have resulted in implementation of that technology in the NAS—as with Traffic Management Advisor; in others, the mechanisms have resulted in less tangible outcomes but nonetheless represent successful transfer in our view. For example, according to NASA officials, much of what is transferred between NASA and FAA is technical knowledge (e.g., an informational report or an algorithm) as opposed to a piece of hardware or new software. These products may not necessarily lead to immediate deployments, but the knowledge transferred may inform future decisions, lead to applied research, or be the precursors to future operational trials. In other instances, these mechanisms may produce a proven technology that is ultimately not implemented by FAA, but can be successfully transferred to the private sector. For example, NASA developed a decision support tool intended to assist controllers in identifying the most optimal route given wind conditions. Though operational evaluation testing was successful, FAA chose not to pursue full-scale development of the capability because it ultimately did not consider the capability to be a controller function. However, Boeing has since leveraged NASA’s work to develop Boeing Direct Routes, a service that uses advanced software algorithms to automatically alert an airline’s operations centers and flight crew when a simple, more fuel-efficient path is available, permitting the operations center to propose those routes to FAA controllers for approval. Boeing predicts that the service will result in measurable decreases in aircraft fuel usage and emissions. In this case, even though FAA—NASA’s intended customer—did not deploy the technology, it was successfully transferred to the private sector and will be used in the NAS to produce anticipated benefits consistent with NextGen goals. FAA primrily reponle for the ir trffic mgement-wether integrtion process nd for directing rerch nd development of vition-pecific wether informtion nd fnctionlity.