BAE Systems say it will develop software for military operators that will enable semi-autonomous multi-domain mission planning.
BAE Systems has been awarded a contract by the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) to develop software that will enable semi-autonomous multi-domain mission planning.
The firm say that the technology will be designed for military operators to leverage battlespace resources from across various domains, such as space, air, land, and sea, for more effective, efficient missions.
“Military operators currently use manual processes to assess availability and coordinate use of sensors, communications, weapons, and other assets across domains. DARPA’s Adapting Cross-Domain Kill-Webs (ACK) program will seek to help operators adapt to dynamic situations with software technology that automatically identifies the best options. In response, BAE Systems’ FAST Labs™ research and development organization, along with teammate Carnegie Mellon University, will create software called Multi-domain Adaptive Request Service (MARS).
MARS aims to help operators make informed decisions by automatically identifying available capabilities across domains, and then rapidly assessing the costs and benefits to use those capabilities when adjusting mission tasks. The software also includes a visual interface that will allow the exploration of available asset options, helping operators arrive at the best course of action to deliver the desired effect on targets.”
“Multi-domain mission planning is complex because it involves a tremendous amount of distributed variables such as domains, systems, resources, and manned and unmanned platforms,” said Chris Eisenbies, product line director of the Autonomy, Controls, and Estimation group at BAE Systems.
“Our hope is that MARS will provide warfighters with the ability to automatically leverage the resources they need and quickly determine the most effective way to accomplish their mission no matter what type of battlespace they are operating in.”
I’m confused – has this anything to do with the software company called “Autonomy” which I think was gobbled up by HP?
I think autonomy was simply being used in the generic sense of the term not in any way in relation to the company Autonomy and additionally as part of the name of the particular division of Bae using that term as part of its title to describe what it does. Unless someone knows better.
I suspect you might be right. I would have steered clear of that term to avoid confusion still …
Been checking through the history of this area of the business and as BAE claims that its work in this area harks back to 2002 in the US (and indeed to the last century generally) then one presumes it would originate in their aquisition of the Lockheed Martin subsidiaries back in 2000 (though Marconi North America was incorporated into the division too even before that). However it has acquired many tech companies in this area since that time (especially in the early years of this century) that have clearly come together and contributed their various technologies to this whole business… Read more »