When we last spoke with Inmarsat’s Senior Vice President of Government Policy, Strategy, and Outreach Rebecca Cowen-Hirsch, the company’s concerns over Ka-band terminal technology falling behind the capability of the available Wideband Global Satcom (WGS) space segment were described as a target issue that required quick action.

   While Cowen-Hirsch is happy to report that terminal research and development progress has been made for both the WGS and Global Hawk programs, an even bigger problem has developed on Capitol Hill that she believes should concern the entire military satcom sector.

 

Cowen-Hirsch: Yes, and we’re seeing very positive movement in the right direction for the government. The research and development arm of the U.S. Army is actually doing some testing on terminals that extend between military and commercial Ka-band. They have confirmed that developing this technology is not a huge leap and that it also is operable over the WGS system. This is a key opportunity for greater flexibility and cost savings. The Global Hawk program, which a very essential program on the airborne side, also is putting the ability for their Ka-band terminals to tune through commercial and military Ka-band into their requirements for operational flexibility. So, we have testing going on in the government and programs of record putting in requirements and at U.S. Strategic Command, which is looking across relevant programs to insert that requirement and expectation.

Cowen-Hirsch: There are more and more manufacturers now that are making this type of terminal capability available for tuning between commercial and military Ka-band. We’re seeing the right movement that’s going to give the warfighter the greatest operational flexibility they need at either no cost or a very modest incremental cost for that enhanced benefit of operational flexibility. I’m very pleased to see what’s happening. It just needs to be accelerated to ensure that the government can capitalize on the WGS system that’s on-orbit, as well as take advantage of what’s coming online from commercial companies such as Inmarsat.

 

Cowen-Hirsch: I see a requirement shift versus specific implementation during the last six months of the year because it does take time to actually purchase and install systems. Right now, we’re at the last quarter of the fiscal year and Congress did not get a current year budget approved until well into the second half of the year. So, the ability for the government to actually do something in this short time frame is limited by budget and the clock running out. In terms of where we’re headed at Inmarsat, we’re going through a preliminary design review with our modem manufacturer and until we complete that successfully, we will not have any announcements specifically on things that we’re doing.

 

Cowen-Hirsch: We’re certainly in a key timeframe, as Congress is going through marks and through appropriations and authorization conferences. What the industry should we watching for are consistencies between the budget process on Capitol Hill and in Congress with the statements of the administration on the executive side of the branch. The activities we’ve seen recently suggest that there’s a pretty significant disconnect.

For instance, on the executive branch, U.S. Secretary of Defense Gates and the president both put a program in place through the Air Force’s evolutionary type acquisition called EASE, which is to ensure that you get a strong industrial base and you can have predictable long-term budgeting, as well as getting capability on the ground or out to the warfighter in the satellite arena. That stated objective was cut by Congress. For service providers, the ASSIST line item was actually zeroed out from DISA’s budget and put into the Air Force budget for the purchase of more WGS satellites or a full production capable satellite. That is inconsistent with the U.S. National Security Space Strategy of leveraging innovative relationships with commercial satcom to compliment military. This is especially true in the wideband arena.

 

Cowen-Hirsch: Service providers want to make sure that there’s cost effective and efficient value proposition. In the wake of these declining budgets, we’re seeing the budget process not take those innovations into consideration. Congress continues to go more towards the traditional approach – buy more overpriced, delayed and expensive military satellites and not look at innovation in terms of acquisition approaches in the case of advanced EHF for EASE.

What we’re seeing as a secondary effect of that is that the warfighter capability across the board is being skimmed off the top as these cuts are being spread around like peanut butter. What Congress should do is make those really difficult trades where you get tangible cost effectively and efficiencies that are being sought by the administration, while still maintaining capability. The communication programs are suffering as a result of it.

 

Cowen-Hirsch: Even when the WGS program is fully funded, it’s still not going to provide sufficient capacity to meet the warfighter requirements. There still is a gap between what the warfighter requires to complete his missions and that which is available to support his mission space. There’s still a gap between what’s available to support the warfighter in the commercial space and the military space and the effort to bridge that divide is not taking place. That keeps providers and their military customers in a reactive mode and that’s not ever a good thing.