A Beavercreek company has won a contract worth up to $60 million to keep running the Air Force Research Laboratory's STEM outreach programs, extending years of work connecting Ohio students and teachers with scientists and engineers at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base. ARCTOS will supply expert personnel, resources and solutions for what's known as the Next-Gen Innovators contract, which backs AFRL's effort to identify, inspire and develop future science and engineering leaders.
According to the Springfield News-Sun, the Air Force Research Laboratory's STEM work has continued for years, and ARCTOS will now organize internships and apprenticeships while helping find airmen and Space Force guardians to serve as mentors, tutors, science fair judges, guest speakers and hands-on demonstrators. Federal procurement records on SAM.gov show the contract was solicited under NAICS code 611710, covering Educational Support Services, as a single-award Indefinite Delivery/Indefinite Quantity vehicle with a five-year ordering period and a six-year total performance period capped at $60 million. ARCTOS members will oversee the effort in collaboration with Air Force and Space Force participants, and the firm will also provide metrics and expertise to advise AFRL on how well the outreach is working.
Nearly Two Decades of Ties to Wright-Patterson
The Next-Gen Innovators award builds on ARCTOS's 18-consecutive-year history supporting Wright-Patterson's Educational Outreach Office, which previously included managing a five-year, $8 million K-16 STEM outreach award, according to the firm. That outreach portfolio has included managing statewide Ohio student programs for FIRST Tech Challenge and FIRST LEGO League, along with the Wizards of Wright! teacher workshop series. The company said it will continue a long partnership with the Air Force Research Laboratory as it takes on the new contract. According to the Ohio Department of Education's Perkins V Plan 2024, the state will emphasize career pathways leading to science, technology, engineering and mathematics fields. An Ohio.gov Choose Ohio First document proposed a cohort of 10 scholars across computer science, computer engineering and cyber majors, illustrating the state's efforts to build STEM talent pipelines.
ARCTOS traces its roots to Universal Technology Co., which had operated since 1961 before merging with Arma Aviation and Advanced Core Concepts in 2019, in a deal spanning Tampa and Atlanta. UTC was rebranded as ARCTOS in 2020. Ty Pollack, ARCTOS vice president and division manager of future capabilities, is among the leaders now steering the firm's work at Wright-Patterson.
A New Corporate Parent in Alexandria
The contract lands just months after Alexandria, Virginia-based DCS Corporation acquired ARCTOS in 2026, a deal the employee-owned firm said united two companies and roughly 350 Dayton-area employees. DCS Corporation officially announced the completed acquisition on March 5, 2026, merging ARCTOS's aerospace research and workforce development operations into the larger firm. Before that deal, ARCTOS had operated as a portfolio company under private equity firm Battle Investment Group, according to law firm Holland & Knight, which advised on the sale.
Brian Mitchell, pipeline coordinator of the Air Force Research Laboratory Munitions Directorate's Workforce Development Branch, said in 2024 that the laboratory has a responsibility to help create the next generation of scientists, engineers and technicians for the Air Force, Space Force and society. Mitchell also said the laboratory must seek talented students in small towns, big cities, rural areas and urban areas alike. Those goals played out on the ground on May 1, 2026, when Chief Master Sgt. of the Space Force John Bentivegna watched a student fly a virtual aircraft during a STEM class tour of AFRL at Wright-Patterson. In June 2023, at the Doolittle Institute in Niceville, Florida, Wanjiku Makumi greeted fellow AFRL scholars at that year's scholar orientation, one of the touchpoints in the broader pipeline ARCTOS helps run.
A Broader Aerospace Footprint Beyond STEM
The educational contract sits alongside a growing list of technical awards for both companies. Arctos Technology Solutions was named one of six contractors selected for a separate $200 million AFRL contract supporting advanced aerospace vehicle technology research through April 2037, a group that also includes Lockheed Martin and Northrop Grumman, according to GovCon Wire. DCS Corporation has said ARCTOS separately secured a $23 million IDIQ contract from the Federal Aviation Administration to provide commercial space transportation flight safety and debris analysis engineering support, extending the firm's reach into civilian aerospace safety work.
Parent firm DCS Corporation expanded its own AFRL footprint in March 2026 after winning a $95 million follow-on contract called ASSET, which supports sensor-autonomy exploitation technologies for the laboratory's Multi-Domain Sensing Autonomy Division. Federal grant tracking records from GovTribe also show that ARCTOS previously served as a subrecipient under an Ohio State University grant to administer student internships for AFRL's Machine Learning for Rapid Certification Program, another example of how the firm links regional higher education with federal research labs. Under federal contracting guidelines for NAICS code 611710, the Small Business Administration sets the small business size standard ceiling at $24 million in annual revenues, a benchmark cited in AFRL's own solicitation notice for the Next-Gen Innovators award.
Taken together, the contracts reflect a wider consolidation of aerospace engineering and workforce development capability in the Dayton region, with Beavercreek-based ARCTOS positioned at the center of both the classroom-facing STEM mission and the technical research work underpinning it. For Ohio students, teachers and mentors involved in FIRST Robotics competitions or Wizards of Wright! workshops, the practical effect is continuity: the same organization that has run these programs for nearly two decades will keep doing so, now backed by a larger, employee-owned parent company.
