August 16, 2023 | International, Land
Elbit Systems Partner, Hanwha, was Selected for the Australian Land 400 Phase 3 Project
Elbit Systems is a key partner to Hanwa to deliver the Redback Infantry Fighting Vehicle (IFV) under the Project.
December 27, 2018 | International, C4ISR
Why the Pentagon’s cyber innovation could fall behind
By: Justin Lynch
Silicon Valley is the home to the transistor and the birthplace of the IT industry. Boston is the home of prominent universities and technology companies such as Raytheon and Boston Scientific.
So where will the country's hub of cybersecurity innovation reside? A new paper argues that a nucleus of new cybersecurity technologies may struggle to form in the United States.
Because the Department of Defense's research facilities are dispersed throughout the country and located in smaller metropolitan regions, the Army is in danger of stagnating when it comes to technology innovation, a Dec. 18 paper in the Army's Cyber Defense Review argued.
“Without immediate, bold action, the Army will miss its best opportunity to seize the initiative in the current Cyber Cold War,” wrote Col. Stoney Trent, an Army official who now works for the Pentagon's top IT officer in the Joint Artificial Intelligence Center. “The Secretary of Defense fully understands the need for dramatic improvement, and fifteen years of Army acquisition failures have created the crisis necessary for change.”
Trent took aim at the Army's decision to move its cyber headquarters to Fort Gordon, Georgia, saying it “lacks most of the characteristics that have attracted technologists to other innovation regions.”
“Limited public infrastructure and services, sparse employment options, a humid subtropical climate, a lack of a private research university, and distance from urban centers will likely delay the emergence of innovative technologists in Augusta-Richmond County,” he wrote.
The state of Georgia, which is partnering with the Army on innovation near Fort Gordon, opened the first phase of a planned a $100 million dollar center earlier this year.
But while Trent argued that the Army has “limited input over the location of its installations and major activities,” because basing decisions are made by Congress, the dispersed locations are not ideal for improving the Pentagon's cyber prowess.
“Due to the location of Army research activities, very few scientists and engineers have access to the operators and analysts who will have to use the technologies under development,” he wrote.
On the contrary, large cities are engines of innovation because they have more local resources, a higher degree of subject area experts and a larger local workforce, Trent argued.
“This exponential increase in innovation is related to social networks and access to ideas, resources, and expertise in more populated urban settings.”
That makes locations like Moffett Air Field in Santa Clara County near Silicon Valley, Fort Devens near Boston, and Fort Hamilton in New York City as potential hubs that “have been left fallow,” Trent argued. “Decades of studies indicate the importance of a culture of experimentation. While our adversaries are experimenting, we must not dither.”
https://www.fifthdomain.com/dod/2018/12/26/why-the-pentagons-cyber-innovation-could-fall-behind
On the same subject
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July 6, 2018 | International, C4ISR
5 technology trends driving an intelligent military
By: Antti Kolehmainen The rise of non-traditional actors, cyberattacks and state-sponsored subversion is challenging democratic governance and creating an increasingly volatile operational and security environment for defense agencies. To address these threats, military organizations must be able to operate seamlessly and intelligently across a network of multinational partners. This year's Accenture Technology Vision identified five trends that are essential components of any intelligent defense organization: Citizen AI, extended reality, data veracity, frictionless business and Internet of Thinking. Private AI: training AI as an effective troop member Harnessing AI's potential is no longer just about training it to perform a specific task: AI will increasingly function alongside people as a full-fledged member of a team. In the high-stakes world of defense, it's especially important that AI systems act as trustworthy, responsible and efficient colleagues. AI could have a major impact for military organizations, including defense logistics and cybersecurity. An adversary equipped with advanced AI capabilities will not wait for its enemies to catch up technologically before launching an offensive. AI's ability to process and analyze vast amounts of data has significant implications across the Observe, Orient, Decide, Act (OODA) loop. From augmenting our ability to detect new threats to analyzing countless variables, AI could transform surveillance and situational awareness. Extended Reality: The end of distance Extended reality (XR), which includes virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR), is the first technology to relocate people in both time and place—effectively eliminating distance. For the defense sector, the ability to simulate and share a common view of an operational theatre is immensely powerful. Recently, Accenture created a mixed reality proof of concept using Microsoft HoloLens and gaming engine Unity that provides military personnel with an interactive map showing real-time location and status data for troops and resources on the ground. With a simple command, a user can order reinforcements or supplies, or create and test different scenarios through a mixed reality interface. XR technology can also enhance operational command capabilities in the field. For example, AR goggles could provide dashboards and data visualizations where and when they are needed – such as at an operating base. XR also will have major implications for training, allowing soldiers and pilots to engage in highly realistic combat simulations. Data veracity: the importance of trust As defense organizations become increasingly data-driven, inaccurate and manipulated information is a persistent and serious threat. Agencies can address this vulnerability by building confidence in three key data-focused tenets: provenance, or verifying data from its origin throughout its life cycle; context, or considering the circumstances around its use; and integrity, or securing and maintaining data. The ability to trust and verify the data that flows between multinational partners is critically important. Organizations must be capable of delivering the right data to the right recipient, at the right time – which can only be accomplished by radically reorienting how data is shared across today's armed forces. Today's vertical approach involves passing information up and down the command stack of a nation's military. In contrast, multinational military operations demand that information is also shared horizontally across the forces of different nations and partners. This shift requires a profound change in technology, mindset and culture within agencies. Frictionless defense: built to partner at scale Our recent survey found that 36 percent of public service leaders report working with twice as many strategic partners than two years ago. And when partnerships between industry, academia and military organizations are horizontally integrated and technology-based, they can expand faster and further than ever before. But legacy systems weren't built to support this kind of expansion, and soon, outdated systems will be major hindrances to collaboration. With this in mind, defense organizations must develop new IT architectures to reduce complexity. Agile IT systems will allow innovation to flourish, unimpeded by internal politics and employee resistance. A modern IT architecture will push organizations to clearly define the services they offer and turn each service into a potential enabler of collaboration. The Internet of Thinking: intelligent distributed defense capabilities Today's technology infrastructures are designed around a few basic assumptions: enough bandwidth to support remote applications, an abundance of computing power in a remote cloud and nearly infinite storage. But the demand for immediate response times defies this approach. Recent projections suggest that by 2020, smart sensors and other Internet of Things devices will generate at least 507.5 zettabytes of data. Trying to manage the computational “heavy-lifting” offsite will become limiting. The need for real-time systems puts hardware back in focus: special-purpose and customizable hardware is making devices at the edge of networks more powerful and energy efficient than ever before. Public service organizations are taking note: our survey indicates 79 percent of leaders believe it will be very critical over the next two years to leverage custom hardware and accelerators to meet new computing demands. The next generation of military strategies ride on pushing intelligence into the physical world. Defense organizations have to embrace new operating models to enable high-speed data flows, harness the potential of distributed intelligence and successfully neutralize threats. The defense sector is challenged to respond to new types of threat, political volatility and even new combat arenas, and acquiring new technology capabilities is a strategic imperative. Delivering greater situational awareness and the ability to respond rapidly to unpredictable adversaries requires investments in AI, edge computing and other emerging technologies. Likewise, today's information architectures will need to be redesigned to collaborate quickly, effectively and securely. Antti Kolehmainen is managing director, defense business service global lead at Accenture. https://www.c4isrnet.com/opinion/2018/07/05/5-technology-trends-driving-an-intelligent-military
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October 6, 2020 | International, Aerospace, C4ISR
Boeing Australia confirms Loyal Wingman production centre
Jon Grevatt Boeing Australia has announced that Queensland, Australia, will be the manufacturing hub for the Loyal Wingman unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) it is developing in partnership with the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF). The company said in a joint statement with the Queensland government that the two parties have entered a partnership that will leverage Boeing's 1,700 staff in the state and its partnerships with 400 Queensland-based suppliers. Since 2018 Boeing has also undertaken a joint project with the Queensland state government to develop autonomous technologies that are supporting the Loyal Wingman programme. Boeing's regional president Brendan Nelson said the partnership will help support the development of capabilities in technologies, such as robotics, as well as facilitate investment in local companies and create export opportunities. “This investment could unlock global defence and aerospace opportunities for Queensland to gain future work share in other Boeing programmes,” he said. Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk said investment in the new aerospace facility could see the Loyal Wingman produced in the state by the middle of the decade, with prototype testing and certification taking place before that. She added, “Our investment in this advanced manufacturing project will provide critical skills for suppliers, academia, and Boeing, and culminate in Queensland becoming the primary final assembly facility for the Boeing Airpower Teaming System (ATS), conditional on orders.” Boeing rolled out the first Loyal Wingman prototype in early May and its first flight is scheduled before the end of 2020. https://www.janes.com/defence-news/news-detail/boeing-australia-confirms-loyal-wingman-production-centre