25 mai 2020 | International, C4ISR
LONDON — Britain's Ministry of Defence is about to launch the final stage of a competition to manage ground station capabilities for the armed forces Skynet satellite communications network by early June, say industry executives.
Release of the invitation to negotiate documents to several industry consortia had been expected last week. Although the date appears to have slipped a little, industry executives, who asked to not be identified, say they still expect the MoD to trigger the final stage of the competition “imminently.”
The documents are expected to be issued to selected bidders within the next two weeks. Four bidder groups are in line to be selected for the next stage of negotiations, said people with knowledge of the competition.
The ground control elements of the MoD's existing Skynet 5 network are currently managed by Airbus Defence & Space as part of a long running private finance initiative deal with the MoD originally awarded in 2003.
Part of that deal is now coming to a close with Airbus's hold on the ground control management of Skynet finishing in August 2022.
A one year transition period is expected to kick off in 2021, if Airbus has to handover the role to a challenger.
The new competition, for a program known as the service delivery wrap, aims to compete management of the ground control stations until a new generation of communication satellites are launched around 2028. That phase is being called the enduring capability element of the Skynet 6 program.
Together the service delivery wrap and the enduring capability competitions are the main parts of a Skynet 6 program, which is aimed at taking Britain's satellite communications into a new era at a cost in the vicinity of £6 billion ($7.3 billion).
A new satellite, known as Skynet 6A, is being acquired from Airbus to ensure communication capabilities are not compromised ahead of the new generation of satellites becoming available later in the decade.
Negotiations on that deal have been dogged by delays.
A new satellite, known as Skynet 6A, is being acquired from Airbus to ensure communication capabilities are not compromised ahead of the new generation of satellites becoming available later in the decade.
Negotiations on that deal have been dogged by delays.
Airbus were named preferred contractor for Skynet 6A as far back as 2017 but the full contract for that deal has yet to be signed.
The company, Britain's biggest space contractor, has been working on long lead components of the satellite in order to stay on track. A contract for the manufacturing of long lead items and preliminary design work was signed, but not announced by the MoD and Airbus in March.
A second phase of the Skynet 6A deal covering build, test, launch and deployment is currently working its way through the MoD and wider government approvals process.
A spokesman for Airbus told Defense News “We are working on elements of 6A. We are hoping for a full contract mid-year.”
With one exception, it's not clear who the runners might be in the final stages of the service delivery wrap competition, as the MoD has insisted all contenders sign a non-disclosure agreement preventing all communication with the media and others.
Competing teams are not even allowed to publicly acknowledge they are interested in bidding.
The exception is a team made up of service provider Serco, satellite operator Inmarsat, IT specialist CGI UK and the U.K. arm of defense giant Lockheed Martin.
It announced its teaming arrangement late last year, just ahead of the MoD bringing the shutters down with its non-disclosure order.
The four companies reinforced their bid credentials May 19, announcing they were forming a team known as Athena, after the Olympian god of war and wisdom, to bid for upcoming U.K. and overseas military and civil space capability programs.
Kevin Craven, the CEO for Serco UK & Europe, called Athena an “exciting new team that will deliver enhanced space-based technologies and services from the U.K. Athena will boost British capabilities, as well as the economy, via growth in this fast-moving, developing sector. The launch of Athena also ensures diversity and choice in the U.K. space sector for future sustainable development.”
There was no mention of Skynet 6 in the Athena announcement. It did however say that Athena will “work on a number of opportunities that leverage space-based technologies, their ground-based systems and end-to-end services as they arise, both in the U.K. and internationally.”
A spokesman for Athena declined to comment on whether they were bidding for the service delivery wrap program, but it's clear they are a contender given the announcement of their interest last December when industry prequalification questionnaires had to be returned to the MoD.
It remains a matter of speculation for the moment who the other bidders are. Previously Airbus, Babcock, Boeing, BT and Viasat have all been unofficially linked with having an interest in the competition.
Companies Defense News tried to contact either declined to comment or didn't return calls.
For Serco, who already provide some of the manpower for the current Airbus Skynet ground station operation, the Athena teaming is the latest in a string of announcements over the last few week that have reinforced its position as a space sector services provider here.
In short order the company has secured separate contract extensions to continue to operate and maintain key ballistic missile defense radars at Fylingdales, northern England and as part of the Skynet 5 program providing support to the U.S. Air Force Satellite Control Network (AFSCN) at Oakhanger, southern England.
The U.S. division of the company announced early April it had been awarded a deal to manage and maintain the U.S. Space Force ground-based electro-optical deep space surveillance (GEODSS) system.
9 août 2023 | International, Terrestre
Dozens of second-hand Leopard 1 tanks that once belonged to Belgium have been bought by another European country for Ukrainian forces fighting Russia's invasion, the arms trader who did the deal said Tuesday.
10 janvier 2022 | International, Aérospatial, Naval, Terrestre, C4ISR, Sécurité
Don't confuse public handwringing about hiring struggles in A&D with actual lost business. Robots will protect the bottom line.
27 février 2020 | International, Aérospatial
Steve Trimble The U.S. Air Force has adopted a three-phase strategy to select small, innovative companies outside the traditional defense industry to perform advanced development work and to tap Silicon Valley-style venture capital firms to help taxpayers finance the new technology. A new process could help rationalize the one-year-old Air Force effort to attract high-tech startups with dozens of Air Force Pitch Day events. These conferences have led to hundreds of small contract awards but no obvious path to guide the aspiring defense contractors further into the byzantine military acquisition process. U.S. Air Force plans to make 50 large “bets” on technology New acquisition training to be based on Fighter Weapons School For the private startups and venture capitalists involved, the Air Force Ventures initiative is designed to offer a new route to the commercial market for potentially game-changing technologies that could benefit from a risk-tolerant government customer providing funding and early support. “We don't really think of ourselves as a [stand-alone] market, but we purchase things in quantities that [are] meaningful enough that we can bridge companies until they reach a level for commercial success,” says Will Roper, assistant secretary of the Air Force for acquisition, technology and logistics. “That's one reason that [venture capitalists] are interested in this.” The Air Force Ventures process starts with the Pitch Day events, during which the Air Force can place initial “bets” worth up to about $50,000 each in Phase I Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) grants on promising, potentially game-changing ideas, says Roper, speaking to about 1,000 Air Force acquisition officials during a Feb. 14 webinar. As the companies transition toward Phase II SBIR awards, the Air Force plans to grant about 300 contracts worth up to $1 million each—with a program office agreeing to fund about one-third of the costs. The funding match is meant to link the SBIR award to a program office, creating a path for the technology to potentially transition beyond the laboratory stage and into a program of record. The third and final step in the Air Force Ventures concept whittles the pool of awards to about 50 recipients. The amount of the award is potentially “unlimited,” Roper says, but is generally regarded as at least $10 million. The first of the “big bets” in Phase III are now under evaluation, Roper says. The contract awards could be announced at South by Southwest, a week-long technology conference and entertainment festival scheduled for March 13-22 in Austin, Texas. The initiative explicitly seeks to help the Air Force break from traditional defense contractors. As the Air Force attempts to field leap-ahead capabilities within the next decade for the Advanced Battle Management System and Next-Generation Air Dominance, leveraging the innovative ideas and technology flowing into the commercial market is seen as critical. “[R&D] in this country is 80% commercial,” Roper explains. “So in the 21st century, the [defense] industrial base should be dual-use. And so we've got to crack the code on how to have public and private funding work seamlessly inside an Air Force program.” But there are significant challenges as the Air Force tries to leverage commercial-sector technology investments: Small companies often need to find a market quickly to generate revenue and cash flow, whereas government program offices tend to make decisions slowly—and inconsistently. “In many cases, their commercialization [strategy] is devalued [by investors] if they have government funds,” Roper adds. The Air Force's program managers also face a learning curve. “If we're making 1,000 small bets a year, the reason we're making 1,000 is that we know most of them aren't going to pan out. So we can't manage the companies the way we would a traditional program,” Roper says. “But we can manage them as a portfolio—the same way that a private investor or a venture capitalist would.” To prepare, the Air Force is sending acquisition officials back to school. Next year, a cadre of program managers will be enrolled in a six-month course at Stanford University, which will teach the Air Force to manage technology investments like a venture capitalist, Roper says. The next step is to expand educational opportunities within the Air Force. A new acquisition curriculum, modeled on operational training centers such as the Fighter Weapons School, will be created, Roper says. https://aviationweek.com/shows-events/air-warfare-symposium/new-air-force-ventures-set-transform-technology-strategy