USAF Awards LockMart Team Contract To Extend TSAT Risk Reduction/System Definition Phase
The U.S. Air Force has awarded the Lockheed Martin/Northrop Grumman Transformational Satellite Communications System (TSAT) Space Segment Team a $75-million, six-month extension to its Risk Reduction and System Definition (RR and SD) contract.
Over the next several weeks, the team will focus on delivering an Interim Design Review (IDR) in early April 2009 for the initial TSAT satellite constellation, known as Block 10. Under the restructured program, the initial increment of TSAT will consist of five Block 10 satellites and associated ground control systems with a first launch capability by 2019.
The IDR will verify the maturity of the updated space segment specification, demonstrate that the team’s design meets performance requirements and analyze other system acquisition and operations activities including life-cycle costs, plans to enter the production phase, and approaches to eliminating risks throughout the program’s life.
The review will detail plans for testing of various products, verification of system performance, and compliance with government requirements including overall security of the system.
In addition, the team will continue to mature the technologies demonstrated during earlier RR andSD milestones to verify their readiness for full-scale development, manufacturing, integration, and operations.
“Our team has met every risk reduction and system definition milestone on this contract, making TSAT ready to enter full-scale development,” said Mark Pasquale, Lockheed Martin vice president and program manager for TSAT.
“We look forward to executing a successful review with our customer and demonstrating our strengths for achieving operational excellence and mission success on this critical program.”
Some of the key technologies for TSAT are digital processing to include radiation-hardened Application Specific Integrated Circuits, Radio Frequency antennas and electronics, Hall Current Thrusters, Lithium-Ion Batteries, and deployable radiators.
Following the IDR, the Lockheed Martin/Northrop Grumman TSAT space segment team, which includes Juniper Networks, Inc., Sunnyvale, Calif., ViaSat, Carlsbad, Calif., and Lockheed Martin Information Systems and Global Services, Gaithersburg, Md., will continue technology risk reduction and systems engineering in support of preliminary design activities. The RR andSD effort will culminate with a multi-billion dollar development contract scheduled to be awarded to a single contractor in 2010.
The restructured program defers some TSAT content such as high-speed lasercom inter-satellite links to future TSAT satellite blocks while preserving critical features such as protection against man-made and natural threats, defenses against cyber attack, backward compatibility with the Advanced Extremely High Frequency (AEHF) satellite constellation and terminals, native Internet Protocol packet routing, and communications-on-the-move.
TSAT provides significantly more capacity and connections than the Milstar and AEHF systems, improving availability of protected satellite communications for future military operations.
It will provide connectivity across the spectrum of mission areas, to include land, air and naval warfare; special operations; strategic nuclear operations; strategic defense; homeland security; theatre operations; and space operations and intelligence.
The Military Satellite Communications Systems Wing, located at the Space and Missile Systems Center, Los Angeles Air Force Base, Calif., is the TSAT contract manager and lead agency for ensuring the capabilities of this system are made available to the warfighter.
more > spacewar.com
Thursday, March 26, 2009
DataPath(R) Receives $12 Million Order for Additional Ka Band Conversion Kits for U.S. Army JNN/WIN-T Terminals
DataPath(R) Receives $12 Million Order for Additional Ka Band Conversion Kits for U.S. Army JNN/WIN-T Terminals
Archive for the 'Military' Category
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Mar 26, 2009, post by peterc
Air Force launches new GPS satellite
US Air Force announced launch of enhanced second-generation global positioning satellites (GPS) on March 24 from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Florida.
This satellite is the penultimate of an eight-block program to replenish GPS satellites for the military as well as for civilian use. Since it launched the first GPS satellite in 1978, the Air Force has periodically upgraded the constellation with new capabilities.
The features built into this latest program block include two new military signals for improving accuracy, increased signal power to receivers on the ground, enhanced encryption, anti-jamming capabilities and a second civil signal to provide dual frequency capability with better resistance to interference. In addition, this orbiter carried a research and development demonstration payload for transmitting a third civil signal known as L5.
More informations at: www.defensesystems.com
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Mar 26, 2009, post by slesik
DataPath(R) Receives $12 Million Order for Additional Ka Band Conversion Kits for U.S. Army JNN/WIN-T Terminals
DataPath, Inc., a leading provider of satellite and wireless communications networks around the world, has been awarded $12 million by the U.S. Army for Ka band conversion kits, spares kits and technical services that enable DataPath(R: 27.3, 0.82, 3.1%) Satellite Transportable Terminals (STTs) and other systems on the battlefield to operate using the Wideband Global SATCOM (WGS: undefined, undefined, undefined%) system. With Ka band conversion kits, vital battlefield satellite communications (SATCOM: undefined, undefined, undefined%) terminals can be quickly converted in the field to operate in Ka band over the recently launched WGS system in addition to operating in commercial Ku band.
This $12 million order is funded from exercised options on an existing delivery order, which is a four-year agreement with the Army that has a potential value of up to $225 million for DataPath. These options are the first exercised options that add to the base award of $100 million that DataPath announced for the same project in January 2009. DataPath began delivering the Ka band conversion kits, spares kits and other equipment and services in January.
“Quickly delivering Ka band conversion kits is a central focus for DataPath,” said Steve Lindeman, vice president of Business Operations at DataPath. “By reconfiguring satellite terminals in the field today to operate in Ka band, we have taken an important step to ensure that communications systems accommodate the need for bandwidth and flexibility to support U.S. military operations around the world.”
The SATCOM terminals being converted were designed and built by DataPath and deployed by the U.S. Army for the Joint Network Node (JNN: undefined, undefined, undefined%)/Warfighter Information Network-Tactical (WIN-T) program. DataPath’s Ka band solution for JNN/WIN-T has been certified by the U.S. Army Strategic Command for use on the WGS system.
Program Manager WIN-T’s Commercial SATCOM Terminal Program at the U.S. Army Communications-Electronics Command in Fort Monmouth, N.J., awarded the delivery order through the Worldwide Satellite Systems contract.
more > foxbusiness.com
Archive for the 'Military' Category
« Previous Entries
Mar 26, 2009, post by peterc
Air Force launches new GPS satellite
US Air Force announced launch of enhanced second-generation global positioning satellites (GPS) on March 24 from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Florida.
This satellite is the penultimate of an eight-block program to replenish GPS satellites for the military as well as for civilian use. Since it launched the first GPS satellite in 1978, the Air Force has periodically upgraded the constellation with new capabilities.
The features built into this latest program block include two new military signals for improving accuracy, increased signal power to receivers on the ground, enhanced encryption, anti-jamming capabilities and a second civil signal to provide dual frequency capability with better resistance to interference. In addition, this orbiter carried a research and development demonstration payload for transmitting a third civil signal known as L5.
More informations at: www.defensesystems.com
Read comments (0)
Mar 26, 2009, post by slesik
DataPath(R) Receives $12 Million Order for Additional Ka Band Conversion Kits for U.S. Army JNN/WIN-T Terminals
DataPath, Inc., a leading provider of satellite and wireless communications networks around the world, has been awarded $12 million by the U.S. Army for Ka band conversion kits, spares kits and technical services that enable DataPath(R: 27.3, 0.82, 3.1%) Satellite Transportable Terminals (STTs) and other systems on the battlefield to operate using the Wideband Global SATCOM (WGS: undefined, undefined, undefined%) system. With Ka band conversion kits, vital battlefield satellite communications (SATCOM: undefined, undefined, undefined%) terminals can be quickly converted in the field to operate in Ka band over the recently launched WGS system in addition to operating in commercial Ku band.
This $12 million order is funded from exercised options on an existing delivery order, which is a four-year agreement with the Army that has a potential value of up to $225 million for DataPath. These options are the first exercised options that add to the base award of $100 million that DataPath announced for the same project in January 2009. DataPath began delivering the Ka band conversion kits, spares kits and other equipment and services in January.
“Quickly delivering Ka band conversion kits is a central focus for DataPath,” said Steve Lindeman, vice president of Business Operations at DataPath. “By reconfiguring satellite terminals in the field today to operate in Ka band, we have taken an important step to ensure that communications systems accommodate the need for bandwidth and flexibility to support U.S. military operations around the world.”
The SATCOM terminals being converted were designed and built by DataPath and deployed by the U.S. Army for the Joint Network Node (JNN: undefined, undefined, undefined%)/Warfighter Information Network-Tactical (WIN-T) program. DataPath’s Ka band solution for JNN/WIN-T has been certified by the U.S. Army Strategic Command for use on the WGS system.
Program Manager WIN-T’s Commercial SATCOM Terminal Program at the U.S. Army Communications-Electronics Command in Fort Monmouth, N.J., awarded the delivery order through the Worldwide Satellite Systems contract.
more > foxbusiness.com
Air Force launches new GPS satellite
Air Force launches new GPS satellite
Archive for the 'Military' Category
« Previous Entries
Mar 26, 2009, post by peterc
Air Force launches new GPS satellite
US Air Force announced launch of enhanced second-generation global positioning satellites (GPS) on March 24 from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Florida.
This satellite is the penultimate of an eight-block program to replenish GPS satellites for the military as well as for civilian use. Since it launched the first GPS satellite in 1978, the Air Force has periodically upgraded the constellation with new capabilities.
The features built into this latest program block include two new military signals for improving accuracy, increased signal power to receivers on the ground, enhanced encryption, anti-jamming capabilities and a second civil signal to provide dual frequency capability with better resistance to interference. In addition, this orbiter carried a research and development demonstration payload for transmitting a third civil signal known as L5.
More informations at: www.defensesystems.com
Archive for the 'Military' Category
« Previous Entries
Mar 26, 2009, post by peterc
Air Force launches new GPS satellite
US Air Force announced launch of enhanced second-generation global positioning satellites (GPS) on March 24 from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Florida.
This satellite is the penultimate of an eight-block program to replenish GPS satellites for the military as well as for civilian use. Since it launched the first GPS satellite in 1978, the Air Force has periodically upgraded the constellation with new capabilities.
The features built into this latest program block include two new military signals for improving accuracy, increased signal power to receivers on the ground, enhanced encryption, anti-jamming capabilities and a second civil signal to provide dual frequency capability with better resistance to interference. In addition, this orbiter carried a research and development demonstration payload for transmitting a third civil signal known as L5.
More informations at: www.defensesystems.com
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