PORTFOLIO

Today's maritime forces face a complex range of demands in their role of protecting the homeland and the associated Exclusive Economic Zone. In many areas of the world these challenges may include weapons trafficking, mass illegal migration, smuggling and piracy, as well as the need to protect coastal and offshore installations from external threats and terrorist action.

The maritime commander is unlikely to have sufficient resources to provide complete and continuous surveillance and interdiction, so he must have robust command support facilities so that he can deploy and command his ships to best overall effect.

This command support capability must include geographic situation awareness, a means to share relevant intelligence information and the ability to pass significant sightings and suspicious activity between ships and to the shore headquarters. These core services can enable the maritime commander to build a comprehensive understanding of activities in his area of responsibility and then deploy his forces most effectively. Most systems that provide this type of capability have been developed to exploit military satellite communications.

EDS Defence has now developed a lightweight, affordable command support capability that can range from a single ruggedised laptop computer to a small network of workstations. This system includes comprehensive picture management and display tools, coupled with appropriate decision and planning aids.

For many nations, the high cost of military satellite communications cannot be justified, especially for the smaller ships. Recognising this challenge, QinetiQ has developed a wireless Tactical Wide Area Network (TACWAN) that can provide a communications network using existing radios (UHF, HF, commercial and military satellite). TACWAN has been developed in such a way that new bearers such as WiMax and 3G can also be added when required. The key element of TACWAN is the Dynamic Router which automatically establishes and maintains the information flow using all available communications bearers.

The combination of the EDS command support system and the QinetiQ TACWAN has been optimised to deliver the critical command support capability to the modern maritime commander. This capability has been demonstrated at sea during multinational exercises with outstanding success. The system is available for fitting in new build platforms or as a walk-aboard capability for existing platforms.