June 26, 2024 | International, Land
Pentagon to identify next Replicator capability set this summer
Deputy Defense Secretary Kathleen Hicks said the Pentagon plans to propose Replicator 2.0 funding in its fiscal 2026 budget.
March 26, 2020 | International, C4ISR
BAE execs explain the thinking behind their latest acquisition
By: Mark Pomerleau
In late January, Arlington, Virginia-based BAE Systems Inc. announced two acquisitions to bolster its electronic systems sector, a move that reflected a combined investment of $2.2 billion.
The purchase included $1.9 billion for Collins Aerospace's GPS receivers business and $275 million for Raytheon's tactical airborne radios.
Company leaders saw an opportunity. GPS receivers could provide secure and resilient position data that would help precision-guided munitions become more accurate. Airborne tactical radios, typically installed on rotary, fixed-wing aircraft and drones, would create a new business for BAE's electronic systems sector.
The properties became available because of a proposed merger between United Technologies and Raytheon, and BAE's two top executives said they see the purchase as a way to more closely hew their businesses toward the Pentagon's long-term needs. Specifically, they point to the 2018 National Defense Strategy. A closing is dependent on the Raytheon-United Technologies merger and is expected in the first half of 2020.
C4ISRNET's Mark Pomerleau spoke recently with Jerry DeMuro, BAE's chief executive, and Tom Arseneault, company president and chief operating officer, about the thinking behind the investment.
C4ISRNET: How do you see these acquisitions fitting into BAE overall? What opportunities could this create?
Jerry DeMuro: As we look at the National Defense Strategy and we look at the service modernization priorities and where we think customers are headed in our core markets, we think that these two businesses are very relevant. We have capabilities in those areas that these properties complement very well.
Both of them happen to be very mature, well-established, strong technology-based businesses that are on the cusp of significant growth because of the relevance to the service priorities.
[It's a] unique opportunity [that] only came about because of the UTC-Raytheon merger. We were very pleased to see it [and we were] opportunistic in going after them.
Tom Arseneault: Precision and autonomy are two key things that run through the Defense Strategy and priorities in the services and the technologies that [Under Secretary of Defense for Research and Engineering] Dr. [Mike] Griffin talks about.
With autonomy, you need to know where you are. Position data is important. Secure, resilient position information. Military GPS is a critical underlying technology. With Collins, you've got a company that's been doing this for 40-plus years and a million and a half of these devices are out there going to M-Code [a new military signal used for GPS]. Autonomy, ditto. You need to know where you are ... certainly with precision-guided munitions.
You're also relying on secure communications. You need to know where you are, and you need to be able to communicate with the systems around you.
C4ISRNET: How do you see these new businesses complementing what you already have and allowing you to pursue contracts that you couldn't before?
DeMuro: We've been working for a number of years now — most people don't know — but we have a precision-guided munitions business.
We provide the seekers for the THAAD [Terminal High-Altitude Area Defense]; we provide all the smarts in terms of combining EW, precision locating and navigating in the LRASM [Long-Range Anti-
Ship] missile. We just won the [Precision Guidance Kit] contract — precision-guided mortar. We are also the provider of the high-velocity projectile and putting these kinds of capabilities in there.
It's a great fit for that business, but also in many of the other things that we produce. Combining this kind of capability gives us a whole new market that we can bring their capabilities to.
And the same thing applies in the radio world, software-defined radios. We can take some of those waveforms and incorporate them in devices that we have today in our C4ISR portfolio.
It's not about cost synergies; it's really about market synergies in those places where we're headed already.
C4ISRNET: Obviously, some of those capabilities, such as THAAD, are dependent on a lot of disparate systems. Does this acquisition help BAE become more interoperable with a lot of other systems?
DeMuro: Think about a product that we make today, the Link 16 [military tactical data link network].
Arseneault: We own the Link 16 waveform as part of the fundamental portfolio of our current communications business. Now we'll be able to add that family of waveforms, we'll be able to use it on these acquired radios and then vice versa.
There's a number of waveforms — software-defined radio waveforms — that come with this portfolio, that we will be able to then market out through our existing communication devices.
THAAD was more on the precision side. While THAAD, itself, is a seeker of a type, I think this is more applicable to some of the new next-generation seekers that will want to be multimodal. So it's [electro-optical/infrared], it'll be radio frequency and GPS.
[We want to] have as many opportunities to get a really good sense of what's driving precision. With a million-and-a-half devices out there, there is a whole wide set of customers that these will continue to supply.
But this will also be a good opportunity for us to incorporate that technology into some of our roadmaps. SECTR [Seeker Cost Transformation] is a DARPA program, a next-generation multimodal seeker. So, GPS will be a piece of that. The idea being where seekers are more modular and so you can use a seeker on multiple weapon types and reduce costs and have greater efficiency.
C4ISRNET: Are you thinking of a card you can plug in? Or more software adaptable?
DeMuro: Chip sets, right. Combined functionality ... because it's all about size, weight and power and cost as you get out there. But the presence of these two product families, and what has to happen to upgrade them in and of itself, supports the business case. We didn't really include a lot of synergies in the business case, but we see some real opportunity there.
C4ISRNET: Can you expand on the autonomy side? I see how the GPS, and linking GPS to radio, can lead to greater precision, but where do you see opportunities on the autonomy side?
Arseneault: Autonomous systems need to know where they are. Secure, resilient position information is critical ...
DeMuro: Anti-spoofing.
Arseneault: These sorts of devices are going to find their way into many if not all of the modern autonomous systems.
Likewise, you need to be able to communicate with things around you. As we're headed to swarms, they want to know where they are. They want to know where all of their surrounding platforms are. Manned-unmanned teaming is another version of autonomy where you want to know, and you want to be able to communicate with your wingman as they call it.
DeMuro: If you think about anti-access/aerial denial, doing all of this in a contested environment — it's got to be secure. M-Code is absolutely essential to that.
These waveforms, low probability of intercept, low probability of detection and also software-defined radios are very agile in moving around to enable that in contested environments. Both of these properties help accomplish that.
C4ISRNET: You mentioned the National Defense Strategy; what role do these non-kinetic capabilities play in future conflicts?
DeMuro: They're foundational. If you don't have them, you can't operate in the future environment.
On the same subject
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June 1, 2020 | International, Aerospace, Naval, Land, C4ISR, Security
The Pentagon has spent 23% of its COVID-19 response funds. Congress is asking why not more.
By: Joe Gould Updated 5/29/20 with response from the Pentagon. WASHINGTON ― The Pentagon has spent less than a quarter of the $10.6 billion Congress gave it in March to protect military personnel and marshal American industry to procure face masks, ventilators and other products hospitals need in their fight against the coronavirus. Citing the Trump administration's most recent reports to Congress, Democratic senators say the Pentagon has placed on contract 23 percent of the funds it was provided nine weeks ago as part of the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act of 2020. It's the latest criticism in a sharp back and forth between congressional Democrats and the Pentagon over the latter's response to the global pandemic. As the nation surpassed 100,000 deaths from COVID-19, nine Senate Democrats wrote to Defense Secretary Mark Esper on Thursday, calling for him to provide Congress with a spending plan for the remaining funds. Defense Appropriations Subcommittee Vice Chairman Dick Durbin, D-Ill., led the letter, which was obtained by Defense News. “We are concerned by the delays in providing this important information, the lack of transparency in the use of emergency funds appropriated to the Department, and troubling signs the funds will instead be spent for other purposes,” the letter read. “Lacking a spend plan, we are not even sure what those purposes may be.” Senate Appropriations Committee Vice Chairman Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., and Senate Armed Services Committee ranking member Jack Reed, D-R.I., signed the new letter with Durbin, Sens. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif.; Patty Murray, D-Wash.; Jon Tester, D-Mont.; Tom Udall, D-N.M.; Brian Schatz, D-Hawaii; and Tammy Baldwin, D-Wis. Though the coronavirus rescue package included more than $1 billion for National Guard deployments requested by the administration to support state authorities, the Guard didn't need the money because the Federal Emergency Management Agency has since taken responsibility for reimbursing states. “We do not understand why the Department requested these funds ... nor do we know what they will be used for now,” the lawmakers wrote. The Pentagon has thus far obligated $167 million of the $1 billion Congress granted under the Defense Production Act, a Korean War-era law that the president recently invoked, to have industry produce key items such as N95 respirator masks and swabs needed for coronavirus testing, ventilators and other items. “Lacking further information from the Department on its plans for these funds, we are unable to answer simple questions such as whether the U.S. Government is doing everything in its power to address shortfalls in supplies which are not only needed at this moment, but also in preparation for a predicted second wave of coronavirus infections,” the lawmakers wrote. In a statement, chief Pentagon spokesman Jonathan Rath Hoffman said the department “remains committed to legally and responsibly executing these funds on the highest priorities to protect our military and their families and safeguard our national security capabilities. As we have seen, this is an evolving and dynamic situation where priorities and requirements change, which is why it is so important that we remain faithful and accountable stewards of the taxpayer dollar.” “As the Members know, the spend plan is due per the CARES Act in four weeks, on June 26th. The plan is currently in final review and approval, and we expect it to be on the Hill by close of business [May 29], a full month prior to the required due date,” Hoffman added. “In the interim, the Department has shown its commitment to transparency through daily and weekly updates from senior DoD leaders to multiple Congressional committees — both staff and members. In addition, DoD has provided hundreds of responses to Congressional COVID queries, and will continue to do so.” The Department of Defense announced its first use of the Defense Production Act on April 13 in the form of $133 million in contracts to 3M, O&M Halyward, and Honeywell to boost domestic production of N95 respirator masks. On Thursday, the DoD announced its latest: $2.2 million to Hollingsworth & Vose for 27.5 million N95 ventilator filters and 3.1 million N95 respirators per month, starting in August ― all to “relieve manufacturing bottlenecks and will expand N95 mask production and ventilator use.” The letter comes just weeks after the Pentagon made a surprise decision to move its point person for the Defense Production Act, Jen Santos, into a new job. But it's also as Democrats have urged President Donald Trump to dramatically increase domestic production of personal protective equipment and testing supplies. “Throughout this crisis, you have continued to lay blame for the public health response on others, from members of the previous administration to those who report to you now,” Schatz, Durbin, Tester and Baldwin wrote in a letter to Trump on May 15. “Your dismissal of the Pentagon's senior industrial policy official appears to be the latest example of removing a knowledgeable and well-regarded technocrat for no reason but to cover for your failure to fully invoke and utilize the DPA authorities.” In early May, Esper clapped back at accusations the DoD had not been transparent in its response to COVID-19. A letter from Senate Armed Services Committee member Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., and nine Democratic colleagues, which accused the Defense Department of failing to adequately respond to the pandemic, contained “a number of misleading, false, or inaccurate statements,” Esper said. “Our commitment is to ensure that we provide Congress complete, accurate and timely information which we are doing on weekly basis,” he said, adding that he speaks with committee leaders on a weekly basis. “We recognize Congress has an important oversight role, but it should be an informed oversight role, and we are committed to doing that.” Aaron Mehta contributed to this report. https://www.defensenews.com/congress/2020/05/28/the-pentagon-has-spent-only-23-of-its-covid-19-response-funds-congress-is-asking-why/
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May 11, 2021 | International, Land
Rheinmetall plants roots in Michigan
American Rheinmetall Vehicles is investing in its pursuit to build the U.S. Army's Optionally Manned Fighting Vehicle by opening up a large facility to aid its design and prototyping efforts.