• Evaluating capability gaps is really a question for Program Managers and those who do capability-based assessments to answer. There are formal assessments during which an inability to achieve a desired effect (a capability gap) is found to exist.
  • From the S&T perspective, users typically see a "gap" in the form of a user request for an improvement to something they already have which doesn't perform well enough.
    • Perhaps it weighs too much, is not sensitive enough, or gets too hot.
    • It might run out of power too quickly.
    • It fails to communicate situational awareness with the central clearinghouse.
  • These are often gaps that originate from Users directly as "urgent needs“.
  • They are generally assigned to an S&T enterprise for fulfillment on a priority basis and the evaluation is a more like an engineering analysis.

There are also gaps that appear as "holes" in the portfolio view. These "gaps" are prone to be visible as clustering of technologies at similar level of maturity (high or low TRL) and indicate either a need to selectively accelerate development or a place to consider making an investment in new projects to keep the pipeline momentum flowing in a certain technology domain.