Next-Gen Ground Control: Raytheon vs. AAI

There is a turf war brewing over ground control for unmanned systems. Raytheon and AAI have each released press in the last week with regard to their next-generation offerings, here's a bit of background:

AAI's One System GCS is the standard for Army and Marine Corps systems (Shadow/Raven), and it's OSRVT (remote video terminal) has been fielded in conjunction, to allow forward deployed soldiers access to UAS collected imagery. AAI is likely the most-used GCS by units fielded...

Raytheon may be the revenue leader in GCS, given it's role on the Global Hawk program (bigger systems = bigger paycheck).

Raytheon's press this week focused on an unsolicited offering to replace the Predator GCS (which has proven man-power intensive and not user-friendly... read: crashes and operator fatigue). If RTN could provide Predator/Reaper ground stations it would consolidate their position as the USAF vendor of choice for GCS. There is a caveat, is they need 12 months, and funding, to produce the system... but if the cost savings below hold true, they have a shot...

" Raytheon predicts that during the next 10 years, it can save the Air Force more than $500 million. The five cost savings benefits are: Reduce manpower requirements by 20 percent, Reduce ground control segment requirements by 20 percent, Reduce training time and costs by 30 percent, Reduce aircraft losses by 50 percent".

Speaking with a General Atomics executive at AUVSI, I learned it has also been developing a next-generation GCS for the Predator/Reaper force structure. I haven't seen any press yet...

AAI's press focuses more on the Army and Navy. It appears they have been funded, and working with program offices within both services to develop a new system. Not only will the system control existing UAS, but also UGV (ground vehicles) and USV (surface vessels), too.

Now, I'm not sure why RTN neglected to release press on their own Navy activities... they had been funded to design TCS (tactical control system), toward similar goals as the new AAI system. Is this program dead.

In other news the USAF and USN will collaborate on BAMS / Global Hawk logistics. That means the USN would probably train their BAMS operators through existing USAF channels... making cross-Navy GCS commonality less important for BAMS than for Tier II.

Also, the Navy has already been operating AAI's Shadow, and contributing to AAI's next-gen GCS development. Operators must already be somewhat familiar with the system.

Those are not great signs for Raytheon. Perhaps why they haven't released anything recently about Navy potential...

Boeing's military aircraft slip

Boeing issued a subtle reminder to the Pentagon recently... essentially, "if you don't choose our birds now, we won't be able to stay competitive for the long-term."

So I have to ask why? Why hasn't Boeing been winning these competitions?

To tie into the last posting, on potential JSF shortcomings. Has the bar been set too high for anyone to achieve without some program "turbulence"? Could Boeing have avoided these JSF issues?

What are the differentiators between a LM proposal and a Boeing proposal on manned fighter aircraft? Why has LM been stealing the show?

With regard to the unmanned programs recently lost by Boeing, I think it's poor positioning of their solution. For BAMS they elected (with Raytheon) to reconfigure a manned Gulfstream for unmanned ops, that's poor judgement. The government was looking for unmanned-specific platforms, not a engineering project with square pegs and round holes (a perception, justified or not, of this type of reconfig).

Whether anyone beside Northrop Grumman could have won BAMS is a legitimate debate. The requirements were pretty much tailored to the Global Hawk: the GH Maritime Demonstrator was a funded Navy proof-of-concept leading to BAMS, and the GH is a proven platform (the worlds most advanced). Pretty stiff competition.

Tough luck on UCAS too... Boeing and Northrop competed head-to-head, each with development funding. The USAF has put its UCAV plans on hold (perhaps a next-gen Reaper by 2011-15), leaving the Navy as the first mover. You don't need a doctorate in naval strategy to know Northrop Grumman had the edge... as one of the two major shipbuilders, they are much better equipped to troubleshoot shipboard operations (a very harsh environment for electronics, not the weather, the EM interferences).

CSAR-X would be a good win for Boeing, but theprogram has been put on hold, after initially being won by... Boeing. I am interested to see how this plays out. Boeing has advanced unmanned capabilities that could supplement or replace manned CSAR at some point in the future, will those play a role in a new CSAR-X competition?

What does Boeing need to do to win a competition?? Pricing, technology?

F-35 a failure for US contractors?

Ouch. Aussies send a poor review of Joint Strike Fighter.

http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/151m-planes-a-disaster/2008/09/13/1220857899066.html

This one could be bad news for the F-35 team. Can you think of a program that is more important to our international reputation right now? Allies are expecting to be tied to eachother through this common, high-value asset.

Australia, Canada, Denmark, Italy, Netherlands, Norway, Singapore and Turkey, Israel... these are all countries that have been linked to an expected 3000 unit production run... but are they all married to the program? Probably not, if Russia's latest Sukhoi is really beating the pants off JSF in computer simulations!

I am curious though. How did team F-35 manage to fly a bird that is "too fast for it's tactical targeting," but also "overweight and underpowered", "lacking manueverability", and "too delicate to withstand ground fire". Wow.

Here's a thought. The targeting systems meant for US versions aren't exportable , and the one's spec'd for the Aussie's haven't gotten the right amount of testing/evaluation, yes?

More concerning than the targeting (that should get dialied in), is the weight problem. If team F-35 has managed to build it both heavy and thin skinned... that's a fundamental design issue, no?

Is this just a new tactic to negotiate on price? Odd way to conduct a healthy long-term relationship with your friendly neighborhood Lock-Mart.

What to do? Probably hustle if you're on team F-35, this looks bad for everyone involved.

Other perceptions: This program is still in the testing phase, a few issues or kinks are normal.