Lockheed Martin to upgrade sonar signal processing computers for Navy undersea surveillance
SAN DIEGO, 3 Aug. 2015.Undersea surveillance experts at Lockheed Martin Corp. are moving forward with developing technology to detect, classify, and track quiet enemy diesel attack submarines in shallow coastal waters.
Officials of the Space and Naval Warfare Systems Command (SPAWAR) in San Diego announced an $8.4 million contract modification Thursday to the Lockheed Martin Mission Systems and Training segment in Manassas, Va., for the Integrated Common Processor (ICP) program.
The ICP is a component of the Navy's Maritime Surveillance Systems (MSS) program -- a system of fixed, mobile, and deployable acoustic arrays that help detect, localize, and track quiet diesel and nuclear submarines.
Navy anti-submarine warfare (ASW) experts are fine-tuning MSS technology to be effective against modern diesel and nuclear submarines in regional, littoral, and broad ocean areas of interest. That's where the ICP program comes in.
ICP is developing the capability to process and display data from all fixed and mobile underwater systems to take advantage of automation advancement, array technology improvements, hardware insertions, and the common software components of the submarine and surface undersea warfare systems.
Eventually the ICP program is intended to provide processing power to support the Navy's low-frequency active (LFA) ASW bi-static processing using the Lockheed Martin Twin-line 29A towed-array sonar for the Surveillance Towed Array Sensor System (SURTASS) submarine-hunting system.
To optimize sonar signal-processing power and keep costs as affordable as possible, the ICP is capitalizing on the Navy's Acoustics-Rapid COTS Insertion (A-RCI) program, which uses the latest generations of commercially available computer server technology for sonar signal processing aboard Navy submarines and surface vessels.
The ICP will have the capability to process and display data from all fixed and mobile underwater systems, and will be used for all new system installations and replace the legacy systems as they reach end of life and require upgrading.
Related: Lockheed Martin to make COTS upgrades to submarine sonars in $29.4 million contract
Since 2011 Lockheed Martin engineers have been developing automation algorithms and techniques for addressing multi-array high beam count requirements in the ICP program, and have continued with sonar signal processing upgrades in coordination with the Submarine A-RCI program.
The order announced Friday is a modification to a Navy $11.9 million ICP sole-source contract to Lockheed Martin awarded in late 2013. Lockheed Martin is the A-RCI prime contractor. Options could extend this contract through 2017 and bring its value to $97.8 million, Navy officials say.
This contract modification combines purchases for the Navy and the government of Japan. Lockheed Martin will do the work in Manassas, Va., and should be finished by this December.
For more information contact Lockheed Martin Mission Systems and Training online at www.lockheedmartin.com/us/mst, or SPAWAR at www.spawar.navy.mil.
John Keller | Editor
John Keller is editor-in-chief of Military & Aerospace Electronics magazine, which provides extensive coverage and analysis of enabling electronic and optoelectronic technologies in military, space, and commercial aviation applications. A member of the Military & Aerospace Electronics staff since the magazine's founding in 1989, Mr. Keller took over as chief editor in 1995.
