The Joint Program Executive Office Joint Tactical Radio System (JPEO JTRS), with participation from the Wireless Innovation Forum (WInnF), yesterday said it has approved the next generation Software Communications Architecture as SCA 4.0.
The first SCA release was in 1999 and since that time several generations of software defined radios have been powered and enabled by this ‘operating system for radios.’
SCA 4.0 is a bold update, introducing new technology that tailors the operating system size specifically for the radio and its mission, the JPEO JTRS office said in a statement. With this update, memory and processing overhead can be reduced to negligible levels, and architectural enhancements can improve security by enabling much faster boot-up times and reconfiguration of the radio.
The power and flexibility in the SCA enables reprogramming of radio frequencies, and because it has an open architecture, it permits a waveform written for one radio to be ported readily to another radio. This capability allows governments and organizations to develop a waveform once, and then reuse the waveform on multiple radios, with the assurance of interoperability.
Government and military radios have much longer lifetimes than the two years of today’s commercial products. SCA 4.0 is specifically designed for the ability to reprogram the radio frequency and signal processing components so the radio can be upgraded with a software download anywhere it is installed.
Additionally, SCA 4.0 allows radio users for the first time to access the many applications created in the commercial market.