Ultra-Light Done Right: Developing the ISV With Precision

by Jacqueline M. Hames

Getting troops and equipment across the battlefield is a vital part of every theater operation. Soldiers and their kits, as well as spare ammunition and other supplies, need to arrive quickly, with nothing left behind—or risk jeopardizing the mission. The Joint Light Tactical Vehicle and Humvee have done a great job at performing those tasks so far, but the battlefield is always changing. In some cases, those vehicles are too heavy and impractical for the task at hand—so, the Army chose to develop a new, ultra-light troop transport in 2018.

The M1301 Infantry Squad Vehicle (ISV) is an ultra-light tactical vehicle that carries nine passengers and their equipment. Its evolution has been informed by Soldier touch point events.

“We are extremely proud of this program and what we’ve been able to achieve in a short period of time,” said Susan Fung, deputy project manager for the Mobile Brigade Combat Team with Capability Program Executive (CPE) Ground. “As you’re aware, in this high-stakes environment of modern warfare, playing it completely safe is often the most dangerous thing a leader can do for decades.”

“Traditional defense acquisition has prioritized its bureaucratic processes and zero-defect mentality over speed, and while well-intentioned, that approach often meant our Soldiers had to wait quite a bit for critical capabilities to reach the field,” she continued. Fung explained that the team is intentionally trading the illusion of a risk-free acquisition process for the ability to use commercial products and iterating with continuous Soldier feedback through the Army’s Transformation in Contact (TIC) program.

EXPONENTIAL GROWTH

The ISV program officially began in 2019, with a procurement objective of 649 ISVs. “However, based on Soldier feedback and TIC experimentation, Soldiers showed us what they truly need,” Fung said. “This led to an explosive growth driven entirely by operational demand.”

The number of vehicles required increased to 900 in February 2021, and then to 1,087 in April 2023, and finally to 2,593. In April 2025, the Army approved the ISV utility variant and increased the Army procurement objective, bringing the procurement objective to 5,733 vehicles across both variants, Fung explained.

“In February of 2026, the Army established the current position objective and procurement objective at 11,582 vehicles,” she said. “That shows you the increased objective based on Soldier demand, and that’s really equivalent to about an 18-fold increase from the original requirement. Not because of requirements creep, but really because Soldiers validated the capability in the combat training environments and demanded more.”

John Hufstedler, product director for Ground Mobility Vehicles at CPE Ground, said that connecting with the mission of the system was critical during the development of the ISV. “Early on, the ISV succeeded by staying locked in,” he said. “A few key requirements were transportability, mobility and payload and resisting requirements creep.”

Army senior leaders helped a great deal in keeping requirements creep at bay, Hufstedler added, by helping CPE Ground resist other programs that wanted to “hang gear off of” the ISV. “Anytime somebody wanted to add a radio with encrypted keys or hang another piece of encrypted equipment off the platform, leadership just didn’t buy into it. And that allowed the vehicle to stay focused and true to its mission, so we didn’t have to leave a Soldier back with the vehicle. All nine could go execute the mission and objective,” he said.

In the traditional acquisition approach, there would be custom military specifications, extensive government testing and sequential milestone gates, Hufstedler explained. The traditional process could take four to 10 years of specialized requirements development that ultimately results in cost overruns and technological obsolescence.

But the ISV took the rapid acquisition approach, using commercial-off-the-shelf solutions and minimal military modifications, and using Soldier feedback as the primary evaluation criteria, Hufstedler said. That resulted in the first unit equipped within 24 months. “I would argue that probably was at a 50% cost savings versus a traditional acquisition approach,” he said.

TRANSPARENCY AIDS PROGRESS

Taking a more risk-positive approach to developing the ISV required somewhat of a culture change within CPE Ground. Specifically, it required more direct, transparent communication.

Hufstedler believes that leading by example, empathy, listening, incorporating team feedback as part of decisions and a willingness to stand by those decisions as leaders was key. Providing team autonomy while clearly defining boundaries and success criteria and transparency at all levels of communication also contributed to their success.

“I want to reemphasize [Hufstedler’s] point mainly on communication,” Fung said. “Really being able to work with the requirements community.” At the time of her interview, Fung had just returned from Fort Benning where she discussed with the user community what trade-offs they might need so that they can all work together to get the capability out to Soldiers as soon as possible.

CONCLUSION

“With the ISV program we prove that calculated risk works,” Hufstedler said. “We keep going back to commerciality—I think that has helped us a lot. Trusting our Soldiers’ judgement and moving at the speed of relevance, I think we’ve delivered that capability.”

The Army’s willingness to accept commercial standards as a starting point and making the Soldiers the primary evaluators of the equipment will be critical to the success of developing ISV variants, he said.

The team is currently developing the ISV-Heavy variant, Fung added. The team used a 90-day commercial solutions opening process to “deliver another vehicle with enhanced onboard power generation and storge capability to support the next generation command and control equipment,” Fung said.

“Overall, the ISV program is a great example of our acquisition reform, which allows getting capabilities to the field faster, leveraging commercial technologies while staying agile and giving Soldiers what they really want,” she continued.

Don’t wait for perfection. Lean into the calculated risks.

For more information, go to https://cpeground.army.mil/Soldier-Systems/Project-Manager-Mobile-Brigade-Combat-Team/.

JACQUELINE M. HAMES is an editor with Behind the Frontlines. She has 15 years of writing, editing and reporting experience with the federal government, and has a B.A. in creative writing from Christopher Newport University.