Major Capability Acquisition (MCA)
Activities Across Phases
Technical Reviews
Develop Strategies
Program Management
Cost Estimation/Affordability
MDD
MSA PHASE
Develop Requirements
Analysis of Alternatives
Study Contracts
Milestone A
TMRR PHASE
Mature Requirements
Prototype Contracts
Prototyping
Develop Preliminary Design
CDD Validation
Dev RFP Release Decision
Milestone B
EMD PHASE
Development Contracts
Complete System Design
Develop System
Developmental Testing
Milestone C
P&D PHASE
Production Contracts
Low Rate Initial Production
Operational Testing
FRP Decision
Full Rate Production/Deployment
O&S PHASE
Sustainment Contracts
Sustain System
IOC/FOC
Develop Strategies
How to use this site
Each page in this pathway presents a wealth of curated knowledge from acquisition policies, guides, templates, training, reports, websites, case studies, and other resources. It also provides a framework for functional experts and practitioners across DoD to contribute to the collective knowledge base. This site aggregates official DoD policies, guides, references, and more.
DoD and Service policy is indicated by a BLUE vertical line.
Directly quoted material is preceeded with a link to the Reference Source.
A program will develop and maintain a series of strategies across the acquisition lifecycle. The Milestone Document Identification (MDID) tool outlines the statutory and regulatory information required by acquisition category, review, and related context. The program management office, with approval from their milestone decision authority, will determine how it will cover the required information via a series of strategy documents. The most common strategy documents include:
See the Milestone Document Identification (MDID) tool for the statutory and regulatory information required.
