06 May 03. Lockheed Martin has been awarded a contract to develop a Joint battlespace situational awareness capability that will serve as the primary common operational picture (COP) for all four military services. The Family of Interoperable Operational Pictures (FIOP) program will integrate real-time land, air and sea data into a single, web-based mapping application for users worldwide.
FIOP will draw information from multiple command and control (C2) systems to create a horizontally-integrated picture of real-time battlefield operations. Friendly and enemy units will be represented in a fully-interactive, “point and click” map of the theater available on a laptop or PC through a standard web browser.
“With FIOP, users will be able to instantly access Joint forces data that was previously stovepiped through different C2 systems,” said Frank De Lalla, director of theater tactical programs for Lockheed Martin Mission Systems. “Click on an F-16, an aircraft carrier, or a land unit, and users will instantly see detailed information for that object on the map for that day’s battle plan. FIOP will also track battlefield events like targets and their associated bomb damage assessment in real time.”
FIOP will be available to users from the Joint Forces Component Commander down to individual wing or unit staff. At each level of command, users can customize FIOP to provide them with the information most relevant to their mission. A logistics officer, for instance, could filter out only the data relevant to her battlefield supply chain or the ground units she is responsible for.
The FIOP program has an aggressive spiral development schedule with deliverables every six months. The first full installment is due in 18 months, when the product will be integrated with the Theater Battle Management Core Systems (TBMCS), the Lockheed Martin-developed Joint air battle C2 system of record, and the Global Command and Control System – Joint (GCCS-J). The contract, awarded by the U.S. Air Force Electronic Systems Center, is worth $3.9 for the first 18 months, with additional funding through 2009.
Future spirals of FIOP call for it to be integrated with land, airborne and space-based sensors, which would provide a powerful integrated C2 and intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) capability. Authorized users could eventually download live video feed from Predator unmanned aerial vehicles, or access satellite photos or other tactical reconnaissance images.
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Martin Mission Systems serves customers including U.S. and international defense and civil government agencies. Mission Systems employs approximately 3,000 at primary facilities in Gaithersburg, Md., Colorado Springs, Colo., Santa Maria, Calif., and is a business unit of Lockheed Martin Corporation.