GPS Signal Distribution Approaching VICTORY

The VICTORY initiative has been broadly adopted across the US Defense ground vehicle community. Last year, PEO GCS generated Acquisition Decision Memorandums (ADM) guiding the Platform community to incorporate VICTORY architecture in many vehicle modernization efforts, as well as new start vehicle programs. The community can generally agree that VICTORY is driving the vehicle architecture in a positive direction, providing a much more efficient architecture to enable current, and future, technology integration. A major component of the VICTORY standards addresses the distribution of GPS-supplied information for position, heading, elevation, and timing. The vast majority of major subsystems on today’s military ground vehicles utilize GPS data in some form. These systems include fire control computers, navigation and blue force tracking equipment, ISR assets, electronic warfare devices, personal navigation equipment, laser range finders, command & control (C2) computers, UAV’s, and much more.

As the joint industry, academic, and Government VICTORY effort matures over the next two to five years in an era of significant budget constraints, how can we as a community ensure a cost effective transition occurs from today’s technology to a full blown “data on the wire” architecture that VICTORY will enable? Hardware and software solutions requiring GPS information are being invested in today by major vehicle programs that will be a part of the vehicle architecture for years to come. How do we ensure these solutions continue to be available for cost effective fielding and sustainment? How do we ensure our key international partners can leverage the architecture and technology today and tomorrow to effectively partner in supporting global conflicts?

The objective of this paper is to discuss a realistic & cost effective vehicle electronics & architecture strategy leading up to full scale VICTORY adoption for major military ground vehicle programs. It will discuss the short term technical issues related to efficient distribution of the GPS frequencies and IS-GPS-153 message formats, as well as potential & current methodologies in support of today’s ground vehicle fleet. It will identify the major issues Industry partners will face as a concerted transition is made from non-VICTORY architecture to the efficient and mandated VICTORY architecture. What are the short term steps integrators and OEM’s can take to ensure a seamless transition and prepare vehicles and subsystems to maximize the value of VICTORY? The conclusion supported shall be that a cost effective strategy can be adopted by a joint industry/Government team for the implementation of VICTORY architecture. Key steps to bridge these architectures shall be identified for consideration by Government and industry participants.