AFRL program manager, SBIR companies receive Tibbetts Award Published Oct. 19, 2007 By 88th Air Base Wing Public Affairs WRIGHT-PATTERSON AIR FORCE BASE, Ohio -- An Air Force Research Laboratory program manager was recognized Oct .10 at the ninth annual Small Business Innovative Research awards ceremony in Washington, D.C., for his service to the SBIR program in the AFRL Materials and Manufacturing Directorate. Marvin L. Gale, now assigned as the business development manager in the AFRL Propulsion Directorate, received the Tibbets Award, named for Roland Tibbetts who is acknowledged as the "father of the SBIR program." These prestigious, national awards are given to those small firms, projects, organizations and individuals judged to exemplify the very best in SBIR achievement. The emphasis is on recognizing those accomplishments where -- in the judgment of those closely involved and often most immediately affected -- the stimulus of SBIR funding has made an important and definable difference. According to AFRL/ML officials, Mr. Gale's unending program management commitment made the SBIR program a very credible acquisition alternative and an efficiently managed research and development process. He streamlined internal acquisition practices in order to accelerate contract awards to SBIR contractors with his standardization of evaluation documentation serving as models for other Department of Defense offices. Mr. Gale further brought AFRL/ML into the electronic age by placing many business processes into Web-based applications in the early 2000s. During the past year, Mr. Gale was part of an integrated product team for the resource office of AFRL that was responsible for executing a coordinated acquisition approach relative to the Air Force SBIR program. He assisted in the development of the commercialization pilot program initiative, applying his corporate knowledge toward advancing the concept. In fostering collaborations supportive of SBIR company commercialization, Mr. Gale initiated a CPP approach for AFRL/ML one year before the implementation of a similar pilot program Air Force-wide. In addition to 11 individual Tibbetts Awards, 50 small businesses received organizational awards. In this regard, AFRL/ML officials said it is noteworthy that 20 of the small businesses who are Tibbetts organizational award winners have received Air Force SBIR contracts. These firms include the following: Advanced Acoustics Concepts; Aptima, Inc.; Architecture Technology Corporation; Decisive Analytics Corporation; Intelligent Automation, Inc.; Kigre, Inc.; Minnesota Wire and Cable Company; NAVSYS Corporation; NVE Corporation; Optical Air Data Systems, LLC; Orbital Research Inc.; QED Technologies International, Inc.; Southwest Sciences, Inc.; The Design Knowledge Company, Touchstone Research Laboratory, Ltd; Trident Systems Inc.; TRS Technologies; Vidacare Corporation; WetStone Technologies; and Wright Materials Research Company.