The U.S. Special Operations Command is using unprecedented outreach and collaboration to develop something special with revolutionary capabilities.
The Tactical Assault Light Operator Suit, or TALOS, is the vision of Navy Adm. William H. McRaven, SOCOM’s commander. He challenged industry and defense representatives at a SOCOM conference in May 2013 to come up with the concepts and technologies to make the suit a reality. The goal is to offer operators better protection, enhanced performance and improved situational awareness.
McRaven spoke more recently at a February 2014 National Defense Industry Association Special Operations/Low Intensity Conflict symposium, in Washington, D.C.
“The TALOS program is a collaboration of efforts,” McRaven said. “We are teaming with 56 corporations, 16 government agencies, 13 universities, and 10 national laboratories and we are leveraging the expertise of leading minds throughout the country to redefine the state of the art in survivability and operator capability.
“This innovative approach brings together the brightest minds in a national effort and we are already seeing astounding results in this collaboration. If we do TALOS right, it will be a huge comparative advantage over our enemies and give our warriors the protection they need in a very demanding environment.”
[...]
SOCOM’s goal, Fieldson said, is to have a TALOS prototype within the next year and to have the suit ready for full field testing within five years. That timetable is revolutionary for the military research, development and acquisition world, even for rapid-equipping programs.
As the only combatant command with acquisition authority, SOCOM is able to accelerate the TALOS project, Fieldson explained. The command’s acquisition executive and research and development staff share a building at MacDill Air Force Base, which he said promotes close collaboration and speedy decision-making.
“We have access that is nontraditional and that absolutely helps us,” Fieldson said. “We can bounce ideas back and forth against the leadership and ensure that what we are doing makes sense. I think that is critical to trying to develop this system within the timeline we are working toward.”
Also, in a departure from traditional development projects, SOCOM’s Acquisition Center staff established an innovation cell to lead the effort, advised by operators and focused on transforming business processes to solve the extreme integration challenges associated with TALOS.
“Because of the technical challenges and the compressed timeline, we are going to take more ownership on the government side than we typically take,” Fieldson said.
“We are going to go in and make some decisions that we sometimes rely on industry partners to make for us,” he said. “That allows us to reach out to a broader audience. That way, if there is a great idea in some nontraditional organization, we can integrate it” without relying on a commercial company to do so.
“We are really changing the process,” Fieldson said. “And the reason we are doing that is to try to streamline the overall effort and drive down both the cost and the schedule. That way, we get the best possible equipment to our force as quickly as possible.”
Although the TALOS is initially intended for special operators involved in high-risk missions, it has implications for the conventional force as well, Fieldson said.
link.
No comments:
Post a Comment