Newcastle business Bohemia Interactive Simulations (BISim) has been subcontracted by Cole Engineering Services (CESI) to deliver significant components of the US Army’s next generation of collective training technology.
Key aspects of the contract will be delivered by BISim’s Australian business, Bohemia Interactive Australia, from the Hunter Region with the business reportedly doubling its engineering workforce and providing potential interoperability benefits to the ADF.
CESI recently announced it had been awarded the Training Simulation Software/Training Management Tools (TSS/TMT) contract and plans to utilise all three of BISim’s primary products (VBS4, VBS Blue IG and VBS World Server) as part of the overall TSS/TMT solution.
The US Army’s Synthetic Training Environment (STE), of which TSS/TMT supplies the central software capabilities, will be designed to allow units and leaders to conduct realistic, multi-echelon and multidomain combined arms manoeuvre and mission command, live, collective training anywhere in the world. TSS/TMT will aim to converge live, virtual and constructive capabilities in a single, easy-to-use interface. Military leaders and instructors will reportedly be able to set up complex virtual battles, coordinating with thousands of AI-powered allies, and fighting against artificially intelligent or instructor-controlled adversaries, with realistic AI behaviours and at theatre-wide scale. Soldiers will be able to repeat these training missions many times over, facing new challenges that will help them to better prepare for live training and enhance their readiness for operations.
“Our small team of Australian-based software and engineering experts will help to deliver this capability, which will be critical to ensuring the training and readiness of the US Army for future combat and operating scenarios," Bohemia Interactive Australia’s Managing Director Ryan Stephenson said. "This contract provides a through-life benefit for our Australian customers, as capability improvements made under international contracts like this are translated into software updates to products in service with the Australian Defence Force.
“The opportunity for Bohemia Interactive Australia to deliver this project locally will generate up to 15 new, skilled jobs in the Hunter region to deliver this capability to US forces.
"This contract will help build Australian sovereign capability in simulation training programs and bring interoperability benefits for the Australian Defence Force, who already operate a version of our VBS software.”
BISim first began working with the US Army on the STE-related programs in 2016 and, as prime contractor working with CESI and 4C, developed a prototype for a cloud-enabled, virtual world training capability under the OTA1 contract in 2018.
“BISim has invested tens of millions of dollars in upgrading and modularizing our technology in anticipation of STE-type requirements, and VBS4 already supports all of the Army’s Games for Training capabilities, representing over one hundred US Army-specific training uses,” BISim CEO Arthur Alexion said. “We are excited to bring BISim’s products and technical expertise in support of prime contractor CESI to jointly deliver the US Army’s next generation of virtual combat training technology in 2025.”