The announcement about the military cloud capability follows successful trials earlier this year.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019ve been working on this in our Rapid Capabilities Office, and I can announce today that we are now at the point where our combat cloud, called Nexus, can begin to be introduced operationally,\u201d Chief of the Air Staff Air Marshal Mike Wigston told the Global Air Chiefs\u2019 Conference in London on July 14.<\/p>\n
The cloud system is ready for deployment now, with a spiral expansion of capabilities planned, said an service spokesman.<\/p>\n
Wigston also told the audience that the Royal Air Force is nearing an operational state for the swarming drone tech.<\/p>\n
The service also intends to invest in a substantial boost to synthetic training capabilities, he added.<\/p>\n
In a program known as Babelfish 7, the RCO has collaborated with Airbus, AirTanker and others in demonstrating the combat cloud system, pulling together the Nexus data platform and a virtual communications node known as Raven in a flexible, on-the-move command-and-control system.<\/p>\n Earlier phases of Babelfish explored connectivity trials involving British Typhoon and F-35 combat jets.<\/p>\n For the combat cloud work, Airbus and AirTanker jointly invested in upgrading the satellite communications system on a Voyager aircraft, enabling it to act as an airborne communications node while concurrently operating its air-to-air refueling tasks. The modification will remain on the aircraft for future operational use.<\/p>\n Nexus, however, is not tied to a specific aircraft type; it can be used on a range of platforms or facilities. The Air Information Experimentation Division of the RCO has partnered with British IT SME SiXworks for the Nexus program.<\/p>\n The service chief described one recent evaluation of the system using an Airbus A330 Voyager.<\/p>\n \u201cWe hand-carried the system onboard one of our Voyager aircraft. Once airborne, laptops and tablets were configured to show a real-time common operating picture constructed from data ingested into a ground-based Nexus node from a variety of information feeds,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n \u201cThis is the combat cloud we talk about, brought to life: data from every sensor, on any platform in the operating space; processed in real time at the edge into useful information; flagged to any user with a need for that information; accessed remotely and fused with what is already known to give situational awareness at any level; and enabling better decisions than our adversaries, executed at the speed of light.\u201d<\/p>\n Wigston went on to describe the capability as \u201cflexible, secure, proven, and we have developed it in-house at a fraction of the cost of comparators.\u201d<\/p>\n The cloud also received a mention from Wigston during another July 14 speech at an event in London. The theme of that conference focused on what an air and space force might look like in 2040.<\/p>\n Britain\u2019s\u00a0military space-related spending<\/a>\u00a0largely revolves around the\u00a0Skynet 6 communications program<\/a>, but Wigston said there are other capabilities the military urgently needs.<\/p>\n \u201cAs a priority, we will establish a space cloud to harvest the terabytes of space-derived data across a truly borderless domain, whilst establishing a space-based [intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance] program to deliver a sovereign multispectral ISR constellation,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n Drones and simulations<\/b><\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.fie.undef.edu.ar\/ceptm\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/SMOLYTCE5RHZXIK73X2V2ZIRI4.jpg\")
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