22 février 2023 | International, Aérospatial, C4ISR
Space Force may hire companies to service orbiting satellites
The head of the Space Force's mobility enterprise said this week the service wants to buy commercial on-orbit logistics capabilities.
25 août 2024 | International, C4ISR, Sécurité
Discover 'sedexp', a stealthy Linux malware using udev rules for persistence, hiding credit card skimmers, and evading detection since 2022.
https://thehackernews.com/2024/08/new-linux-malware-sedexp-hides-credit.html
22 février 2023 | International, Aérospatial, C4ISR
The head of the Space Force's mobility enterprise said this week the service wants to buy commercial on-orbit logistics capabilities.
27 juin 2018 | International, Terrestre
Gabriel Dominguez BAE Systems has been awarded a USD83.6 million contract to provide to Taiwan the “necessary material and technical engineering to build, integrate, test, and deliver” 36 AAV7A1 Assault Amphibious Vehicles. The contract is for 30 AAVP7A1 personnel carriers, four AAVC7A1 command post vehicles and two AAVR7A1 recovery vehicles, according to a 22 June announcement by the US Department of Defense (DoD). This deal, which involves Foreign Military Sales (FMS) under the Taipei Economic Cultural Representative Office (TECRO) – FMS case TW-P-SEQ – also includes support and test equipment, spares, publications, training, engineering services, logistics, and other technical support required. All work will be performed in York, Pennsylvania, and is expected to be completed by 22 July, 2020, said the DoD, adding that this contract “was not competitively procured in accordance with Federal Acquisition Regulation 6.302-1(a)(2)(ii) - only one responsible source and no other supplies or services that will satisfy agency requirements”. The contracting authority is the US Marine Corps Systems Command in Quantico, Virginia. Once delivered, the AAV7A1s are very likely to be used by the Republic of China Marine Corps (RoCMC), but will not be the first ones to be operated by the Corps. In 2003 Taiwan signed a contract for 54 ex-US Marine Corps AAV7A1-series vehicles that have begun replacing the LVTP5 series of amphibious fighting vehicles used by the RoCMC. The latest contract announcement comes a few weeks after Taiwan said it welcomed a potential shift in policy by the United States' government to facilitate military sales to the island on a case-by-case basis as opposed to the current approach of ‘bundling' several defence deals together, as Jane's reported. The Ministry of National Defense (MND) in Taipei said in comments reported by the state-owned Central News Agency on 5 June that any US transition to approving FMS requests separately would improve its ability to plan and budget military modernisation requirements. http://www.janes.com/article/81335/bae-systems-to-supply-assault-amphibious-vehicles-to-taiwan
24 avril 2020 | International, Terrestre
While some prototype deliveries and field tests are being delayed, Army leaders said, there's enough slack in the schedule that combat units will still get the new tech on time. By SYDNEY J. FREEDBERG JR.on April 23, 2020 at 2:40 PM WASHINGTON: The Army and its contractors are coping with the COVID-19 pandemic so well that the service expects no delay in the fielding of future weapons, the Army Secretary and his two top modernization officials told reporters today. The “rigorous” review of acquisition programs for the 2022 budget request is also still on schedule, Sec. Ryan McCarthy said. “It's just amazing how quickly they've adapted, kept their workforce engaged, and are protecting cost, schedule, and performance on these weapons systems,” said McCarthy, recently returned from a visit to BAE and General Dynamics facilities in Detroit. “Also I'm very proud of Dr. Jette's and Gen. Murray's performance during this crisis, working on things like progress payments for manufacturers, trying to help them get access to small business loans, the managing of second- and third-tier suppliers.” “Right now, all the companies that were closed for any period of time are reopened,” said Assistant Secretary Bruce Jette, the service's civilian acquisition chief. One BAE worker was infected, resulting in a week-long shutdown of a combat vehicle assembly line – you can't weld armor plate over your telephone, Jette noted – but the company has now restarted production with new precautions in place. The company and the union have agreed to give up their traditional week-long shutdown for summer vacation to catch up. The Boeing CH-47 helicopter plant in Philadelphia also shut down for 10 days, Jette reported, but they're back up and running as well. He's most worried about smaller subcontractors, where a single COVID-19 case can force the entire workforce to be quarantined for 14 days, so he's tracking that closely. “I keep track on a daily basis of 63 pages of supply chain [data],” Jette said. “Our industry partners have been really good about opening their books all the way down to their sub-suppliers and keeping us well-informed — they contractually don't have to do that but they have.” Some deliveries of prototypes have been delayed, said Gen. John “Mike” Murray, chief of Army Futures Command. But, so far, those delays are measured in weeks and there's sufficient slack in schedules to catch up later this year, he said, which means programs will proceed to production and fielding on time. What's particularly tricky for the Army is that, after decades of dumping “good ideas” on soldiers only to find they didn't actually work, it's now systematically letting soldiers try out prototypes hands-on. These soldier touchpoints require troops to work together in the field, often side-by-side with contractors who record their feedback and make some fixes on the spot. That's difficult given pandemic precautions – but not impossible. Other types of testing allow a little more social distance, and work from engineering design to budget reviews can take place entirely online. Gen. Murray gave a rundown of key programs: The next flight test of Lockheed Martin's Precision Strike Missile (PrSM) will take place as scheduled on April 30th, Gen. Murray said. “I'm very confident,” he declared, to the point he's already planned his flight to go observe. On the other hand, the third big soldier touchpoint test for the IVAS targeting goggles, scheduled for this summer, has been delayed to the fall. That's not just because of social distancing, Murray said, but also because a Microsoft subcontractor ran into COVID-19 problems (they'll be back in operation this week). Because this would have been the first test of a fully militarized and ruggedized “form factor” of IVAS, which began life as a modified Microsoft HoloLens, it's too important to cut corners, he said. The program will be able to make up the lost time and deliver the final production version to troops on schedule, he said. There's been a six week delay in delivery of the three competiting prototypes for Next Generation Squad Weapon, meant to replace the M249 SAW. Once the weapons arrive, however, the Army will now get them into soldiers' hands in just two weeks, a month faster than originally planned, making up for most of that lost time. Field-testing of one contender for the new FTUAS drone is already underway at Fort Riley, as we've previously reported. Testing of another drone design at Fort Campbell is “a little bit delayed,” Murray said, but should start by the end of the month. The Limited User Test of the IBCS missile defense network has been postponed (again, as we've reported). But the equipment remains in place at White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico, Murray said, software updates continue, and the soldiers who spent months training to operate it will be back to do the test “this summer or early fall.” (The Army also previously announced it would postpone field tests of promising new Robotic Combat Vehicles). “In general,” Jette said, “we don't see any FUEs changing”: That's military jargon for “First Unit Equipped,” the crucial moment when enough of a weapon has been built to equip a significant combat unit. “We are tracking each program,” Jette said, not just the service's top priorities “but all of our over 600 programs, [and] none of them are at risk” of a delay so severe they can't recover. https://breakingdefense.com/2020/04/covid-19-wont-slow-new-army-weapons-mccarthy-murray-jette/