Royal Navy sailors and officers will benefit from immersive virtual training under a £25 million contract with defence company QinetiQ, according to Navy News here.
The five-year agreement will deliver realistic simulation of missions and potential threats, allowing personnel to train for warfighting scenarios in a safe but demanding environment. The Maritime Command and Staff Trainer (MCAST) can emulate a task force’s deployment and model the activities of opposing forces, giving commanders the opportunity to practise managing complex operations.
Commodore Andy Ingham, Commander Fleet Operational Standards and Training, Royal Navy, said: “QinetiQ and the Royal Navy have worked closely together over many years on a multitude of projects helping FOST deliver World Class Training. MCAST is the exciting next step on our training innovation journey, a dedicated synthetic training facility, designed to prepare us to face both known and developing threats.”
Will Blamey, Chief Executive, UK Defence, QinetiQ, said: “Our innovative, digital-led approach to training supports the requirements of the Strategic Defence Review to increase warfighting readiness. MCAST will ensure that Royal Navy personnel are put through their paces in an environment which reflects the complex, multi-domain and multi-national battlespace of future warfare.”
Inzpire, part of the QinetiQ Group, will design the training scenarios using the latest simulation technology to create and deliver fully immersive and realistic exercises. QinetiQ will provide and manage tools to capture data from the planning, execution and evaluation phases, enabling continuous improvement of training content.
This contract builds on QinetiQ’s existing synthetic operational training work for the Royal Navy under the Platform Enabled Training Capability (PETC). MCAST, alongside PETC, will be managed from a dedicated hub at QinetiQ’s Portsdown Technology Park in Portsmouth.
