The defence industry is having to change its approach to managing the spectrum. There are several drivers for this: spectrum is a valuable and finite resource, and there are competing demands for it from commercial and government spectrum users. There is also treasury pressure for defence to reduce its spectrum footprint – the Cave Report recommends the introduction of market mechanisms to spectrum, which means that users will need to be more efficient in their use.

The Challenge

One of the big challenges defence has is that it is very difficult to predict the military demand on spectrum and ensure its capabilities have the agility and flexibility to operate in different parts of the spectrum. Addressing this will improve the ability to manage and allocate this finite resource which in turn will help defence achieve the vision of Information Enabled Capability and meet the Cave Report requirements. Fortunately, spectrum management is something we know a lot about.

Our Approach

First, we built the UK Ministry of Defence (MOD) their Pilot Battlespace Spectrum Management System (PBSMS). Then we took this a stage further in the Coalition Warrior Interoperability Demonstration (CWID) in 2008. We’ve helped the MOD audit their spectrum holdings, analyse their use and identify potential opportunities for release to the commercial sector through market mechanisms. We have pulled all this knowledge together and created a next generation spectrum management architecture and demonstrated it at CWID 2010.

It’s known as Aurora and it can deal with all aspects of spectrum management from acquisition and deployment through to disposal. The Aurora suite provides these capabilities through a Service Oriented Architecture. It’s hosted and integrated within an Enterprise infrastructure, which means it can connect with other services, capabilities, and of course, your coalition partners.

Aurora has been designed as a suite of tools, each with different functionality, which means you have the tool to fit your needs. At the heart of Aurora is the spectrum information repository. The information services offered by Aurora ensure that the integrity and availability of information is fully utilised. Aurora can support offline and remote use, with synchronisation when connectivity is available, which means you don’t need to worry about unreliable communication links. It uses international data standards to ensure interoperability with national and international partners / regulators.

Key Benefits

  • Enterprise Spectrum Management capability
  • Support to Strategic, Operational, Tactical and Acquisition users
  • International data standards ensure interoperability
  • Suite of tools gives you the right tool to fit your needs
  • Cross sector expertise gives you access to commercial innovations