Towards a European Distributed Experimentation Capability: MBDA Experiences and Perspectives

摘要

Distributed modeling and simulation capabilities have become a key element of experimentation, supporting transformation, Simulation Based Acquisition and Networked Enabled Capability. For some time, MBDA Missile Systems has had experimentation facilities in the UK, France and Italy. In the UK, the company has a Distributed Experimentation Capability consisting of a high bandwidth network linking the Simulation Centre at Stevenage, the System Integration Facility at Bristol and the Trials Facility at Bedford. Over the last two years, a multinational team, part of the Synthetic Environments Centre of Excellence within the company, has been established. Its primary objective is to create a company wide European Distributed Experimentation Capability, linking the facilities in the UK, to Chatillon in France and La Spezia in Italy. Different link technologies are being evaluated, including internal company networks and the Internet. As part of this evaluation, a Test-Bed infrastructure was established in the UK and distributed to France and Italy for the integration of French and Italian simulations. An interim milestone was a co-located experiment held at the end of 2005. However, the capability continues to be developed to achieve the distributed networking capability. Extensive use is being made of Collaborative Working Environments including: an SE Web on the company's Intranet and an always-on video conferencing. This paper outlines the challenges of creating such a distributed capability covering: working across national boundaries, export controls, distributed teams, the network technologies and the benefits of sharing a common toolset and approach. This paper was first presented at the NATO Conference in October 2006 (RTO-MSG045-014).