Military to get mobile comms

Warfighters will be able to send and receive information from vehicles on the battlefield starting this summer because of an agreement Americom Government Services (AGS) and ViaSat signed to combine their infrastructure and technologies.

AGS will join its Ku-band satellite, teleport and terrestrial infrastructure with ViaSat’s spread spectrum technology, which allows for the use of smaller antennas and higher channel speeds, and prevents interference from other satellites. The companies’ Command and Control (C2) On-the-Move service will provide channel speeds of 10 megabits/sec from the Global Information Grid, the military’s name for its networks, to moving vehicles at speeds of about 60 mph and up to 512 kilobits/sec from the vehicles back to the GIG, according to a Feb. 8 AGS statement.

“By connecting Americom’s world-class teleport and terrestrial infrastructure to DOD’s GIG, we not only can support, but can facilitate the deployment of network-centric warfare applications,” said David Helfgott, AGS’ chief executive officer.

The C2 On-the-Move service includes voice over IP, two-way video for intelligence-gathering systems, and blue- and red-force tracking. The service will initially be offered in the Indian Ocean region.