September 25, 2018 | International, Aerospace, Naval, Land, C4ISR
In her first on-camera interview since taking on her new position, Lockheed Martin EVP for Aeronautics, Michele Evans, talks her priorities and gives an update on several programs.
August 31, 2021 | International, Naval
Italian shipyard Fincantieri is holding early talks with Italy's Leonardo to acquire its naval gun manufacturing operation, formerly known as Oto Melara.
November 5, 2020 | International, Aerospace
By: Jen Judson WASHINGTON — Beginning early next year, the Pentagon will host the first opportunity for industry to demonstrate counter-drone technology aimed at small systems, the next step in a plan to test out new capabilities twice a year at common test ranges, according to Army officials in charge of the effort. Pentagon leaders approved in late September a set of requirements to help counter small drones, laying a path for how industry can develop technology to plug into a single command-and-control system. The Joint Counter-Small Unmanned Aircraft Systems Office, or JCO, kicked off the pursuit with an industry open house Oct. 30. The defense secretary delegated the Army in November 2019 to lead the effort to consolidate the wide range of counter-small unmanned aerial system, or C-sUAS, capabilities into a select group of interim systems. Those systems have now been chosen, with the JCO turning its sights toward establishing an enduring collection of capabilities — while acknowledging that there's no silver bullet and that a layered approach is needed, using both kinetic and non-kinetic means, to defeat small drones. The JCO has identified three sites for common test ranges to conduct evaluation and testing of promising counter-drone technology, according to Col. Greg Soule, resources director for the Army's Rapid Capabilities and Critical Technologies Office. The RCCTO is supporting the JCO by helping identify material solutions for C-sUAS, and it is leveraging its work on directed-energy and high-power microwave technologies to roll into a solution. A decision memo on locations is awaiting approval by Army Vice Chief Gen. Joseph Martin. Soule said those locations will be shared “when the time is right.” The JCO also set up a working group to look into testing C-sUAS capabilities in an urban environment, according to Soule. To ensure the JCO is comparing apples to apples when it comes to counter-drone technology, it also stood up a working group with representatives across all the armed services to establish joint test protocols. That protocol is out for signature and should be in hand by Nov. 6. Additionally, Ellen Lord, the undersecretary of defense for acquisition and sustainment, has asked the JCO to look at the feasibility of establishing a single source for training targets “to help reduce costs, reduce lead times and streamline the waiver process,” Soule said. “All services already have sources for where they go now. So potentially we could find a way to find some synergies and efficiencies.” Industry interest Industry is eager to get technology in front of both the JCO and RCCTO. Many defense companies participating in the Association of the U.S. Army's annual virtual conference last month highlighted counter-drone capability. General Dynamics Mission Systems featured its recent partnership with Dedrone, a leader in drone detection and defeat technologies using machine-learning software, sensors and electronic attack methods. Lockheed Martin showcased its MoRFIUS C-sUAS capability that it is working on with the RCCTO. MoRFIUS uses high-power microwave technology in an aerial platform. That capability can be used to extend the range beyond current counter-drone defeat systems to defeat drone swarms. MoRFIUS is a recoverable and reusable technology. Leonardo DRS also highlighted its mobile counter-drone capability using Moog's Reconfigurable Integrated-weapons Platform turret with multiple kinetic effectors, different electro-magnetic and infrared sensors, an onboard radar, and electronic warfare technologies. Raytheon, which has a foothold in the C-sUAS market with its Coyote Block II kinetic effector and its Ku-Band Radio Frequency System, emphasized its track record and upgrades to the system. The industry open house had roughly 500 industry representatives tune in. The JCO will select industry applicants to show off their capabilities at the first demo, which is to take place in the second quarter of fiscal 2021. At the demonstration, the JCO will provide instrumentation and threat surrogates as well command-and-control elements. Industry participants will need to bring technology to defeat drones, said Adam Martin, who briefed industry on test ranges and protocols at the open house. There will be technology insertion points in the enduring architecture after each demonstration that address gaps, he added. https://www.defensenews.com/unmanned/2020/11/04/heres-how-the-pentagon-will-test-industrys-counter-drone-tech-for-an-enduring-capability/
May 6, 2019 | International, Aerospace, Naval, Land, C4ISR, Security, Other Defence
Military systems are increasingly using software to support functionality, new capabilities, and beyond. Before a new piece of software can be deployed within a system however, its functional safety and compliance with certain standards must be verified and ultimately receive certification. As the rapid rate of software usage continues to grow, it is becoming exceedingly difficult to assure that all software considered for military use is coded correctly and then tested, verified, and documented appropriately. “Software requires a certain level of certification – or approval that it will work as intended with minimal risks – before receiving approval for use within military systems and platforms,” said Dr. Ray Richards, a program manager in DARPA's Information Innovation Office (I2O). “However, the effort required to certify software is an impediment to expeditiously developing and fielding new capabilities within the defense community.” Today, the software certification process is largely manual and relies on human evaluators combing through piles of documentation, or assurance evidence, to determine whether the software meets certain certification criteria. The process is time consuming, costly, and can result in superficial or incomplete evaluations as reviewers bring their own sets of expertise, experiences, and biases to the process. A lack of a principled means of decomposing evaluations makes it difficult to create a balanced and trustworthy process that applies equally to all software. Further, each subsystem and component must be evaluated independently and re-evaluated before it can be used in a new system. “Just because a subsystem is certified for one system or platform does not mean it is unilaterally certified for all,” noted Richards. This creates additional time delays and review cycles. To help accelerate and scale the software certification process, DARPA developed the Automated Rapid Certification Of Software (ARCOS) program. The goal of ARCOS is to create tools and a process that would allow for the automated assessment of software evidence and provide justification for a software's level of assurance that is understandable. Taking advantage of recent advances in model-based design technology, “Big Code” analytics, mathematically rigorous analysis and verification, as well as assurance case languages, ARCOS seeks to develop a capability to automatically evaluate software assurance evidence to enable certifiers to rapidly determine that system risk is acceptable. “This approach to reengineering the software certification process is well timed as it aligns with the DoD Digital Engineering Strategy, which details how the department is looking to move away from document-based engineering processes and towards design models that are to be the authoritative source of truth for systems,” said Richards. To create this automated capability, ARCOS will explore techniques for automating the evidence generation process for new and legacy software; create a means of curating evidence while maintaining its provenance; and develop technologies for the automated construction of assurance cases, as well as technologies that can validate and assess the confidence of an assurance case argument. The evidence generation, curation, and assessment technologies will form the ARCOS tools and processes, working collectively to provide a scalable means of accelerating the pathway to certification. Throughout the program's expected three phases, evaluations and assessments will occur to gauge how the research is progressing. ARCOS researchers will tackle progressively more challenging sets of software systems and associated artifacts. The envisioned evaluation progression will move from a single software module to a set of interacting modules and finally to a realistic military software system. Interested proposers will have an opportunity to learn more during a Proposers Day on May 14, 2019, from 8:30AM to 3:30PM (EST) at the DARPA Conference Center, located at 675 N. Randolph Street, Arlington, Virginia, 22203. The purpose of the Proposers Day is to outline the ARCOS technical goals and challenges, and to promote an understanding of the BAA proposal requirements. For details about the event, including registration requirements, please visit: https://www.fbo.gov/index?s=opportunity&mode=form&id=6a8f03472cf43a3558456b807877f248&tab=core&_cview=0 Additional information will be available in the forthcoming Broad Agency Announcement, which will be posted to www.fbo.gov. https://www.darpa.mil/news-events/2019-05-03