Core Services Group Wins $26 Million Navy VX-1 Operational Test Support Contract

Core Services Group Inc. of Virginia Beach, Virginia, has won a Navy contract with a potential value of up to $26.4 million to provide analytical operational test and evaluation support to Air Test and Evaluation Squadron One, known as VX-1. The firm-fixed-price, indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity award supports the Navy’s Operational Test and Evaluation Force and was set aside for service-disabled veteran-owned small businesses. The ordering period is expected to begin in October 2026 and could continue through April 2032. Work will be assigned through task orders, with testing conducted at locations in the United States and overseas according to squadron needs.

VX-1 Operational Test Support Details

Core will provide analytical support for VX-1’s operational evaluations of Navy aviation capabilities. Based at Naval Air Station Patuxent River, Maryland, the squadron tests aircraft, weapons and sensors under operationally relevant conditions before capabilities enter fleet service. The Navy also identifies development of anti-submarine and anti-surface-warfare tactics and procedures as part of VX-1’s work.

The assignment sits within a broader Navy testing process that examines whether systems are effective and suitable for operational use. An Operational Test and Evaluation Force description of its Aviation Warfare Division identifies manned and unmanned aircraft, weapons, electronic warfare and anti-submarine systems among the capabilities it evaluates. VX-1 is one of the field activities that conducts those tests.

The task-order structure means Core’s specific test assignments and performance locations will depend on Navy requirements as orders are issued. The range of possible settings is illustrated by VX-1’s deployment of two P-8A aircraft to Hawaii in July 2025 to test new anti-submarine-warfare systems before fleet fielding. That event predates this award and illustrates the squadron’s work rather than an assignment under Core’s new contract.

Award and Contractor Background

The Navy received five offers for the competitively awarded contract. Naval Supply Systems Command Fleet Logistics Center Norfolk is the contracting activity. Core has an existing record of Navy aviation test-support work, including a $1.3 million EA-18G analytical-services order with a potential performance end in February 2026 and a $379,473 MQ-4C Triton order with a potential performance end in June 2026.

Those earlier orders concern individual aviation programs, while the new award provides support to VX-1 as its operational-test needs arise. Additional information on the company’s federal awards is available through Core Services Group’s HigherGov profile.

This award was disclosed by the DoW in its daily press release. Additional contract details will be available on HigherGov in approximately 90 days under N0018927DW001 after the contract is formally disclosed by the government.