Logs Onto Military SATCOM System Using Low Bandwidth
Raytheon told ANN Wednesday its Navy
Multiband Terminal (NMT) is the first advanced, next-generation
satellite communications (SATCOM) system to successfully log on to
and communicate with the US government's Milstar SATCOM system
using low and medium data rate waveforms.
So, what does that mean? It's a big deal... as the system will
provide naval commanders and sailors with greater data capacity, as
well as improved protection against enemy intercept and
jamming.
Raytheon has also demonstrated that its NMT is fully compatible
with existing submarine and shore antennas, an important life-cycle
cost-savings objective of the NMT program.
This achievement follows Raytheon's earlier success in
developing the first Software Communications Architecture
(SCA)-compliant SATCOM system to validate the advanced extended
data rate communications waveform. This waveform provides highly
protected and high-speed communications with the Department of
Defense's (DoD) new Advanced Extremely High Frequency satellite
constellation planned for operation in 2010. Raytheon's
non-proprietary, SCA implementation of these waveforms meets the
DoD's vision to make them available for future developments,
significantly reducing costs.
"Raytheon's design engineers logged more than 13,000 hours
onboard ships and submarines collecting data to understand what
matters most to the Navy," said Jerry Powlen, vice president of
Network Centric Systems' Integrated Communications Systems. "These
achievements demonstrate Raytheon's ability to continue to provide
the Navy with the most reliable, affordable and user friendly
advanced SATCOM capability."
With more than 500 Navy SATCOM systems currently fielded,
Raytheon's NMT solution builds on the company's extensive
experience and innovative solutions in naval communications. NMT,
which replaces several existing SATCOM systems developed and
maintained by Raytheon during the last 20 years, is expected to be
installed in more than 300 ships, submarines and shore
stations.
The Navy's communications program office, which reports to the
Navy's program executive office for command, control,
communications, computers and intelligence, is responsible for
developing and delivering NMT capabilities to the fleet.
"Our NMT SATCOM design features over 95 percent commonality of
parts," said Powlen. "For our customer, that means it can share a
significant percentage of parts between ships, subs and shore
stations, without additional investment and logistics cost. In
fact, our total life-cycle design even reduces the number of
personnel needed to operate and maintain the system, while
minimizing the training needed to support it. We consider these
critical features for the future."
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