By Geoff Fein
While much of the discussion about open architecture (OA) focuses on freeing up hardware and software, at the Office of Naval Research (ONR), they are in the midst of an effort to develop a system that can simultaneously run various radio frequency (RF) bands through a single aperture, according to a service official.
“Our interest is in operational systems being open,” Bobby Junker, head, command, control, computers, communications, intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance, told Defense Daily recently.
“I started working this issue when we did the Advanced Multifunction RF Concept (AMRFC),” he added.
What ONR is doing in AMRFC is focusing on how to make an aperture that can simultaneously do radar, communications, navigation, and electronic warfare (EW) using simultaneous, independent beams out of the same aperture, Junker said.
“We’ve done it. Now we have something called the Integrated Naval Prototype Integrated Topside, which is now working with [the Program Executive Office] IWS and PEO C4I, etc., to build Topside prototypes, and it’s being done open,” he said.
Junker said when he first raised the idea of AMRFC back in the late 1990s, the traditional prime contractors resoundingly told him this idea wasn’t within their business plans.
“What I told them was the Navy can’t afford their business plan,” he said.
But there are advantages to industry in considering this approach, Junker noted.
“They’d never lose a contract. If it’s open, you may not win the initial layout but when it comes to maintenance, when it comes to upgrades, you are still a player,” he said. “So, there are advantages to industry participation.”
Eventually, industry came around, Junker added. “The part that was difficult then was to lay out a strategy whereby we would do this.”
The initial prototype effort began in the 1999-2000 time frame and was completed in 2004, he said.
While the prototype wasn’t an OA system, Junker noted it was at a relatively high level. “You had a receive aperture that was one subsystem, you had a transmit aperture that was another subsystem. It had well defined interfaces with all of the processing guts…control.”
“What I wanted was the ability to go a step lower on the apertures,” Junker said. “I wanted to go to at least sub apertures if not modules.”
Three years ago, ONR brought in the National Defense Industrial Association and together the two organizations formed a working group made up of representatives from industry and the Navy, he said.
Within the working group emerged four to five sub groups, Junker said. One was an oversight group, co-chaired by Raytheon [RTN] and the Naval Research Lab (NRL) .
The oversight group was a critical component, he added. “What they did was come up with a construct for basically breaking down the system.”
“When we break down the system, it’s more than just an aperture,” Junker said. “It’s spectrum too.”
He added that the Navy likes to operate from high frequency (HF) through at least 40 to 45 GHz. “And I can do that in one aperture.”
“So part of this is actively defining how we go across this chunk of spectrum,” Junker said. “What came out was this overall construct for the architecture. And then what we did was, we put out an IDIQ contract. The first real task on that was the architectural design for these multifunction apertures.”
ONR developed an agreement with industry that said different companies would come in and bid on this contract and ONR would support the ones the organization thought were really strong. Junker said there are about six industries that have contracts for task number one.
“Overall there are 18 different companies under the IDIQ, but some of them are suppler type companies,” he said. “It’s a complex but flexible environment that we can work with.”
The agreement also noted that industry could come in with their proposed designs and then the Navy can evaluate them and pick and choose the parts and subsystems that the service thinks are the best, Junker said. “And the companies have agreed that anything that we choose, any subsystem that we choose, then becomes an open standard.”
For those efforts that are not selected, the company can keep its platform, he added. “But what is selected is then open. So the advantage is to the company. If they are selected, they have a huge jump ahead, but over time other companies can come up to speed.”
ONR is in the midst of implementing the strategy, Junker said.
There are going to be multiple prototypes, he added. “Right now we have the task order out for this initial design of the first one which is going to be an integrated EW, communications, and probably intel aperture from somewhere in the 3 to 5 GHz to probably somewhere in 20 to 22 GHz,” Junker said. “So it is a very wide band aperture.”
ONR and NRL have a working prototype, the AMRFC test-bed, at NRL’s Chesapeake Bay Detachment Test facility, he added. “It operates from around 5 to 18 to 20 GHz. But this was built on technology from 2000 and before…[it’s a] huge monster thing.”
ONR now has an electronics program that operates on an annual budget of approximately $20 million. Junker said when it gets right down to it, with any RF system, what can be done depends on the electronic technology.
“If you don’t have the capability in electronic components, you are not going to do it,” he said. “We recognized early on we had to have a healthy electronics development program along with any prototyping we do.”
While Junker acknowledges that early on it may be the initial contract awards that get in and get a jump on work, it certainly will be open in the future for others to participate.
In fact, Junker said ONR has already demonstrated that. “There is a program we had that supported in DDG-1000 called the Multi Function EW.”
“It was multi-function, but it was just confined to EW,” he said. “It was a subset of the EW program. The prototype was done by Northrop Grumman. We funded DRS to build one of the subsystems just to [demonstrate] this. Those are things that we have done moving along that path.”