News Review: Boeing delivers HF Mod | ADM Jul 2010
Boeing Defence Australia’s Modernised High Frequency Communications System (MHFCS) has completed testing and been introduced into service with the ADF.
The project has been running several years late, though the core element was delivered in 2004 and has been operating since then.
Developed under Joint Project 2043 the MHFCS, more commonly known in Australia as HF MOD (for High Frequency Modernisation), is now recognised as the world’s most advanced high-frequency communications system.
The announcement of Final System Acceptance came on May 12.
Greg Combet, Minister of Defence Materiel and Science, said, “The purpose of the HF MOD is to provide the ADF with a secure, cost-effective information exchange capability for the command and control of deployed forces as a primary survivable system and as a parallel system to satellite communications.”
“Since late 2008, Boeing has achieved every milestone on or ahead of schedule, and we remain on track to complete all activities necessary to achieve the formal ‘project complete’ sign-off [in June],” Steve Parker, Boeing vice president and general manager for Network & Space Systems – Australia, said.
The MHFCS has exceeded its contractual requirements for both performance and availability, he said.
It automates many of the tasks required to establish and maintain long-range communication channels, giving it the capacity to change high-frequency communications on a global scale.
Boeing owns the Intelectual Property for the MHFCS system, Parker says, and has identified export opportunities for the system worth ‘multiple billions’ of dollars in North and South America, Europe and Asia.
He told reporters in Brisbane in May that Boeing Defence Australia is now the Boeing global Centre of Excellence for both HF communications and ground-based command and control systems, based on the performance of the Vigilare air defence command and control (C2) system which is due to undergo acceptance testing at the RAAF’s Northern Region Operations Centre (NORTHROC) at Tindal air base mid-year.