Amentum played a central role in a UK Ministry of Defence exercise designed to break new ground in networking of drones and robotic systems.
Project Acheron, organised by Defence Equipment & Support’s Multi-domain Integrated Systems game changer programme, tested new integrated command, control, communications, and network architectures for use by all the armed services.
We supplied an eight-wheeled autonomous vehicle, smaller tracked ground vehicles, aerial drones, as well as a suite of connected microphone arrays, both dismounted and integrated into the UGVs.
Using an Amentum-built integrated network and network architecture, feeds from all assets could be viewed on one screen, enabling faster decision making and full situation awareness of deployed platforms.
The Amentum team operated at Royal Marines Barracks Chivenor in Devon, for an exercise which simulated an unopposed shore landing by Royal Marines Commandos, who then used the platforms for surveillance, reconnaissance of the surrounding terrain and a teleoperated cache resupply drop for advancing troops.
Simultaneous exercises took place at two other training bases in different parts of the country to provide a truly disparate example of how feeds from different assets can be received and utilised.
George Stone, Project Manager in Cyber & Intelligence, said: “The multi-domains aspect was an important part of the exercise. We had representatives from the Royal Navy, Army and Royal Air Force as well as suppliers all working alongside each other.
“This is the first time that information from sensors on multiple autonomous systems has been available to view by everybody on one screen. It was really a game-changing demonstration of the capability that emergent technologies can deliver.”
