DDG-51 modernization
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New Finmeccanica acquisition DRS EW & Network Systems, Inc. in Buffalo, NY received a $6.9 million fixed-price, time and materials contract for a Gigabit Ethernet Data Multiplex System (GEDMS) for DDG 53, a Flight 1 Arleigh Burke Class AEGIS destroyer commonly known as USS John Paul Jones. Some may remember the ship’s namesake as the Scot who became the father of the American navy, and uttered the famous battle phrase “I have not yet begun to fight!”

The GEDMS is a network for Arleigh Burke Class destroyers that acts as a ship wide data transfer network for a ship’s machinery, steering, navigation, combat, alarm and indicating, and damage control systems. It was designed to replace the miles of point-to-point cabling, signal converters, junction boxes, and switchboards associated with conventional ship’s cabling. DRS will also provide a land-based GEDMS trainer, EDMS hardware, and installation and checkout repair for the DDG53 GEDMS, and the contract includes an option which would bring the cumulative value of this contract to $7 million.

USS John Paul Jones
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Work will be performed in Johnstown, PA (80%) and Buffalo, NY (20%), and is expected to be complete by December 2009. This contract was procured on a limited competition basis, with 2 proposals solicited and 2 offers received via the Federal Business Opportunities website. The Naval Surface Warfare Center, Dahlgren Division in Dahlgren, VA manages the contract (N00178-08-C-2001).

Raytheon: C4ISR Future?
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As video communications is integrated into robots, soldiers, and UAVs, and network-centric warfare becomes the organizing principle of American warfighting, front-line demands for bandwidth are rising sharply. The Transformation Communications Satellite (TSAT) System is part of a larger effort by the US military to address this need.

The final price tag on the entire TSAT program has been quoted at anywhere from $14-25 billion through 2016, which includes the satellites, the ground operations system, the satellite operations center and the cost of operations and maintenance. By mid-2007, the U.S. Air Force was scheduled to make a key decision: build the TSAT system on its current schedule and launch in 2013-2016, or postpone TSAT, take stopgap measures and add Advanced Extremely High Frequency (AEHF) satellites 4 & 5 to the three slated for launch from 2009-2012.

Lockheed Martin and Boeing have won a total of $514 million each in risk reduction contracts for the TSAT SS satellite system, in hopes of making that Plan B unnecessary. The bids are in, and both teams await a decision. TSAT’s $2 billion TMOS ground-based network operations contract is already underway.

The TSAT constellation of satellites, receivers, and infrastructure has seen a recent resurgence of news coverage, and its central role in next-generation US military infrastructure makes it worthy of in-depth treatment. Yet its survival is not assured by any means. Outside events and incremental competitors could spell its end just as they spelled the end of Motorola’s infamous Iridium service. This updated DID Special Report looks at the TSAT program, its challenges, and the potential future(s) of U.S. military communications – with new additions highlighted in green for your convenience. The latest item is another $150 million in TSAT-SS development contracts, despite an expected decision date of November 2007. The wording of the accompanying announcements also suggests that some reconsideration of TSAT program options in under way…

• Key Background – Why TSAT Is Thought to be Necessary (i.e. continue reading…)
• Key Background – The Big Picture: TSAT and the Transformational Communications Architecture
• Briefing – What Is TSAT?
• Briefing – TMOS: TSAT’s Ground Component
• Briefing – The AEHF Alternative, and Lessons Learned for TSAT
• Analysis – TSAT Program: Issues & Decisions
• Analysis – TSAT’s Competitors – and Its Fate
• News – TSAT: Timeline and Ongoing Developments [updated]
• Appendix A – Additional Readings & Sources
  
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Harris Corp., Palm Bay, FL has won a $15.1 million initial order under an indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity, firm-fixed price contract for “Multi-Band Shipboard Satellite Communications Systems; Force Level Variant.” Terminals delivered under this contract are most likely Harris’ AN/WSC-8V; they will allow the Program Executive Office-Command, Control, Communications, Computers, Intelligence and Space (PEO-C4I & Space) and Navy Communications Program Office (PMW-170) to provide commercial SATCOM connectivity capability to the Fleet. This contract includes 5 one-year ordering periods, and has a total estimated value of $85.4 million.

Work on the initial order will be performed in Palm Bay, FL, and is expected to be complete by January 2009. If delivery orders are placed throughout, work could continue until June 2013. This contract was competitively procured with using full and open competitive procedures via the Space and Naval Warfare Systems Center E-commerce website, with 5 offers received by the Space and Naval Warfare Systems Command in San Diego, CA activity (N00039-04-D-0004).

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On May 19/08, “GCC C3 Market Projected at $9b from 2008-2015” discussed the potential for Command, Control and Communications contracts in the [Arabian] Gulf Cooperation Council countries, which includes extensive border security and first responder related contracts.

As one recent example, EADS recently announced a EUR 12 million (about $25 million) contract from the Qatar Ministry of Interior to operate its secured nationwide TETRA radio network for several years. EADS has established a solid global position in this area, with a number of country-wide TETRA network implementatios under its belt. This contract covers the full range of services managed by the Network Operation Centre (NOC), which acts as the single point of operation and maintenance for the network. The NOC will include Element Management System, a Network Management System, a Trouble Ticketing System, a Configuration Management Database, and Service Management to allow reporting, monitoring and evaluation vis-a-vis the Service Level Agreements. A Web Portal will provide access to those applications and processes in a unified way via a standard web browser.

The effort falls under the EADS Secure Networks Evercor family of solutions, and is a follow-on to the 2006 contract awarded to EADS Secure Networks partner Atlas Telecom. Deployment and implementation of that TETRA network which is almost complete. As a next stage, EADS SN and its partners will set up a dedicated TETRA competence center and Center of Excellence, which will include a training centre as well as a test bed for applications and services. This will be the first TETRA center of excellence in the Middle East.

Nimrod MR2 at work
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In the face of the Soviet threat to the West’s vital sea lanes and thus its reinforcements in the event of war, long-range maritime patrol aircraft were a high priority for the western alliance. Like Lockheed’s P-3 Orion, Britain’s Nimrod aircraft are also based on a previous airliner design. Unlike the USA, Britain chose a jet-age Comet airframe. They ended up with an aircraft that boasted an unrefueled endurance of over 10 hours and longer range than the P-3, but less-favourable “low and slow” characteristics. The British claim, however, that “propeller-engined aircraft make a discrete resonance that can be detected by submerged submarines, whereas the jet noise of the Nimrod is virtually undetectable.” Both aircraft types would go on to see long and successful service, and both would also be produced in ELINT / SIGNIT versions: the EP-3, and the Nimrod MR1.

The USA dithered over the successor to its P-3 Orion fleet, before finally choosing the 737-based P-8A in June 2004. Meanwhile, a British program was begun in 1996 to rebuild their existing Nimrod Mk2 fleet to the MRA4 standard with new wings, engines, internal systems, and mission systems. Unfortunately, that program has faced a series of budget cuts, stalls, and conditions that have reduced the program from 21 aircraft to 12, and threatened complete cancellation at times. As of July 2006, however, the British are also moving forward.

This article will serve as DID’s focus for the UK’s Nimrod fleet upgrade programs, which may have spinoff effects into India’s ongoing maritime patrol aircraft competition. The most recent update is unrest in Britain’s Parliamentary Defence Committee, and a coroner’s report that the Nimrod which crashed in Afghanistan in 2006 had “never been airworthy.” He recommends grounding the fleet, but the UK MoD refuses…

• Hunters of Subs & Signals: Britain’s Nimrods
• MRA4 Program: The Next Nimrods
• Contracts and Events [updated]
• Project HELIX: Upgrading the Nimrod R1 ELINT Fleet
• Additional Readings & Sources
• Addendum: Correction Credit
  
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Air strike… priceless
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Back in August 2005, we noted that “ENCORE I.T. Contracts Raise Ceiling to $2.5B Until ENCORE II Arrives.” Services under ENCORE II will include high level enterprise IT policy, integration management, communications engineering, and asset management. According to the Encore II RFP, DISA intends to use the contract to support users in the military services and agencies as they transition from legacy systems to Net-Centric Enterprise Services (NCES), which embodies the new techno-organizational opportunities described above. Encore II will help them effectively use core NCES product lines, including collaboration and discovery tools, and a planned joint services knowledge portal. That’s the vision, anyway. In January 2006, we followed that up with “Pentagon’s $13 Bn “Encore II” RFP Gets Revised, Extended,” explaining the ENCORE vision, its origins, and its likely obstacles.

That wait ended on Jan 31/07, when 6 companies received indefinite delivery/indefinite quantity multiple-awards contracts. They include provisions for Firm, Fixed-Price, Time-and-Materials or Labor-Hour and Cost-Reimbursement (CPFF, CPAF, etc), and will run from March 12/07 through March 11/17. The maximum not-to-exceed value for the ENCORE II contract over a 5-year period, plus its 5 one-year option periods, is $12.225 billion. This is slightly less than the $13 billion projected. Performance will be at various locations within the Continental United States (CONUS), and also outside the CONUS (OCONUS), and each task order issued will be opened to competition among the ENCORE-II winners.

The solicitation was issued as a full and open competitive action with 16 large firm proposals received – but the Defense Information Technology Contracting Organization DITCO) at Scott AFB, IL picked just 6 large firm winners with small business awards to follow. Whereupon, the protests began. Now, the small business roster has been added, and the large business roster has been expanded…

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FRES-U finalists: There
can be only one…
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Many of Britain’s army vehicles are old and worn, and the necessities of hard service on the battlefield are only accelerating that wear. The multi-billion pound “Future Rapid Effects System” (FRES) aims to recapitalize the core of Britain’s armored vehicle fleet over the next decade or more, filling many of the same medium armor roles as the Stryker Family of armored wheeled vehicles and/or the Future Combat Systems’ Manned Ground Vehicle family. Current estimates indicate a potential requirement for over 3,700 FRES vehicles, including utility and reconnaissance variants. Even so, one should be cautioned that actual numbers bought usually fall short of intended figures for early-stage defense programs.

The FRES program was spawned by the UK’s withdrawal from the German-Dutch-UK Boxer MRAV modular wheeled APC program, in order to develop a more deployable vehicle that fit Britain’s exact requirements. Those initial requirements were challenging, however, and experience in Iraq and Afghanistan led to decisions that removed a number of FRES requirements including weight. The UK MoD has taken some criticism for its selection of wheeled APCs as its FRES-U infantry fighting vehicle finalists, and even more criticism for making the Boxer MRAV one of those finalists after spending all that time and sterling on FRES development. The MoD is defending its choices, however, and has now declared a winner…

• FRES: The Program (Continue reading…) [updated]
• FRES: Contracts & Key Events [updated]
• Additional Readings
• Appendix 1 – The British Army’s Armored Vehicle Fleet, late 2006
• Appendix 2 – A New Procurement Approach: System House Challenges
• Appendix 3 – FRES: Key Challenges for the Contractors
• Appendix 4 – FRES Experiments: Electronic Architecture Contracts
• Appendix 5 – FRES Experiments: Vehicle-Related Contracts
  
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GBS Concept & Elements
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Pentagon contracts occasionally refer to the Global Broadcast Services (GBS). A variant of was first fielded in Bosnia during 1996, and special nodes were also set up in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. It sounds almost like a form of global satellite TV – which is close, but not quite right. GBS is not intended to replace existing MILSATCOM (MILitary SATellite COMmunications) systems in any way. Instead, GBS uses a form of “push and store” to distribute high-bandwidth information for local relay, thereby saving critical two-way military satellite communications systems from having to handle every field request.

The other thing that makes GBS so attractive is the ability to provide high-volume data directly into 18-inch antennas, allowing streaming to and storage in devices that can move with units in the field. The GBS “pushes” a high volume of packaged data to these widely dispersed, low-cost receive terminals like Eyaktek’s Satellite Receive Suite, whose function resembles the set-top smart cable TV storage box or TiVO used in your home.

This is DID’s FOCUS Article for the GBS system. The latest news is Raytheon’s efforts to maintain the contract as its underpinnings change, and continued delivery of GBS-related systems…

• The GBS System: More Details
• Contracts & Key Events [updated]
• Additional Readings & Sources
  
  Continue Reading… »

Schedule, July 2007
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In late December 2006, the German Federal Armed Forces commissioned a consortium consisting of Siemens Business Services (SBS) and IBM to modernize and manage its non-military information and communications technology under the HERKULES project. A company called BWI Informationstechnik GmbH (BWI IT) has been formed in Meckenheim near Bonn, Germany to supply the relevant IT services. Siemens and IBM hold 50.1% of the shares in a 25.05%/ 25.05% split, while the German Federal Government holds 49.9%. The Bundeswehr is represented on the board of directors, and the consortium is open to audit by the military, the German Defense Ministry and the General Accountants Office.

The 10-year contract is worth approximately EUR 7.1 billion (currently about $9.3 billion), including value added tax. This is touted as the largest current public-private partnership (PPP) in Europe, and up to 2,950 German Federal Armed Forces IT employees will be working within the project. After 10 years, BWI will revert to 100 percent Bundeswehr control. The project is underway, but concerns are being raised…

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The US military’s JTRS program began in the late 1990s as an attempt to unify its underlying communications infrastructure. The idea was to create a family of radios for troops, vehicles, ships, et. al. that all shared a similar underlying architecture, could use Internet Protocol for data, and was a “software-defined” platform that relied on software rather than hardware to handle communication protocols. This would eliminate the Iraqi war phenomenon of multiple radios in each vehicle, in order to let the troops inside talk to various services et. al. It would also make the equipment far more “future proof,” by allowing in-place upgrades to extend compatibility with American and foreign systems, add new communications waveforms, et. al.

The program was visionary – and very ambitious. Ongoing requirements creep was thrown into the mix, and the result was major delays and cost overruns that eventually led to the complete restructuring of the program. Contracts. The part of the program that aimed to create radios for aircraft and ships has seen development contracts issued to Team Boeing (Boeing, BBN Technologies, Harris, L-3 Communications, Milcom Systems Corporation, Northrop Grumman, Rockwell Collins) and to Team Lockheed (Lockheed Martin, BAE Systems, General Dynamics, Northrop Grumman, Raytheon) back in 2004, with an extension in 2006 that brought the totals to about $75 million each.

We now have a winner, subject to the usual caveats concerning possible contract award protests…

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