By The U.S. Army will continue experimentation and prototyping via an Other Transaction Authority (OTA) agreement to Team Anduril on behalf of Program Executive Office Command, Control, Communications, and Network (PEO C3N), to deliver a prototype architecture for the Army’s Next Generation Command and Control (NGC2) initiative to the 4th Infantry Division, the Army announced July 18.
The OTA, for $99.6 million over 11 months, requires Anduril and several teamed industry partners to provide an integrated and scalable suite of command and control (C2) warfighting capabilities across hardware, software, and applications, through a common and integrated data layer.
The continuation of this OTA is the first step in scaling NGC2 to division-level experimentation and prototyping with the 4th ID to inform broader fielding across the Army. The Army is also executing a competition for additional vendors and vendor teams through a Commercial Solutions Opening (CSO), with additional OTA(s) expected to be awarded later in Fiscal Year 2025 for NGC2 prototyping with other units, including the 25th Infantry Division and III Corps Headquarters.
“This award further demonstrates that the Army can move faster, smarter, and in step with innovation,” said Jesse Tolleson, Acting Assistant Secretary of the Army for Acquisition, Logistics and Technology. “Leveraging non-traditional acquisition pathways and inviting industry into an iterative development process breaks down barriers and delivers capability at the speed of relevance. NGC2 is the kind of agile, scalable model required to remain ahead of tomorrow’s fight.”
“NGC2 is not just a capability. It’s a blueprint for how we’ll deliver future Army systems,” said General James Rainey, Commanding General of Army Futures Command. “This award reflects a fundamentally different relationship with industry, built on shared purpose, speed, and trust. By co-developing with our industry partners and putting Soldiers at the center of design, we’re delivering what they need—faster, more integrated, and ready for the fight.”
The OTA follows Team Anduril participation in the Army’s early NGC2 experimentation during Project Convergence and linked events, and it allows the Army to maintain momentum to deliver a prototype; while the CSO expands competition for industry team leads and the pool of potential vendors who can contribute to NGC2 efforts going forward.
“We know that timely and integrated data will be critical to enable commanders’ decision making in future warfare, and we need industry to bring their best in order to meet the speed of need for our warfighters,” said Brig. Gen. Shane Taylor, PEO C3N. “NGC2 is not a one-and-done contract, but a long-term effort of continuous contracting and investment in the technologies that will deliver needed overmatch for our force.”
Aligned with the Army’s Continuous Transformation efforts and building upon Transformation in Contact (TiC) and Command and Control (C2) Fix initiatives, NGC2 is a new approach to enable commanders to make more, better, and faster decisions than the enemy. NGC2 is not a single program or technology, but an ecosystem delivered as a “technology stack” of four layers including transport, infrastructure, data, and applications. This approach integrates information from previously siloed warfighting systems and enables the use of artificial intelligence and machine learning tools to rapidly organize and analyze data to improve commanders’ decision advantage.
“Commanders want this level of technology – the ease of accessing applications no matter where they are on the battlefield, gaining complete situational awareness through a wireless tablet, and having access to a suite of collaboration, planning, and modeling tools to enable decision advantage is what NGC2 is all about,” said Col. Michael Kaloostian, Director of the Command and Control Cross-Functional Team (C2 CFT), Army Futures Command. “It’ll be intuitive, reliable, and maintain the pace of technological change.”
Source: U.S. Army
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