With defense budgets around the world generally in decline, simulation
and training manufacturers are scrambling more intently than ever
for their share of the global market.
"Every week, budgets go down, and training requirements stay
the same or get harder," said Ross Q. Smith vice president
of sales and business development for Quantum3D, of San Jose, Calif.
Quantum3D makes interactive three-dimensional (3D), personal-computer
(PC)-based visual computing systems.
"There’s a trend toward embedded training," Smith
explained in an interview, at this year’s International Training
and Education Conference, known as ITEC 2000, in The Hague, Netherlands.
"Instead of building a separate facility for training, we actually
hook up our system inside the vehicle in which you’re going
to fight."
At ITEC, for example, Quantum3D was showing off its Thermal Sight
Video Controller (TSVC), which it developed for use with Canada’s
Light Armored Vehicle (LAV) appended trainer. The TSVC produces
video signals simultaneously for both the LAV commander and gunner
display channels. Real-time 3D images "provide for the utmost
realism in an appended training environment," Smith said.
There is a growing demand for increased realism in simulation,
Smith said. "People want the real road, the real field, the
real building. If you want to take out terrorists in a specific
building, you can’t train in a typical building. It has to
be a real building."
Earlier this year, Quantum3D unveiled its Heavy Metal AAlchemy
4116–the first of a planned family of scalable, advanced,
real-time 3D graphics systems for visual simulation and training
applications. AAlchemy 4116 enables real-time rendering of complex
synthetic environments, rich in cultural features, free from distracting
artifacts and at sustained frame rates, Smith said.
MultiGen-Paradigm Inc. (MPI), also based in San Jose, is touting
"the first fully correlated sensor product suite on Windows
NT," according to Brian Bartel, MPI’s vice president
for marketing. This group of products provides the ability to construct
a single application that simultaneously renders correlated out-of-the-window,
radar, night vision and infrared visuals, using a single material-classified
database, Bartel said. The products include:
The international marketplace is becoming increasingly important
for MPI, Bartel said. "Fifty percent of our business is outside
of North America," he said. "And 75 percent of that is
European."
Another industry player, Evans & Sutherland (E&S), of Salt
Lake City, is marketing its new Symphony line of products internationally.
A Wide Range
Introduced in 1999, the Symphony line includes a wide range of graphic
products for simulation. Among them:
In Orlando, Fla., last year, E&S "showed a simulator in
a container, which could be deployed by ship or aircraft,"
Oyler said. The ability to deploy simulation technology can make
a big difference in warfare, Oyler asserted.
"Compare Kosovo to Chechnya," he said. Russia’s
"destruction of Chechnya has been scandalous. The NATO assault
on Yugoslavia was much more controlled and precise, with much less
loss of life."
Logicon Inc., a Falls Church, Va.-based division of Northrop Grumman
Corporation, has been promoting its Combined Tactical Training and
Analysis System (CTTAS). CTTAS integrates two older Logicon products
to provide a wider spectrum of naval tactical, war gaming, sensor
simulation, virtual prototyping and interactive courseware development,
according to Susan L. Panichas, a Logicon project manager, in Middletown,
R.I.
The two older products are Logicon’s Distributed Universal
Simulation/Stimulation Trainer (DUSST) and Virtual Combat System
Simulation (VCSSIM), Panichas said. DUSST provides generic combat-system
operations, based on validated sensor and weapons modeling, battle-damage
assessment, intelligent opposition forces and master control of
the tactical scenario. VCSSIM performs a wide variety of accurate
representations of real-world operations. The combined system facilitates
all aspects of training, she explained.
Because all operations are software-based, existing hardware can
be reconfigured instantly to any platform configuration, Panichas
said. This, she added, means that a single client-server classroom
can be used to train a variety of platforms–including aircraft
and ground installations–without the need for individual hardware-based
training devices.
Lockheed Martin Information Systems, headquartered in Orlando,
is seeking expanded international sales for its Close Combat Tactical
Trainer (CCTT), a distributed interactive simulation system now
used by the U.S. Army.
More than 100 of these simulators are in use today, explained Walter
J. Wojciechowski, a project engineer at Lockheed.
The CCTTs provide training for crews of Abrams tanks, Bradley fighting
vehicles, M113A3 armored personnel carriers and high mobility, multi-purpose
wheeled vehicles, or HMMWVs, he said. They also can be used to provide
training for units as large as battalions. In the future, he noted,
they might be able to accommodate even regimental-size groups.
Simulation firms throughout Europe, Canada and beyond are competing
aggressively with U.S. companies for their own piece of the global
pie.
For example, SEOS Displays Limited, of Burgess Hill, in the United
Kingdom, unveiled its Mercator digital distortion-correction system
at ITEC. Mercator is a PC-based technology designed to correct the
image distortion found in the liquid-crystal displays (LCDs) used
in many portable computers.
"Mercator digitizes the video stream at full 24-bit color
depth, ‘warps’ the image and delivers it on to the display,"
explained Owen Wynn, SEOS managing director and chairman.
SEOS, Wynn said, is the world’s leading supplier of simulation
visual display systems. "We are the people who provide the
view at the windows," he told National Defense.
More than 80 percent of the 15-year-old firm’s business comes
from exports, more than half of that to North America. For this
reason, Wynn this year moved to Orlando, to head up SEOS operations
in the United States for a three-year stint. While in Orlando, he
will retain his leadership positions in the firm.
Joint Venture
Alenia Marconi Systems (AMS)–a Welsh-based joint venture by
Finmeccanica of Italy and BAE Systems of the United Kingdom–is
marketing a Reconfigurable Naval Classroom Trainer.
In the trainer, two different warfare scenarios were demonstrated
at ITEC. In one, two hostile task groups were depicted carrying
out anti-submarine operations against a friendly submarine. In the
other, sensor and weapons simulations were combined to present the
control room of a friendly submarine operating against a shore-based
target, while an enemy ship prowled on the surface.
The trainer is a generic system that combines modern, powerful,
commercial, off-the-shelf (COTS) hardware with the latest modeling
tools and reusable software, according to David Jarrett, AMS account
development manager. The system can be configured easily into an
equipment or a platform environment and can represent any system
or subsystem that uses computer technology, Jarrett said.
Reconfigurable
"It’s as reconfigurable as they want to make it,"
he explained. "In some armed forces, that is an issue."
AMS, Jarrett explained, has divisions in Italy and the United Kingdom,
operating in the fields of ground and naval radar, missile systems,
air traffic management, command and control, simulation and synthetic
environments, engineering, software design and manufacturing.
Thomson Training & Simulation, a division of Thomson-CSF, located
just outside of London, is seeking new customers for its new TRUST
(Truck Simulator for Training). The first two TRUST simulators were
put to use in January by two major European truck-driving trainers–AFT-IFTIM,
of France, and VtenL, in the Netherlands–according to Thomson’s
communications manager, Mark Rouson.
TRUST reproduces every detail experienced by truck drivers in real
driving conditions, Rouson said. The simulator features:
The system is catching on in Europe, especially with gasoline prices
at record high levels, Rouson said. Earlier this year, he said,
Thomson was producing 11 TRUST simulators for three leading European
training organizations.
Saab Training Systems AB, headquartered in Huskvarna, Sweden, is
promoting several products:
"These systems won’t let you cheat," said Saab
representative Jerker Johansson. As an example, he cited the BT
47. "If you get killed [in a simulated fire fight], your transmitter
won’t work, and you’re out of it."
A total of 95 percent of Saab’s business is in exports to
20 countries, including the United States, the United Kingdom, Germany
and Canada.
Siemans Switzerland Ltd., based in Zurich, is offering a new mapping
software, called MapTool. The software allows simple and flexible
map reading on personal computers, according to retired Swiss Army
Col. Franz Lötscher, a Siemens consultant.
MapTool makes it possible to combine digital maps, digital height
models and vector data and to supplement the computer map with aerial
photographs, Lötscher said. A map produced with it shows not
only towns, villages, streams, rivers and contours, but also individual
objects, such as vegetation and houses–all in three dimension.
The software currently operates with the digital maps of the Swiss
Federal Office of Topography, said Lötscher. The Swiss now
are creating a digitized map of all of Switzerland, he noted. Computerized
maps, he said, will enhance Switzerland’s ability to maintain
a high state of readiness, even though its defense budget is declining.
SE Swiss Electronics Enterprise Corp, based in Bern, and C.O.E.L.,
of Wedel, near Hamburg in Germany, have joined together to develop
the Combined Arts Direct Fire and Area Weapon Training System (CODARTS).
"It’s like MILES (the laser-based marksmanship training
system used by U.S. troops)–only on a larger scale" explained
Nancy Buchanan, SE marketing and project manager.
CODARTS can be used by units as small as squads to those of several
hundred soldiers and combat vehicles, Buchanan said. Opposing forces
use state-of-the-art tactical-engagement simulators.
"Unlike MILES, CODARTS is a two-way system," Buchanan
said. "Simulators measure the distance between shooters and
targets. There are different codes for tanks and infantry. There’s
no confusion."
Training can take place in open terrain or in built-up areas, Buchanan
said. An exercise-control center monitors the entire training, controlling,
coordinating and recording everything that happens for after-action
review, she explained.
The Swiss Army has contracted with SE and C.O.E.L to develop simulators
for its vehicle-mounted machine cannons and guns by the end of 2001,
Buchanan noted.
"Switzerland is not a member of NATO," she noted. For
centuries of European wars, it has been neutral, she said, but the
Swiss also are determined to maintain their independence. "They
take their military training seriously."
Krauss-Maffei Wegmann, or KMW–the new German military technology
conglomerate–is marketing training products for armored vehicles.
KMW was created in 1999, from the merger of two of the country’s
leading defense manufacturers, Krauss-Maffei and Wegmann & Co.,
explained Stephan Straube, a KMW representative.
At its factories in Munich and Kassel, the combined company makes
a number of armored vehicles, including the Leopard family of main
battle tanks and the PzH 2000 Self-Propelled Howitzer. Nearly 8,000
Leopard 1 and 2 tanks have been fielded by 16 nations on three continents.
In Europe, Straube said, the Leopard 2 is in use from the Arctic
Circle to Gibralter.
KMW provides training and simulation products for its customers
in the areas of driving, maintenance, gunnery, and other combat
skills, Straube explained.
Air Defense
"One of our biggest projects is the air-defense gunnery and
combat simulator, the ASF/PLT-V," said Straube. "It is
used to train commanders and gunners of our Gepard and Cheetah Self-Propelled
Anti-Aircraft Guns (SPAAGs)."
This simulator, Straube said, recreates the vehicle’s battle
stations in a "highly realist manner." Up to seven simulator
cabins can be networked together, he said.
CAE Electronics Ltd., of Quebec, is focusing on tactical training
systems. One example is its three-channel, image-generating system,
dubbed Medallion. Exhibited at ITEC, this simulation showed a pilot’s
eye view of a training scenario involving a military helicopter
on a U.N. mission to protect refugees in a Kosovo-like setting.
The scenario was played out on three large screens, providing attendees–and
the pilot at the simulation controls–a panoramic and detailed
view of events. In the scenario, the helicopter comes upon a small
contingency of white U.N. vehicles about to be overrun by hostile
armor.
Real Terrain
The rolling, hilly terrain being portrayed is real, said the simulator’s
pilot, Mike Couch, a researcher at the U.S. Army Research Institute
at Fort Rucker, Ala. It is about 30 kilometers from Saint Tropez,
near the French Mediterranean.
"The [simulated] movement is very slow and boring," Couch
said. "That’s the way it should be. We like to sneak
in, hit our targets and sneak out."
Virtual Prototypes Inc. (VP)–a Montreal-based supplier of
software- development tools–has been promoting its Sequoia
Integrator for High-Level Architecture (HLA). Integrator is the
first product of VP’s Sequoia family of development tools
for simulation applications, explained Yvan Legacé, the firm’s
marketing director.
"Everybody’s looking at HLA," Legacé told
National Defense. Integrator for HLA, he said, is aimed at military
organizations and simulation-system developers who own older simulation
systems and are looking for a simple migration path to HLA.
The product consists of middleware software and tools for integrating
existing simulation applications within an HLA environment, Legacé
said. It provides a visual-model editor, a data exporter-importer
and runtime support.
In general, Legacé said, interest in simulation is picking
up. "Last year, for the first time," he said, "more
than 50 percent of our sales were in simulation."
Some exhibitors complained that this year’s ITEC wasn’t
as dynamic as previous years. "It’s been kind of slow,"
said Legacé. "There’s not been a lot of visitors–especially
from the defense ministries and military services."
Visitors might have been put off by a persistent band of demonstrators
holding forth at the entrance to the conference site, the Netherlands
Conference Centre. Waving large banners with slogans such as "Weapons
Trade in Disguise" and "ITEC War Traders–Top Criminals,"
protesters accosted people entering and leaving the conference.
They stained a pool outside the centre blood red.
Many attendees, however, said the protesters had no idea what the
conference was really about.
"The protesters thought this was an armaments show,"
said John Mills, ITEC’s public relations and marketing director.
"Mind you, we can simulate death and destruction, but our products
don’t actually kill anybody."
In any case, ITEC 2000–the 11th of its kind–was the
last to be held in The Hague, the medieval royal capital of the
Netherlands and seat of the United Nation’s International
Court of Justice. ITEC 2001 will be held in Lille, a major industrial
city in the north of France, midway between Paris and Brussels.