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No matter who is sitting in the Oval Office Jan. 21, whether it is Donald Trump or Joe Biden, the overall Pentagon budget drafted by the White House will probably look about the same. Fate of the U.S... https://aviationweek.com/defense-space/budget-policy-operations/us-presidential-candidates-will-face-stagnant-defense-budget

Nathan Strout WASHINGTON — Software-defined payloads have revolutionized how industry and the government approach satellites. So why not software-defined ground stations? That's the question Kratos is asking. On Oct. 20, the longtime Pentagon contractor with experience building satellite support systems unveiled its new OpenSpace platform — a family of virtual products that applies the software-defined approach to the ground station. OpenSpace uses an open standards, cloud-based system that can be continuously adjusted to mission needs without having to install new hardware. Pentagon officials often complain that the nation's current satellite ground architecture is stymied by stovepiped, custom-built proprietary ground systems. The department has said it plans to move to an enterprise ground system, but it's not there yet. Kratos hopes that OpenSpace can at least be part of the solution. Because the platform is software-based, satellite operators no longer need to use custom-built hardware to connect to and control their on-orbit systems. Instead, OpenSpace virtualizes the ground system in software, effectively allowing it to be linked up to any antenna with a digital converter. “It's a big announcement from our perspective in that it's going to address a lot of the key issues that are challenging the space industry across the board, and especially some of the issues that the defense and government world is going through,” Neil Oatley, Kratos' vice president for marketing, told C4ISRNET. Software-defined payloads have opened up new possibilities in the space industry. Previously, satellites were designed to be rather static tools — once placed in orbit, it becomes all but impossible to physically replace the payload hardware or refigure the software. That means that the system you launch is the system you've got, regardless of whether your mission needs change or you want to do something new with your orbital tech. The Defense Department is investing in capabilities that could eventually allow physical access to operational satellites via robotic space vehicles, but that's still in development. All that is just to say, when the military builds a satellite, it builds it with the expectation that the space-bound payload will be largely static over the lifetime of the spacecraft. In other words, it will do the mission it was meant to do, and not much else. “When you look at the ground today, it's the one area where we're really stuck back in 2G-type technology,” said Phil Carrai, president of Kratos' Space, Training and Cyber division. “Systems are stovepiped. They're static. They're built with custom hardware. They have software-specific technologies that are dedicated to specific satellites. And that's really making them unable to play in the coming new world.” Building a new, custom ground system for each new satellite or constellation is not only costly, but it limits flexibility. The satellite-specific nature of existing ground systems makes it difficult to build third-party applications that can easily be installed across systems. Moreover, it limits the ability of operators to simultaneously connect to multiple constellations using the same ground system. However, industry has created a workaround. Satellites may not be physically inaccessible, but they frequently communicate with operators over radio frequency signals. If a given payload's functions are largely virtualized — meaning they are software-defined and not hardware-defined — then operators can alter a given satellite's capabilities and mission by simply installing new software. Hence, the growing interest in building software-defined payloads. In fact, the next GPS payload will feature an entirely digital payload. With OpenSpace, Kratos is applying the basic principles of software-defined payloads to satellite ground systems — the technology used to command and control the spacecraft once it's on orbit. The ground system is what operators use to cue, download data from, and monitor their satellites. According to Kratos, its OpenSpace platform is the first dynamic, software-defined ground system that will apply those lessons learned from the space layer to the ground layer. “What we did with OpenSpace is we actually started from scratch with an entirely new platform that is based on the fundamentals of network function virtualization (NFV) and software-defined networking (SDN),” said Greg Quiggle, vice president of product management at Kratos, comparing the platform to the architecture underlying new 5G networks. “We took that same basic premise and we applied it to the way a ground system should be built to interconnect software-defined satellites, multi-constellation networks and a terrestrial network.” A key feature that enables OpenSpace is the digitization of the radio frequency signal as close to the antenna as possible, transforming that flow of data into what is effectively a large ethernet network. “Once you've done that — you move from [radio frequency] to digital — you now can process those subchannels, that bandwidth, in software through something called virtualized network functions,” Quiggle explained. The platform takes typical purpose-built ground station hardware — splitters, channelizers, matrix switches, modulators, demodulators and much more — and recreates them in a virtual environment. Once the radio frequency data is digitized, it can be processed through all of these virtual tools. One consequence of that is the software can be run anywhere — it does not have to be located at the antenna. Operators can run this solution in the cloud or in a classified data center, said Quiggle. That also means any ground station using OpenSpace can be quickly adjusted for different uses. For instance, take an operator who needs to interact with satellites. By using an OpenSource-enabled ground station, that individual can load his or her own software-defined solution into the system, connect with the satellite, download any data and cue the spacecraft for its next tasks. Once that satellite passes out of view, a second operator can take over the ground station, load an entirely different software-defined solution and interact with the satellite as it passes over. In this scenario, both users were able to use a single ground station to communicate with their own unique satellites. In another example, the first user is ready to use one ground station to interact with a satellite as it passes overhead, but inclement weather disrupts the process. Instead of waiting for the satellite to pass overhead again, the user simply needs to find the next available ground station on the satellite's course, virtually load software and then access the satellite from there. Military applications OpenSpace is clearly set to have commercial implications. In fact, Microsoft announced Oct. 20 that it will use OpenSpace as part of its Azure Orbital ground-station-as-a-service. Azure Orbital is Microsoft's answer to Amazon Web Services' Ground Station model, which allows customers to access their satellites by renting time on Amazon's ground stations and the AWS platform. It's a business model that could be attractive to small companies looking to field small satellites without building massive, cost-prohibitive ground systems to support them. But a product like OpenSpace could make an even bigger splash in the military space community, especially when it comes to satellite communications. In a statement released earlier this year, the Space Force laid out its concept of “fighting SATCOM.” The service envisions enabling war fighters to roam among satellite communications providers to ensure forces remain connected even if one provider is jammed or unavailable. That level of fluidity requires some major changes to how the military has traditionally approached satellite communications. “One of the things that the government is looking for very specifically is the ability to create an open enterprise-wide architecture for their protected communications systems,” said Frank Backes, senior vice president for federal space-related business at Kratos. “And as they move forward with proliferated LEO [low-Earth orbit] and MEO [medium-Earth orbit] constellations to add communication options, resiliency and capability to their current geosynchronous space communications environment ... this ground architecture is very critical to the defense goals and what they're trying to achieve,” he added. Currently, the ability to roam between constellations to avoid jamming is hampered by stovepiped systems, which are designed to work with a single satellite or a set of satellites. Because OpenSpace can leverage any radio frequency antenna, digitizes that signal and process that data in software, the operator can use the same ground station for multiple constellations. Kratos certainly hopes that its system could be the ground solution for the “fight SATCOM” concept. “Today, the U.S. government on the defense side is very dependent on their own antennas and their own hardware that is deployed for their communications infrastructure and their satellite command-and-control environment. And one of the reasons for that is the hardware that is out in the field today is protected hardware: It may have specialized waveforms, it may have specialized components, it may even have specialized encryption infrastructure,” Backes said. “That limits the military to only using certain apertures for communications. As soon as you move to this dynamic environment — this OpenSpace environment that Kratos is talking about — now you have the ability to use any commercial or military antenna infrastructure for your system and dynamically configure that as needed. “Combined with the ability to move protected hardware out of the field and putting that into a controlled cloud environment, now all of a sudden I have the ability to create the resilient environment that the Department of Defense is looking for.” Kratos told C4ISRNET in a statement that the company “is providing satellite ground system engineering support on several DoD pLEO space segment teams.” In addition, the company noted it “will be bidding our OpenSpace and [Eterprise Ground Services] capabilities on pLEO systems as those opportunities mature.” “When you look at ... the new LEO and MEO constellations — just from a pure imaging/sensing perspective — we don't see how you make those happen without an element of a dynamic software-defined ground,” Carrai said. “The timing has to be second or milliseconds. That we think is going to be essential for us to really get what we're paying for and we need from a U.S. constellation perspective.” https://www.c4isrnet.com/battlefield-tech/space/2020/10/20/are-software-defined-ground-stations-the-next-big-leap-kratos-is-betting-on-it/

Andrew Eversden WASHINGTON —The Pentagon's top artificial intelligence office awarded five blanket purchasing agreements potentially worth hundreds of millions of dollars for technical staffing services. The Joint Artificial Intelligence Center awarded five five-year contracts, each with a $100 million ceiling, to Redhorse Corp., Cyber Point International LLC, Elder Research Inc., Barbaricum LLC and Enterprise Resource Performance Inc. According the Oct. 15 contract announcements, the companies will provide “software development, machine learning, cognitive and systems engineering, operations research, and user experience design” services. Lt. Cmdr. Arlo Abrahamson, spokesman for the JAIC, told C4ISRNET that “the contracts will provide key staffing to augment JAIC mission and product teams with positions such as data scientists, engineers, technical writers, and admin assistants.” The ordering period started Sept. 25, 2020, and runs through Sept. 24, 2025. Several of the companies have experience working with Defense Department partners. Redhorse, an AI and machine learning specialist, has supported the Army, Navy and the department itself. Cyber Point, a cybersecurity company, has won several smaller Pentagon contracts over the last five years, while Elder Research has worked with the Defense Department, the Army, the Navy and the Defense Intelligence Agency. Barbaricum, a defense consulting firm, has experience supporting special operations forces across the globe. Enterprise Resource Performance, an IT service provider, has worked with the Army and the Navy. https://www.c4isrnet.com/artificial-intelligence/2020/10/20/pentagons-ai-hub-awards-multiple-100m-blanket-purchasing-agreements

Joe Gould WASHINGTON ― Space emerged as Lockheed Martin's business area with the highest growth, driven by hypersonic weapons programs and an anticipated next-generation interceptor award, CEO James Taiclet said Tuesday on the company's third-quarter earnings call. Though F-35 fighter jet deliveries and classified programs drove growth in Lockheed's aeronautics segment, and demand for Hellfire missiles drove the missiles and fire control segment, low single-digit increases were largely Lockheed's norm for the quarter. “When we speak of hypersonics, I think there's a very big upside there because there's a very big threat. It's getting worse out of Russia and China, and the U.S. and its allies are going to have to meet it both on offensive and defensive hypersonic systems,” Taiclet said, adding that classified space systems are a “wide-open field.” Taiclet also said he expects the government will work with industry to counter emerging kinetic and non-kinetic threats to space assets, ground stations and the links between them. He pointed to the Space Development Agency's selection of Lockheed, which is one of the firms building its “transport layer” — a low-Earth orbit constellation of satellites that can transfer data globally through optical intersatellite links. Taiclet touted the satellite constellation's eventual ability to transmit data at high speeds to aircraft, ground troops, and surface and undersea vessels as synergistic with Lockheed's push into 5G networking, which Taiclet calls “5G.mil.” A telecom executive before he joined Lockheed in June, Taiclet speculated that the company's toehold will give it an advantage as competition in this business area heats up. SDA Director Derek Tournear previously stated that the transport layer will be the space component of Joint All-Domain Command and Control, or JADC2, a Pentagon effort to connect any sensor to any shooter across domains and services. The effort now has a “C” at the beginning — CJADC2 — for “Combined.” Lockheed reported Tuesday that its space segment's net sales in the third quarter of 2020 increased $163 million, or 6 percent, compared to the same period in 2019. The segment earned $90 million for government satellite programs due to higher volume (primarily Next Generation Overhead Persistent Infrared satellites), and about $60 million for strategic and missile defense programs due to higher volume (primarily hypersonic development programs). Space's operating profit in the third quarter of 2020 decreased $61 million, or 20 percent, compared to the same period in 2019. There was a decrease there of $50 million due to lower equity earnings from the corporation's investment in United Launch Alliance ― a joint venture with Boeing. Lockheed announced last week it will partner with Aerojet Rocketdyne to compete for the Next Generation Interceptor program, which is run by the Missile Defense Agency. The MDA plans to downselect to two companies, with an eventual winner expected to have a system ready in 2028. On Tuesday's call, Taiclet said Lockheed's acquisition of Integration Innovation Inc.'s hypersonics portfolio this month was to provide a new capability in thermal management for hypersonic glide bodies. The deal with i3 of Huntsville, Alabama, was part of a broader mergers and acquisition strategy, that includes joint ventures and commercial partnerships, to add to the company's “technological firepower” in areas like mission systems, he said. “We plan to be active, but we plan to be very, very prudent,” he noted. It was disclosed last week that the Pentagon's nascent hypersonic missile, during a March 19 test in Hawaii, hit within 6 inches of its target. The Army is developing a ground-launched capability and plans to field a battery-sized hypersonic weapon to soldiers by 2023. Lockheed executives were upbeat about space launch. Under a recent Pentagon award, potentially worth billions of dollars, to launch national security payloads over the next five years, ULA will receive 60 percent of the contracts and SpaceX will get 40 percent. Asked Tuesday about competition between ULA and SpaceX, Lockheed Chief Financial Officer Ken Possenriede acknowledged SpaceX as “more than an emerging threat right now.” “Of the recent competitions we've had with them, we've been pleased with where ULA landed relative to SpaceX,” Possenriede said. “We also think we now have a price point that is compelling to customers that will allow ULA to get its fair share of awards over SpaceX.” https://www.defensenews.com/2020/10/20/lockheed-sees-earnings-growth-in-space-business/

The Navy will use the new high-speed demonstrator to help refine its requirements for future stand-off anti-ship and land-attack missiles. oeing has received a contract to help develop a ramjet-powered high-speed missile demonstrator for the U.S. Navy. The company says that the design will aid the service in identifying requirements for future air-launched missiles, possibly ones able to reach hypersonic speeds, that its F/A-18E/F Super Hornets and other combat aircraft within its carrier air wings will be able to employ against targets on land or at sea. The company's Defense, Space & Security division announced that the Naval Air Warfare Center Weapons Division (NAWCWD), part of Naval Air Systems Command (NAVAIR), had awarded it this contract, worth approximately $30 million, on Oct. 20, 2020. The work will be conducted under what is officially called the Supersonic Propulsion Enabled Advanced Ramjet (SPEAR) program. The goal is to conduct the first flight of the demonstrator in late 2022. "We have a talented team of engineers to meet the challenging technical demands and schedule timeline that the SPEAR program requires," Steve Mercer, the Program Manager at Boeing for the SPEAR effort, said in a statement. "We look forward to working with Navy experts to advance technologies for the Navy's future capabilities." It's not entirely clear what kind of missile demonstrator the Navy is looking for exactly for the SPEAR program. The acronym includes the word "supersonic," but Boeing's press release cites its prior work on the X-51A Waverider, an experimental air-breathing hypersonic vehicle that featured a scramjet engine. Hypersonic speed is generally defined as anything above Mach 5. At the same time, Boeing also highlighted its work on "the Variable Flow Ducted Rocket propulsion system under the Triple Target Terminator program in 2014." The Triple Target Terminator program, or T-3, which the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) led, explored concepts for very-long-range air-launched missiles that would be able to engage hostile aircraft, cruise missiles, and air defense threats on the ground, hence the name. A Variable Flow Ducted Rocket propulsion system is a kind of rocket ramjet, a relatively well-established concept at its core, in which gas produced by burning a source of solid fuel is mixed with compressed air fed into a combustion chamber via a duct or air intake to produce thrust. Advanced designs that allow for varying the flow of gas into the combustion chamber make it possible to throttle the thrust and adjust the speed of the vehicle the ramjet is powering. With this in mind, it's worth noting that NAWCWD issued a request for information regarding "Solid Fuel Ramjet Propulsion Manufacture/Test" in March, though it is unclear if that contracting notice is related in any way to SPEAR. In addition, Boeing's press release says that it will "co-develop" the SPEAR demonstrator, but it's unclear if this means another company is involved in the effort or that the Navy's own engineers and scientists will be directly assisting with the work. The website of the Naval Aviation Systems Consortium (NASC) lists a contract award to the company relating to the SPEAR program on Aug. 31, valued at just over $32 million, but for the demonstrator's airframe only. NASC "has been formed to support the technology needs of the Naval Air Warfare Centers (NAWCs) and the Naval Air Systems Command (NAVAIR) through the use of Other Transaction (OT) Authority," according to the site. There is no mention of this award in the Pentagon's daily contracting announcement for Aug. 31, which is supposed to include any deal valued at more than $7 million. The SPEAR contract that Boeing has just announced also does not appear in today's notice, so it's unclear when the Navy formally awarded these two contracts and whether or not they are, in fact, the same one. The War Zone has already reached out to Boeing for more information about its involvement in the SPEAR effort. Whatever the company's role in the project is or isn't, the press release certainly indicates that it will be a stepping stone to the development of future anti-ship and land-attack missiles that will be integrated onto aircraft in the Navy's carrier air wings. This includes the services F/A-18E/F Super Hornets, another Boeing product, a significant number of which eventually slated to go through the Block III upgrade program, which will add a host of advanced features that you can read about in more detail in this past War Zone piece. At the same time, the clear indication is that any operational weapons that follow-on from the SPEAR effort could be added to the arsenal of the service's F-35C Joint Strike Fighters, as well. An F/A-18E Super Hornet, at left, and an F-35C Joint Strike Fighter, at right, share space on the flight deck of the Nimitz class aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln during tests in 2018. "The contract award comes after the Department of Defense requested information from the defense industry to help the Navy determine technical requirements of future carrier-based land and sea strike weapons systems," Boeing's press release said. "The SPEAR flight demonstrator will provide the F/A-18 Super Hornet and carrier strike group with significant improvements in range and survivability against advanced threat defensive systems," Mercer, the firm's SPEAR program manager, added. Very-long-range, high-speed strike weapons could be very valuable for the Navy's carrier air wings, especially as potential near-peer adversaries, such as China and Russia, continue to develop and field increasingly longer-range and otherwise more capable surface-to-air missile systems and associated radars and other sensors. Aircraft carriers and their associated strike groups and air wings are also increasingly at risk from various anti-access and area-denial capabilities, further underscoring the need for weapons with greater range and that are able to prosecute targets faster to help ensure their survival. At present, the primary air-launched stand-off anti-ship and land-attack missiles available to them are the AGM-84D Harpoon anti-ship cruise missile, the AGM-84H/K Standoff Land Attack Missile-Expanded Response (SLAM-ER), and the AGM-158C Long Range Anti-Ship Missile (LRASM), all of which are subsonic. The service is in the process of developing the AGM-88G Advanced Anti-Radiation Guided Missile-Extended Range (AARGM-ER), which will have at some surface strike capabilities and will also serve as the basis for a Stand-in Attack Weapon (SiAW) for the U.S. Air Force. However, the exact speed and range of this weapon are unclear. The Navy is also developing a powered cruise missile derivative of its AGM-154 Joint Stand-Off Weapon (JSOW) glide bomb. Boeing's SPEAR announcement comes as the U.S. military as a whole is pursuing a wide array of new hypersonic strike weapons, including unpowered boost-glide vehicles and air-breathing missiles. The Air Force is working toward its own "Expendable Hypersonic Multi-Mission Air-Breathing Demonstrator" as part of a program called Mayhem, which is linked to work on advanced turbine-based combined cycle engines. That service is also working closely with DARPA on the Hypersonic Air-breathing Weapon Concept (HAWC) project and its own Hypersonic Attack Cruise Missile (HACM) effort. Lockheed Martin, which is leading the development of the HAWC missile, has proposed a follow-on design for use by the Navy in the past. In August, the Air Force had said it was looking at designs from Boeing, as well as Lockheed Martin and Raytheon, to meet a requirement for "a solid-rocket boosted, air-breathing, hypersonic conventional cruise missile, air-launched from existing fighter/bomber aircraft." It's not clear if that announcement was related to HACM or not, but the following month, Boeing released a computer-generated promotional video featuring a B-1 bomber firing what the company described as a notional hypersonic missile. The company has subsequently released a more detailed still rendering featuring this conceptual missile that, at least visually, appears to be an air-breathing design. All told, it's hardly surprising that the Navy is also in the process of pursuing its own high-speed strike missiles to arm its carrier aircraft. There's no reason to believe that the weapons that emerge from SPEAR won't be suitable for integration onto land-based platforms, such as the service's P-8A Poseidon maritime patrol aircraft, as well. Whatever SPEAR's final design looks like, it's an important step forward for the Navy in providing this capability to its combat aircraft fleets in the future. https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/37170/navy-hires-boeing-to-develop-a-very-fast-and-long-range-strike-missile-demonstrator

Michel Cabirol Sous la pression d'éventuelles sanctions américaines et des ONG, les banques françaises, dont BNP Paribas et Société Générale, appliquent désormais des règles de conformité (compliance) excessives pour les entreprises de défense considérées comme des entreprises à risque pour un financement. Cette tendance est en train d'étrangler progressivement une industrie de souveraineté. "Même si vos solutions semblent d'avenir et votre stratégie business cohérente, vous accompagner est trop risqué pour nous compte-tenu de la part de la défense dans vos contrats à venir". "Le critère de souveraineté n'est pas notre sujet quand nous évaluons un financement". "Ce n'est pas parce que la BPI vous soutient, que vous avez des contrats déjà signés, que nous devons vous suivre aveuglément"... Les refus de financement des banques françaises se multiplient, les témoignages désespérés, notamment des PME ou start-up de la filière défense, aussi. Clairement les banques, dont BNP Paribas et Société Générale, jouent de moins en moins le jeu pour financer et/ou accompagner une industrie souveraine, la défense, qui reste pourtant soutenue par l'État français, selon une note du GICAT (Groupement des industries françaises de défense et de sécurité terrestres et aéroterrestres) envoyée aux ministères des Armées et de l'Économie et que La Tribune a pu se procurer. Consciente du danger mortel que cette situation représente pour le secteur, la commission de la défense de l'Assemblée nationale souhaite s'emparer de ce sujet en lançant d'ici à la fin de la semaine une mission flash sur ce dossier extrêmement sensible. "Depuis maintenant deux ans, notre industrie de défense est confrontée à un problème croissant : le système bancaire et financier français est de plus en plus réticent à accompagner nos entreprises du secteur de la défense tant pour leur développement qu'en soutien à l'exportation", constate cette note du GICAT. Les directions juridiques ont pris le pouvoir Les refus de financement se décident principalement dans les bureaux discrets des équipes de juristes et d'avocats (compliance et éthique) devenues très puissantes (trop ?) au sein des directions des banques françaises. Ces dernières refusent des financements dans le développement, voire l'ouverture de compte auprès de jeunes entreprises "pure player" de la défense ou duales, assure le GICAT. "Les organismes bancaires décident de manière discrétionnaire de critères de compliance très poussés, se basant sur les analyses et recommandations de prestataires privés dont il n'est pas précisé le nom ou la nationalité", regrette l'organisation professionnelle. C'est le cas entre autre de la Société Générale, citée dans le document du GICAT : "l'industrie de la défense fait l'objet d'une attention particulière compte tenu du détournement potentiel d'usage de ses produits". "Au-delà des réglementations applicables, le groupe Société Générale définit dans la présente politique des critères additionnels d'exclusion et d'évaluation, qui... https://www.latribune.fr/entreprises-finance/industrie/aeronautique-defense/armement-la-bombe-incendiaire-de-la-filiere-defense-gicat-contre-les-banques-francaises-860045.html

MISSILE DEFENSE AGENCY a.i. solutions Inc.,* Lanham, Maryland, is being awarded a $203,204,319 competitive, cost-plus-fixed-fee, level-of-effort contract with a three-year base value of $77,728,390 and two one-year options for quality and mission assurance advisory and assistance services. The work will be performed in the National Capital Region; Dahlgren, Virginia; Huntsville, Alabama; Kirtland Air Force Base, New Mexico; Fort Greely, Alaska; Orlando, Florida; Moorestown, New Jersey; Tucson, Arizona; Salt Lake City, Utah; Promontory, Utah; Joplin, Missouri; and other locations as directed, with an estimated completion date of December 2025. This contract was competitively procured via publication on the beta.SAM.gov website with two proposals received. Fiscal 2020 and 2021 research, development, test and evaluation; and Foreign Military Sales funds in the amount of $4,513,906 are being obligated at time of award. The Missile Defense Agency, Huntsville, Alabama, is the contracting activity (HQ0858-21-C-0010). NAVY Lockheed Martin Corp., Lockheed Martin Aeronautics Co., Fort Worth, Texas, is awarded a $138,769,282 modification (P00027) to previously awarded cost-plus-award-fee, cost-plus-incentive-fee contract N00019-19-C-0010. This modification adds scope to continue the development of pilot training device software to align the F-35 air system with continued capability development. Additionally, this modification provides for testing and continuous re-certification activities for dual capable F-35 aircraft as Block 4 capabilities are developed, matured and fielded in support of the Navy, Marine Corps, Air Force and non-Department of Defense (DOD) participants. Work will be performed in Orlando, Florida (51%); and Fort Worth, Texas (49%), and is expected to be completed in June 2024. Fiscal 2020 research, development, test and evaluation (Air Force) funds in the amount of $4,623,119; fiscal 2020 research, development, test and evaluation (Navy) funds in the amount of $3,325,900; and non-DOD participant funds in the amount of $1,071,980 will be obligated at time of award, none of which will expire at the end of the current fiscal year. The Naval Air Systems Command, Patuxent River, Maryland, is the contracting activity. L3 Technologies Inc., Global Communications Solutions Division, Victor, New York, is awarded a firm-fixed-price, indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity contract with a ceiling of $87,712,000 for the purchase of up to a maximum 169 production Marine Corps Wideband Satellite – Expeditionary systems. Work will be performed in Rochester, New York, and is expected to be complete by October 2025. Fiscal 2020 procurement (Marine Corps) funds in the amount of $20,673,900 will be obligated on the first delivery order immediately following contract award and funds will not expire at the end of current fiscal year. This contract was competitively procured via the beta.sam.gov website, with four offers received. The Marine Corps Systems Command, Quantico, Virginia, is the contracting activity (M67854-21-D-2025). Technology Security Associates Inc.,* California, Maryland, is awarded an $83,287,546 cost-plus-fixed-fee, indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity contract. This contract provides a full range of platform security and related support services to include, security modeling, program security management, trusted systems and network, cybersecurity, anti-tamper, system security engineering, international programs security support, acquisition security support, communications security support and physical security, force protection, anti-terrorism, and emergency management support for the Naval Air System Command and the Naval Air Warfare Centers. Work will be performed at Patuxent River, Maryland (90%); St. Inigoes, Maryland (2%); Lakehurst, New Jersey (2%); Orlando, Florida (1%); China Lake, California (1%); Point Mugu, California (1%); North Island, California (1%); Cherry Point, North Carolina (1%); and Jacksonville, Florida (1%), and is expected to be completed in October 2025. No funds will be obligated at the time of award; funds will be obligated on individual orders as they are issued. This contract was competitively procured as a small business set-aside; two offers were received. The Naval Air Warfare Center, Aircraft Division, Patuxent River, Maryland, is the contracting activity (N00421-21-D-0005). Lockheed Martin Corp., Fort Worth, Texas, is awarded a $12,663,878 modification (P00088) to previously awarded cost-plus-fixed-fee contract N00019-16-C-0033. This modification adds scope in support of the F-35 Lightning II Lot 11 diminishing manufacturing sources redesign of the Electrical Optical Targeting System, 270V Battery Cell Separator and a component for the Helmet Mounted Display System for Navy, Marine Corps, Air Force and non-Department of Defense (DOD) participants. Work will be performed in Fort Worth, Texas, and is expected to be completed in January 2024. Fiscal 2020 aircraft procurement (Navy) funds in the amount of $5,198,654; fiscal 2019 aircraft procurement (Air Force) funds in the amount of $5,198,654; and non-DOD participant funds in the amount of $2,266,570 will be obligated at time of award, none of which will expire at the end of the current fiscal year. The Naval Air Systems Command, Patuxent River, Maryland, is the contracting activity. AIR FORCE Privoro, Tempe, Arizona, has been awarded a $37,100,000 firm-fixed-price agreement for prototyping and pilot work to support the establishment of a trusted platform for secure mobility that will bring the advantages of commercial mobile technology to government agencies. Work will be performed in Phoenix, Arizona, and is expected to be completed Aug. 1, 2024. Fiscal 2019 and 2020 research, development, test and evaluation funds in the amount of $2,668,000 are being obligated at the time of award. The Air Force Research Laboratory, Dayton, Ohio, is the contracting activity (FA8650-19-9-9333). U.S. SPECIAL OPERATIONS COMMAND Trofholz Technologies Inc., Rocklin, California, was awarded a $15,000,000 maximum single award, indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity contract (H92240-21-D-0001) with an ordering period of up to five years for contractor-provided non-personal Integrated Electronic Security System services in support of Naval Special Warfare Command (NSWC) enterprise requirements. Fiscal 2021 operations and maintenance funds in the amount of $145,899 are being obligated at the time of award. The work will be performed in various locations inside and outside the U.S. and may continue through fiscal 2026, depending on timing of orders placed by NSWC. The contract was awarded competitively using Federal Acquisition Regulation Part 15 procedures with four proposals received. NSWC, Coronado, California, is the contracting activity. ARMY Sikorsky Aircraft Corp., Stratford, Connecticut, was awarded a $13,739,845 modification (P00152) to contract W58RGZ-17-C-0009 for one UH-60M Black Hawk helicopter. Work will be performed in Stratford, Connecticut, with an estimated completion date of Nov. 30, 2020. Fiscal 2010 Foreign Military Sales (Jordan) funds in the amount of $13,739,845 were obligated at the time of the award. U.S. Army Contracting Command, Redstone Arsenal, Alabama, is the contracting activity. DEFENSE LOGISTICS AGENCY Oshkosh Defense LLC, Oshkosh, Wisconsin, has been awarded an $11,340,637 firm-fixed-price, requirements-type contract for tire and wheel assemblies. This was a competitive acquisition with one offer received. This is a three-year contract with no option periods. Locations of performance are Wisconsin and New Jersey, with an Oct. 20, 2023, ordering period end date. Using military service is Army. Type of appropriation is fiscal 2021 through 2024 Army working capital funds. The contracting activity is the Defense Logistics Agency, Land and Maritime, Warren, Michigan (SPRDL1-21-D-0004). *Small business https://www.defense.gov/Newsroom/Contracts/Contract/Article/2388282/source/GovDelivery/

Valerie Insinna and Jen Judson WASHINGTON — After years of sometimes contentious discussions, the Army and Air Force have adopted a plan to work together on what they are now calling Combined Joint All-Domain Command and Control — the idea that all of the U.S. military's sensors and shooters must be able to send data to each other seamlessly and instantaneously. The agreement, signed Sept. 29 by Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Charles Brown and Army Chief of Staff Gen. James McConville, paves the way for closer collaboration on “mutual standards for data sharing and service interfacing” that will ultimately allow the services to ensure that new communications gear, networks and artificial intelligence systems they field can connect to each other, reducing the risk of incompatibility. But much is still unknown, including the exact nature of the Army-Air Force collaboration and how much technology the services will be willing to share. Army Futures Command and the Air Force's office of strategy, integration and requirements are tasked with leading the joint effort, which will bridge the services' major avenues for CJADC2 experimentation — the Army's Project Convergence and the Air Force's Advanced Battle Management System. Over the next 60 days, the two services will formulate a plan to connect the Project Convergence and ABMS exercises, and ensure data can be transmitted along their platforms, said Lt. Gen. Clinton Hinote, who leads Air Force's strategy office. But that doesn't mean the services are on a path to adopt the same systems architecture, data standards and interfaces. “What the Army and the Air Force are agreeing to is, we're going to be able to see their data, they're going to be able to see our data. And as much as we can, we will come up with common standards,” Hinote said in an Oct. 15 interview. “But even if we can't come up with common standards, we realize that translators are going to be something that will be with us for a long time, and we will build the translators necessary to make sure we can share.” The main point of the discussions was to avoid redundancies, McConville told Defense News on Oct. in a generation, said Army Secretary Ryan McCarthy, who pointed to the formation of the AirLand Battle doctrine in the 1980s as the last time they worked together so intimately on a new war-fighting concept. “I'm very encouraged that we have the Air Staff and the Army Staff investing countless hours,” he said. “We're laying down the path to get there. And it really starts with cloud architecture, common data standards, and command-and-control systems that you can wire together so that they can share information at the speed of relevance. So that whether it's an F-35 [fighter jet] or an artillery battery, they communicate with each other to prosecute enemy targets.” Battle of the AIs The Army's and the Air Force's goals are roughly the same. The services want to be able to take data from any of the services' sensors — whether that's the radar of an E-3 early airborne warning aircraft or the video collected by an MQ-1C Gray Eagle drone — and detect a threat, fuse it with other information coming in from other platforms, use artificial intelligence to provide a list of options to commanders and ultimately send accurate target data to the weapon systems that will shoot it, all in a drastically shortened timeline. Over the past year, the Air Force held three ABMS demonstrations, with the most recent taking place Sept. 15-25 alongside U.S. Indo-Pacific Command's Exercise Valiant Shield. So far, the service has tested out technology that allows the F-35 and F-22 jets to send data to each other despite their use of different waveforms. It also test tech that connects an AC-130 gunship with SpaceX's Starlink constellation, and used a high-velocity projectile shot from a howitzer to shoot down a surrogate cruise missile. All of those demonstrations were enabled by 5G connectivity, cloud computing and competing battle management systems that fused together data and applied machine-learning algorithms. Meanwhile, during the Army's first Project Convergence exercise held in September, the service tested a prototype of the Extended Range Cannon Artillery, fused data through a new system known as Prometheus and used artificial intelligence to recommend options for shooting a target. A Marine Corps F-35 also participated in some tests, receiving targeting information that originated from a satellite, then passing on information from its own sensors to an Army AI system known as FIRES Synchronization to Optimize Responses in Multi-Domain Operations — or FIRESTORM. Joint Army and Air Force experiments could begin as early as March 2021, said Portia Crowe, the chief data officer of the Army's Network Cross-Functional Team at Army Futures Command. Crowe, who spoke during a Oct. 14 webinar hosted by C4ISRNET, did not elaborate on what would be tested. Much of the early collaboration between the Army's Project Convergence and the Air Force's ABMS will likely involve plugging in new technologies from one service and seeing if they can successfully send data to the other's nodes in the experiment, Hinote said. But that won't be “where the magic happens,” he noted. “The magic is going to happen in the flow of information, and then the development of that information into something that looks new” through the use of artificial intelligence. Felix Jonathan, a robotics engineer from Carnegie Mellon University, inputs data into an autonomous ground vehicle control system during Project Convergence at Yuma Proving Ground, Ariz., which took place Aug. 11-Sept. 18, 2020. (Spc. Carlos Cuebas Fantauzzi/U.S. Army) Though Project Convergence and ABMS are still in their infancies, the Army and the Air Force have adopted different philosophies for incorporating machine learning into the “kill chain” — the sensors and weapon systems that detect, identify and prosecute a threat. While the Air Force is largely experimenting with solutions made by contractors like Anduril Industries and Palantir, the Army is mostly relying on government-owned platforms created by government software coders. “One of the things that I see as being an incredibly interesting exercise — I don't know if this will happen this year or next year, but I'm sure it will happen — is let's compare what we were able to do in the government, using government civilians who are coders and who are programming these machine-learning algorithms to come up with the top three actions [to take in response to a given threat],” Hinote said. “And let's compare that to what [private] companies are doing and their intellectual property. And then, if that gives us insight, then what is the business model that we want to propose?” But as those technologies mature, Hinote said, the services must answer difficult doctrinal and technical questions: How much should the government be involved in shaping the responses given by the algorithm, and how does it balance that requirement with industry's ability to move fast? When an AI gives a commander a list of military options, who owns that data? And how can military operators know the underlying assumptions an AI system is making when it presents a threat to commanders and a set of options for countering it? If they don't understand why an AI system is recommending a course of action, should commanders feel comfortable using lethal force? “How do we know enough about the machine learning and algorithms so that their output is useful, but not a surprise to us? And if it is a surprise, how did it get to that surprise? Because if you don't know that, you're going to feel very weird about using it for lethal force,” Hinote said. “Right now we're kind of feeling our way down that path to see how much trust are we going to have in these algorithms, and developing trust is going to be something you're going to see over and over and over in both Project Convergence and ABMS onramps.” Major barriers The Army and the Air Force aren't the only military entities driving to make CJADC2 a reality. The Navy recently launched its own effort — Project Overmatch — and tapped Rear Adm. Douglas Small on Oct. 1 to lead it. Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Michael Gilday has said it is the service's second-most important priority, falling behind only the Columbia-class ballistic missile submarine. Coast Guardsmen simulate interdicting a jammer on a vessel in support of an Advanced Battle Management System experiment in the Gulf of Mexico on Sept. 3, 2020. (Staff Sgt. Haley Phillips/U.S. Air Force) In totality, the U.S. military will have at least three separate CJADC2 initiatives, each fielding their own hardware and software. There are good reasons for each service retaining their own programs, according to Hinote, as each domain presents unique challenges, and each service organizes itself differently to project power on land, at sea or in the air. “The Army has been very concerned over scale. They see each of their soldiers as being a node inside the network, and therefore you could have millions of nodes. And they're very concerned that if this was only Air Force-led, that the scale couldn't be reached — we would not have the ability to plug in all of those soldiers and nodes in the network,” Hinote said, adding that it's a valid concern. He added that the Air Force also has its challenges — namely the difficulty of sending data over long distances, and having to connect aircraft and sensors that may be far away from a target. But the result is three large, complicated acquisition programs that will need billions of dollars in funding — and potentially compete against each other for money. To further complicate the issue, the military's existing funding mechanisms aren't optimized for the fast-paced, iterative experimentation and procurement the services seek. One way to overcome this might involve creating a Pentagon-wide fund for CJADC2, and then split it among the services, Hinote said. Another option might include designating one service as the executive agent, giving that force organizing authority and the power of the purse. But both come with drawbacks. “[There are] different models out there, but none of them seem to really fit,” Hinote said. “And so we have been having talks with especially the appropriations defense [committees on] the Senate and House side on what would it look like for a modern military to buy a capability like this, and what would the taxpayers need for understanding that this is good stewardship. And that has not been decided.” https://www.c4isrnet.com/digital-show-dailies/ausa/2020/10/20/the-army-and-air-force-are-finally-on-the-same-page-with-a-plan-to-connect-the-military-what-happens-next/

Sebastian Sprenger COLOGNE, Germany — Rheinmetall is teaming with Textron Systems to pitch the Lynx KF41 vehicle as a Bradley replacement to the U.S. Army, the company announced Tuesday. The campaign marks the second time that the Düsseldorf, Germany-based company is targeting the Optionally Manned Fighting Vehicle program following an unsuccessful attempt last year that eventually saw the ground service halt the race. This time around, Rheinmetall is putting greater emphasis on a U.S. footprint, led by its growing American Rheinmetall Vehicles subsidiary based in Sterling Heights, Michigan. Textron, as the newcomer on Team Lynx, is meant to be front and center when it comes to manufacturing and robotics capabilities. “Textron Systems' Slidell, Louisiana, vehicle production facility has supported more than 15 armored vehicle programs of record supporting over 20 countries,” Henry Finneral, senior vice president and general manager of Textron Systems' Marine and Land Systems business, said in a statement. “We stand ready to support the team and the US Army and deliver a trusted platform for the future.” Matt Warnick, managing director at American Rheinmetall Vehicles, said the “teaming agreement brings together two of the world's leading providers of defense industry solutions." Raytheon remains part of the team. Executives hope the new Army competition will give all bidders more leeway in fine-tuning their eventual offers to the service's requirements. That marks a contrast to the previous acquisition attempt, where the ground service essentially wanted specific features already built into prototype vehicles, with little time for companies to adjust. This time around, the Army plans to downsize to five bidders, then three, before picking an eventual winner. A final request for proposals is expected late this year or early next. Service officials have put competitors on notice that an open architecture in the vehicle design will be at a premium, a feature that Rheinmetall touted in its bid notice. “The network is almost more important in some ways than building the combat vehicles,” Maj. Gen. Brian Cummings, program executive officer of ground combat systems, told Defense News in an interview ahead of the Association of the U.S. Army's virtual conference, which ended last week. Rheinmetall previously planned to present the teaming arrangement with Textron at this year's AUSA show if the event had taken place in person. https://www.defensenews.com/global/europe/2020/10/20/rheinmetall-eyes-do-over-in-new-pitch-of-its-lynx-vehicle-to-the-us-army/