The Ministry of Defence is embracing far-reaching benefits of digitisation for its Land ISTAR programme, to transform how the British Army operates, integrates and sustains a persistent and decisive global presence.
A contract worth £6.7m has been awarded to Roke, the delivery partner for ZODIAC, which will act as the central nervous system for Land ISTAR. It marks the start of an Alpha development phase to de-risk the delivery of the Land ISTAR programme.
Integrate for Advantage
Land ISTAR will deliver an integrated and distributed system of sensors, applications and underlying system architecture that will enable the Army to act with greater precision and speed. Enhancing FIND to UNDERSTAND and FIND to EFFECT is critical to the generation of a competitive advantage in the modern operating environment across the continuum of competition.
As the core project for the Land ISTAR programme, ZODIAC must provide the systems required to ingest data from all battlefield sensors and CJIIM* intelligence feeds. It will need to fuse, analyse and distribute the resulting intelligence to battlefield users, integrating across Land, Sea, Air, Space and Cyber, and with Allies.
During the Alpha phase of ZODIAC, Roke will be responsible for capturing requirements, initial design, solution architecture, risk reduction, and market assessment for further development.
Paul MacGregor, Managing Director of Roke said:
“Roke is proud to contribute to this important and bold transformation in support of the defence of our nation. ZODIAC will pioneer the use of next generation technologies, empowering and better protecting the British Army to think and act faster than our adversaries.
“Innovation will be the catalyst for everything we do. From harnessing our significant knowledge in physical sensors and communication systems to embedding new architectures and processing at the edge, drawing on the expertise of our Cubica colleagues who specialise in data fusion, machine learning and autonomy.“
Roke will also work closely with a trusted consortia of industry partners to refine the model of ZODIAC development further, ensuring the customer takes advantage of world-beating technical capabilities on a continuous and enduring basis.
