CASSIDIAN develops electronics for the german Army’s new mobile communications system

• Soft­ware-con­trolled radio enhances pro­tec­tion of sol­diers in mis­sions abroad 
• Super high fre­quen­cy tech­nol­o­gy enables high data rates, long ranges and excel­lent resis­tance to jamming

11 May 2012 – Cas­sid­i­an, the defence and secu­ri­ty divi­sion of EADS, has paved the way for the over­all inte­gra­tion of the Ger­man Armed Forces’ new soft­ware-defined radio com­mu­ni­ca­tions sys­tem (“Komm­Sys­Bw”) by deliv­er­ing the system’s first elec­tron­ic com­po­nents in due time. The project, called “SVFuA” (“Stre­itkräftege­mein­same Ver­bund­fähige Funkgeräte-Ausstat­tung” – Inter­con­nectable Joint-Ser­vices Radio Equip­ment), is intend­ed to opti­mise the Bundeswehr’s jam-resis­tant mobile voice and data com­mu­ni­ca­tions in the com­ing decade, par­tic­u­lar­ly in mis­sions abroad. 

“Secure mobile com­mu­ni­ca­tions are a nec­es­sary pre­con­di­tion for the pro­tec­tion of our sol­diers,” explains Dr. Rolf Wirtz, Head of the Mil­i­tary Mis­sion Sys­tems unit at Cas­sid­i­an. “Thanks to our expe­ri­ence with super high fre­quen­cy equip­ment and the use of new tech­nol­o­gy, for exam­ple on the basis of gal­li­um nitride, we are in a posi­tion to offer an excel­lent solu­tion for the most com­plex com­po­nent of the new radio system.” 

The SVFuA project is being devel­oped by Hagenuk Marinekom­mu­nika­tion, TDS, Rohde & Schwarz, Tele­funken Racoms and Cas­sid­i­an, with each of them act­ing as an inde­pen­dent con­trac­tor. Cassidian’s pack­age cov­ers the devel­op­ment of a broad­band trans­mit and receive mod­ule. Using the most up-to-date tech­nolo­gies, this mod­ule allows for secure data trans­mis­sion with bit rates of up to 30 Mbits per sec­ond. Owing to its wide band­width, the broad­band mod­ule is one of the most chal­leng­ing ele­ments of the new radio sys­tem. The high band­width enables the trans­mis­sion of large vol­umes of data over long dis­tances, while at the same time ensur­ing opti­mum resis­tance to jam­ming. A par­tic­u­lar chal­lenge in this con­text is the inte­gra­tion of the elec­tron­ic sub­assem­blies into the very small space avail­able to ensure that the radio equip­ment can be eas­i­ly installed in the vehicles. 

Sim­i­lar radio fre­quen­cy com­po­nents are already being deliv­ered by Cas­sid­i­an for NATO’s data link pro­gramme MIDS (Mul­ti­func­tion­al Infor­ma­tion Dis­tri­b­u­tion Sys­tem). For this pur­pose, the com­pa­ny has set up spe­cial­ized devel­op­ment and pro­duc­tion facil­i­ties at its Unter­schleis­sheim, Ulm and Friedrichshafen locations. 

About CASSIDIAN (www.cassidian.com)

Cas­sid­i­an, an EADS com­pa­ny, is a world­wide leader in glob­al secu­ri­ty solu­tions and sys­tems, pro­vid­ing Lead Sys­tems Inte­gra­tion and val­ue-added prod­ucts and ser­vices to civ­il and mil­i­tary cus­tomers around the globe: air sys­tems (air­craft and unmanned aer­i­al sys­tems), land, naval and joint sys­tems, intel­li­gence and sur­veil­lance, cyber secu­ri­ty, secure com­mu­ni­ca­tions, test sys­tems, mis­siles, ser­vices and sup­port solu­tions. In 2011, Cas­sid­i­an – with around 28,000 employ­ees – achieved rev­enues of € 5.8 bil­lion. EADS is a glob­al leader in aero­space, defence and relat­ed ser­vices. In 2011, the Group – com­pris­ing Air­bus, Astri­um, Cas­sid­i­an and Euro­copter – gen­er­at­ed rev­enues of € 49.1 bil­lion and employed a work­force of more than 133,000.

CASSIDIAN – Defend­ing World Security 

Con­tact:
Lothar Belz Tel.: +49 (731) 392 3681
lothar.belz@cassidian.com