AT&T led a technology consortium using 5G and open radio access network (RAN) technology to test intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) capabilities for the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD).

The test used AT&T’s private 5G network platform, Fujitsu’s open RAN, and aerospace and defense company Northrop Grumman’s tactical data links to transmit ISR data and video for the DoD-focused “digital battle network."

“The Department of Defense [DoD] is working to digitally connect its space, air, land, sea, and cyber assets to help military commanders better communicate and share information in real time. This has also been described as a 'digital battle network,'" Lance Spencer, Client EVP-Defense at AT&T, explained to SDxCentral via email. "AT&T is working with collaborators in the defense and technology industries to test and prove advanced networking capabilities like commercially-provided 5G networking to help the DoD realize its digital battle network ambitions."

The collaboration looks to provide “a critical step” to building that network for multi-domain operations, Spencer added. “Military command, control, and communication systems use tactical data links to transmit, relay, and receive critical data in order to gain information superiority in the battlefield.”

According to Spencer, the DoD’s demand for 5G open architecture “is nascent but getting stronger,” which prompted AT&T partnering with Northrop to support the DoD’s Joint All-Domain Command and Control (JADC2) Implementation Plan. 

Spencer emphasized the second paragraph of the DoD’s statement in the plan, which articulates the need to “keep pace with the volume and complexity of data in modern warfare.” The plan therefore looks to enable the Joint Force to implement “automation, artificial intelligence (AI), predictive analytics, and machine learning (ML) to deliver informed solutions via a resilient and robust network environment.”

In the context of battle situations, where “every second counts,” Spencer says 5G’s nearly 100-times download speed improvement compared with legacy 4G LTE technology is essential, and that open RAN deployed at the network edge supports the network slicing use cases effectively to “enable secure and efficient over-the-air firmware upgrades.”

“Our collaboration with Northrop Grumman and AT&T highlights the benefits of the ecosystem underpinning of open RAN, enabling new configurations of mission critical communications networks," Fujitsu SVP Greg Manganello added. Fujitsu was recently cited as a leading open RAN vendor by Dell'Oro Group.