“Our mission is to promote and optimize small business solutions,” Luke Schultz, acting director of the AFMC Small Business Office, said in a statement. “Just like how AFMC trains and equips the Air Force, we do the same for small businesses that partner with AFMC and its centers.”
AFMC oversees the creation, life cycle management, and sustainment of nearly every major Air Force weapon and plane. The command has some 89,000 employees globally and manages $81 billion of budget authority annually, about a third of the Air Force’s budget in fiscal 2025.
AFMC’s headquarters anchors Wright-Patterson, a base has some 35,000 military and civilian employees, making it the largest concentration of employment in one locale in the state of Ohio.
“The AFMC Small Business Office serves as the front door for small businesses wanting to do business with the Air Force,” Schultz said. “We guide them through everything from registration to identifying contracting opportunities, and we actively work with public affairs to get the word out on industry days and outreach events where businesses can network and connect with the right people.”
In the last fiscal year, nearly $2.9 billion in Small Business Innovation Research Phase III contracts went to companies pursuing technologies useful to the military, AFMC said.
In 2025, AFMC hosted 150 outreach events for businesses, with more than 3,000 attendees, a 22% jump from the previous year, the command said.
The last calendar year saw a 43-day lapse in federal funding that ended Nov. 12 impacting (among others) more than 8,000 civilian employees who work at or for Wright-Patterson. That shutdown came after the end of fiscal 2025.
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