The Defense Department in fiscal year 2016 plans to develop and implement policies that encourage modular, open-systems architectures (MOSA) in acquisition programs, the first official acknowledgement by the Pentagon that open systems will allow the military’s technology to affordably keep pace with ever-evolving threats.
Congress has directed the Defense Department to study its implementation of MOSA standards and policy and to report on the value or lack thereof in requiring modular, open systems in system development, Kristen Baldwin, principal deputy to the deputy assistant secretary of defense for systems engineering said Nov. 4.
In response to a relative downturn in funding, the military will become smaller just as global threats are proliferating and becoming more technologically savvy. Modernizing while keeping pace with the technical acuity of potential adversaries can only be achieved by implementing MOSA, Baldwin said during a luncheon keynote at the eighth-annual Open Architecture Summit hosted by Defense Daily in Washington.
“The Department views its ability to be agile, flexible, ready and technologically advanced as intrinsically intertwined with the philosophy of open systems,” she said. “These approaches often offer great opportunities to leverage subsystem-level competition to future systems, to provide a pathway to innovation and hopefully to reduce cost over time.”
In partnership with industry and academia, the Defense Department wants to establish a “community of practice,” Baldwin said, “tasked to advance the current body of practice as well as establish and execute a plan of work to make the most effective use of modular open systems approaches.”
Baldwin’s boss, Defense Department chief weapons buyer Frank Kendall, has directed a top-down analysis of MOSA implementation in acquisitions. The effort’s focus will be on updating policies and guidance, to include service-specific directives aimed at requiring MOSA during development and acquisition, Baldwin said.
Baldwin’s office and other acquisition and systems engineering officials have spent months on the study and are nearing publication.
“We have some gaps that have been identified in the area of standards or tools, but this is not a negative. This enables us to know that our programs are requesting support to use MOSA techniques for the betterment of their acquisition program results.”
The Defense Department also may need to refresh its education and training practices for both engineers and acquisition professionals to place an emphasis on MOSA, she said.
“Engineering and contract officers should be taught the same basics about MOSA, but are there particular adaptations that apply directly to the activities that they perform as part of acquisition? Not everyone needs to be an expert in all aspects of MOSA, but we all need to be cognizant of what those basics are.”
Baldwin pointed out several MOSA initiatives that various military services have already developed and instituted. The Army has established standards for integration of electronic mission systems on its combat vehicles given the mouthful official title of vehicle integration for command, control, communications, computers, intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance and electronic warfare (C4ISR/EW) interoperability. Shortened to VICTORY, it is a framework for integrating electronic mission equipment in ground platforms. Most ground vehicle acquisition programs for the Army and Marine Corps have VICTORY standards as a contractual requirement, including Stryker, the armored multipurpose vehicle (AMPV), the Abrams tank, Bradley Fighting Vehicle and the joint light tactical vehicle (JLTV).
The Air Force has successfully implemented open mission systems standards to reduce the time it takes to integrate new technologies into legacy aircraft. OMS standards have been particularly successful in upgrading aircraft with software-driven missions and payloads, including the U-2 and Global Hawk surveillance aircraft and the B-2 Spirit bomber, she said.
“This has provided an opportunity to add software and payloads to these platforms, changes in weeks as opposed to months and years,” Baldwin said. “These demonstrations confirm how open architectures can enable rapid integration of new capabilities and software solutions to meet the needs of ever-changing threats.”
Other initiatives to develop and implement OMS standards involve multiple services, like the future airborne capability environment (FACE). The Army, Navy and Air Force have joined with industry to establish a set of standards that will result in common, open avionics systems for all military aircraft.
As an enterprise, DoD is striving to achieve five goals through implementation of MOSA standards.
Requiring modular, open systems “enables several software and hardware modules to be changed independently of each other and independently of the system for which they were designed and in which they reside,” Baldwin said.
MOSA also allows for systems and platforms to be upgraded incrementally and regularly as technology progresses outside the military realm, or to adapt quickly in the face of novel threats.
“In this manner, delivery of new capabilities or replacement technologies can be realized without rebuilding the entire system,” she said. “OMS can enable less expensive modifications throughout the life cycle without requiring redesign of major components or systems.
MOSA standards also likely will reduce “vendor lock” in acquisition of large, multi-layered and complex weapons and platforms by ensuring successive software iterations and individual capability modules can be openly competed, she said.
“OMS approaches enable flexibility to achieve value or innovation during the procurement phase,” she said. “In none approach third-party developers can offer software development kits and system-development tools that include source code … in order for innovation to be accomplished organically.”