A DoD subcontract can require drawings, specifications, test data, manufacturing information, manuals, or other technical data while also incorporating DFARS data-rights clauses. The business risk is not simply whether the Government receives the file. It is what license rights accompany the delivery.
Subcontractors should identify deliverables, development funding, preexisting material, assertion requirements, and marking procedures before technical data begins moving through the prime.
DFARS 252.227-7013 is a license-rights framework
The current DFARS 252.227-7013 clause addresses rights in technical data for other than commercial products and commercial services within its stated scope. It distinguishes unlimited rights, government purpose rights, limited rights, and specifically negotiated rights, with the applicable category depending on the data and development circumstances.
The clause also states that rights not granted to the Government are retained by the contractor.
Official source: DFARS 252.227-7013 — Rights in Technical Data.
Funding history matters
- Development exclusively with Government funds can support broader Government rights in covered technical data.
- Mixed funding can lead to government purpose rights for qualifying data, subject to the clause's details and exceptions.
- Development exclusively at private expense can support limited-rights treatment for qualifying technical data.
- Certain categories such as form, fit, and function data can carry unlimited rights regardless of a broader private-expense argument.
Identify restricted data before delivery
The clause requires technical data that the contractor asserts should be furnished with restrictions to be identified in the contract attachment, subject to limited post-award assertion procedures. Restrictive markings must also use authorized legends.
Technical data delivered without required restrictive markings can be presumed delivered with unlimited rights, subject to the clause's correction procedures for inadvertent omissions.
Subcontractor questions to resolve
- What technical data is actually a deliverable?
- Which items, components, or processes were developed privately, with mixed funding, or with Government funds?
- What rights category is being asserted for each deliverable?
- Are the assertions included in the prime's data-rights attachment?
- Who is responsible for applying and preserving restrictive legends?
- Does the subcontract give the prime broader rights than the Government receives?