US Navy ‘s Satcoms Demand Will Continue to Grow

 The cancellation of the Transformational Satellite Communi-cations Systems program (TSAT) by the Department of Defense (DoD) coupled with the increasing bandwidth requirements of naval forces and personnel will be driving demand for commercial satcoms. To meet these increasing demands, the Navy embarked on its own initiative called Commercial Broadband Satellite Program (CBSP). The CBSP aims to utilize commercial capacity in all frequency bands to meet its requirements globally. In January this year, the Navy’s CBSP awared a contract potentially worth US $ 542.7 million over five years to a consortium of 17 companies led by Intelsat General. Intelsat had to partner with is competitor SES for the contract which will involve also Britain’s Skynet and the Loral and Hisdesat joint-venture, Xtar.

"Demand will continue to outstrip capacity," said Capt. Edwin Pena (USMC) in his presentation during the workshop. He cited the Navy and Marines requirements on the ground for "smaller, lighter, faster units that use less power."

VADM Lyle Bien, US Navy (ret.) moderating a panel at the Navy Satcom Users Workshop with representatives from the commercial sector, from left: Mark Dale, Comtech EF Data; William Flynn, Americom Government Services; Scott Scheimreif, Iridium; Tom Foust, Intelsat General;Dan Losada, Hughes Network Systems and David Gomes, Ironhawk Technologies.

Meanwhile, at the AFCEA conference, the main buzz was the new emphasis of the Navy on "information dominance."

Adm. Gary Roughead, USN, Chief of Naval Operations, told an overflow audience at the three-day event’s final luncheon that the Navy will be built around information, in both technology and practice. "Our way forward must be centered on information and how we use it," Adm. Roughead said.

Adm. Roughead continued that information and intelligence are so inexorably linked that he decided to combine the two in the Navy. "We’re moving out in the area of information dominance," he stated. The admiral mentioned several key technologies that the Navy will need to maintain its supremacy in the information age. One is unmanned vehicles and systems, which are the key to moving information. The admiral noted that the Navy has deployed a vertical takeoff unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) on a ship involved in counterdrug operations in the eastern Pacific Ocean.

The Navy Satcom Users Workshop is being held for the 4th year in a row, but this year is its first year at the AFCEA show. It is organized by the SIA together with SPAWAR PEO C41. The SIA also holds an Army Satcoms Users Workshop to be held at the LandWarNet Confererence and exhibition in Tampa, Floria in August 2010 and a DoD Commerical Satcom Users Workshop in Washington., D.C. in December 2010.

For more information on the SIA and its Satcom Users series of workshops go to: www.sia.org.