Northrop Selected to Speed Up US Army's Software Development

Northrop Grumman has been awarded a $70 million, 28 month contract to accelerate the software development of the US Army's Integrated Air and Missile Defense (IAMD) Battle Command System (IBCS) into a more agile framework.

Under the contract, awarded by the Aviation Missile Technology Consortium (AMTC), Northrop Grumman and the US Army will partner to prototype an agile development process in order to build, test and field capabilities faster to respond to current and emerging needs, the company said in a statement Wednesday.

As part of the Agile Technical Insertion initiative, IBCS was designated among a number of high priority programs to adopt an agile development methodology to enable maturation of the system.

“This contract brings IBCS into a new era of software development, enabling the rapid integration of new capabilities and improvements to further IBCS’s survivable battle management architecture using an agile software development process,” said Dan Verwiel, vice president and general manager, combat systems and mission readiness defense systems, Northrop Grumman. “By combining our industry leading capabilities in agile software development and DevSecOps with our extensive expertise on the IBCS program, we can rapidly respond to warfighter requirements and bring innovative solutions to IBCS.”

With its open systems architecture, IBCS allows incorporation of current and future sensors and effectors, and enables interoperability with joint C2 and the ballistic missile defense system. This modular open system architecture optimizes the benefits of agile techniques and methodologies, including frequent, ongoing and rapid “agile sprints” to develop and test incremental software advancements. This transformational approach will enable greater responsiveness to current and emerging needs that support mission objectives and avoid costly rework later in the development cycle.

Designed to connect the force for unified action against evolving threats, IBCS is a net-centric command and control system for the air and missile defense mission. IBCS enhances battlefield survivability by creating a resilient self-healing network of all available sensors that can reduce and eliminate vectors of attack while providing operators with a single integrated air picture of unprecedented accuracy and a broader defended area.

IBCS is managed by the US Army Program Executive Office for Missiles and Space, Redstone Arsenal, Alabama.