TESTING THE WATERS


Unlike a stand-alone app, ODIN does not just ride on a computer and interface with an operator—it needs to share and display information across the network so that users can view and join available radio nets. As PM TR personnel worked to create ODIN, they not only applied the MACE standards, but also interacted regularly with PM Mission Command within PEO C3T to determine what information the app would need to pull from and push across the Blue Force Tracking network; how it would function in bandwidth-disadvantaged environ- ments; and how it would connect with other aspects of the JBC-P system.


Tis team effort extended into risk reduc- tion in the


integrated laboratories at


Aberdeen Proving Ground, MD, followed by an operational assessment with ATEC and Soldiers at the NIE 15.1, which began in October 2014 at Fort Bliss, TX, and White Sands Missile Range, NM. In all, ODIN took less than a year from idea to test. As the Army moves forward to formally evaluate the host MACE frame- work itself over the next year, we are documenting lessons learned from the ODIN experience to help shape future agile app development and evaluation for the MACE infrastructure.


RADIO MARKETPLACE Another area of technology that demands a new testing approach is the emergence of software-defined tactical radios, which use high-bandwidth waveforms to trans- mit and receive voice, data, video and other information across great distances and beyond line of sight. Approved by the Office of the Secretary of Defense, the Army’s acquisition strategy for the Hand- held, Manpack, Small Form Fit Rifleman and Manpack radios does not follow the traditional structure of development, test, achieving full-rate production and then buying large quantities of a system


20 Army AL&T Magazine


RADIO CHECK


SPC Sergio Hernandez, a cavalry scout with the 1st Cavalry Regiment, conducts a radio check on a Manpack radio system evaluated during NIE 14.2. The Army has developed an iterative process of qualification and operational testing to support the competitive “radio marketplace” approach to procuring additional Manpack and Rifleman radios. (Photo by SSG Richard Andrade, 16th Mobile Public Affairs Detachment)


from a single vendor. Instead, the strategy calls for a “radio marketplace” in which multiple qualified vendors will compete for smaller-quantity delivery orders on a regular basis, driving innovation through competition.


Te purchase of nondevelopmental-item commercial radios for military opera- tions is possible because the radios will use secure, standard waveforms that are owned by the government, certified by the Joint Tactical Networking Center and made available to run on multiple hardware models that industry produces. But while comparisons to smartphones


January–March 2015


exist in the commercial communications market—with most consumers upgrad- ing their cellphones every few years as both phone and networking technology evolve—the radio marketplace concept is new territory for the Army.


To support the strategy, the Army has developed an iterative process of quali- fication testing and operational testing that will allow for maximum vendor par- ticipation and flexibility for technology to evolve in areas such as weight, range, processing power and battery life. Each vendor who wins a Rifleman or Manpack radio contract will first provide a limited


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