GRAHAM WARWICK/WASHINGTON DC
Boeing and Lockheed Martin are revising their designs for airborne, maritime and fixed-site (AMF) terminals following restructuring of the troubled Joint Tactical Radio System (JTRS) programme to reduce cost and risk. Approved by the US Department of Defense in late March, the revamp scales JTRS back to an incremental acquisition strategy.
Increment 1 is focused on “transformational network capabilities and high-priority waveforms”, says the joint programme executive office. These include the Wideband Networking Waveform, a wireless mobile internet-based network that is the backbone of JTRS, and the Joint Airborne Network – Tactical Edge, which will connect manned and unmanned aircraft.
The five former service-led JTRS clusters have been reorganised into four centrally managed domains: ground; airborne and maritime; network enterprise; and special radios. JTRS radios for helicopters have been moved from the army-led Cluster 1 to the airborne and maritime domain, says Leo Conboy, Boeing AMF JTRS programme manager.
Boeing- and Lockheed-led teams completed AMF preliminary design reviews (PDR) late last year, and are now revising their designs to reflect the new requirements. “We will go back and do a delta PDR,” says Conboy. A request for proposals for AMF is expected in July, leading to award of a system development and demonstration contract by year-end.
AMF is one half of the new airborne and maritime domain. The other is the Multifunctional Information Distribution System (MIDS).
The competing suppliers of this widely used Link 16 data radio – BAE Systems/Rockwell Collins joint-venture Data Link Solutions and Viasat – are under contract to develop a JTRS version of the MIDS low-volume terminal.
Source: Flight International
