Convoy Operations
with Manned-unMANneD Systems

COMMANDS aims to deliver the European ground forces a System of Systems able to provide a trustable and effective cooperation between different manned and unmanned assets.

It will contribute to the reduction of operational risks by enhancing the information superiority and manoeuvring capabilities of the European Armed Forces in accordance with the highest ethical standards.

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Project Description

COMMANDS will develop capabilities for agile, intelligent and cooperative manned and unmanned land systems.

The project “Convoy Operations with Manned-unManneD Systems” (COMMANDS) aims at developing Through Life Capabilities (TLC) for agile, intelligent and cooperative manned and unmanned land systems.

The results will not only enable to upgrade current ground vehicles of the EU inventory for specific missions, but also to be integrated in future vehicles in development.

COMMANDS is a development project selected by the European Defence Fund (2021 edition). It has received official support from six Member states: Cyprus, Greece, Italy, Lithuania, Poland and Spain. It will be implemented from 2022 to 2025.

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Project timeline

The COMMANDs project will last 36 months, starting on 1 December 2022. This period will be organised in 4 phases, in which 14 technical working groups will intervene.

Phase 1

Intelligent Behaviour and Ethics within Land Systems Operations.

Work packages involved: 5
Expected duration: 4 months

Phase 1 will organise the whole study under a Normative Framework offering an understanding of current and future trends for Intelligent Behaviour in Land Systems Capabilities and their enablers including Rules of Engagement and Ethics.

Accordingly, it will analyse the current state-of-the-art and set the requirements for the Business Case in Phase 4 where the Project Lessons Learned and Results will present a roadmap of development and exploitation within the EU.

Phase 2

Determine and assess the commonalities between land systems capabilities and technology insertion.

Work packages involved: 4
Expected duration: 8 months

Phase 2 will study all these capabilities and technologies in terms of their Modularity, Architecture, Autonomy, Safety, Security and Performance, focusing on a Human Centric Ethical approach to human factors and design of an Intelligent Digital Assistant (IDA) with an Adaptive Digital Twin that will act as the Interface between the Human Operator and the local or remote System.

Phase 3

Design a framework to demonstrate and early de-risk state-of-the-art Ground Close Combat Systems with intelligent capabilities.

Review and final organisation of Case Studies in line with Key Performance Indicators Metrics (KPIMs).

Work packages involved: 2
Expected duration: 18 months

Phase 3 is the phase where UGVT technologies are down- selected for prototyping development to be included in the mobile demonstrator. To do that a series of technology design and development, and testing activities will take place over a period of 18 months.

The focus will be on specific capabilities within a System of Systems approach for Intelligent Manoeuvrability, Intelligent Situation Awareness, Intelligent Integrated Survivability, intelligent Integrated HUMS, C4I Integrate Capabilities, Intelligent Command and Control and common UGVT across all capabilities.

Phase 4

Demonstrate the feasability and impact of advanced integrated technologies that are able to provide intelligent coherent capabilities.

Work packages involved:3

Expected duration: 6 months

Phase 4 targets the requirements set by the call; it aims to showcase UGVT state-of-the-art and upcoming innovative technologies and demonstrate their feasibility and the strategic advantage they offer by using them in tactical operations. It presents in a Laboratory Controlled environment innovative UGVT upcoming Intelligent Capabilities at different TRLs (4-7).

The Mobile Demonstrator presents State-of-the-art UGVT Intelligent Integrated Capabilities at TRL 6/7 using a Last Km Re-supply Convoy with Force Protection Scenario under different Vignettes with use cases that will take place in a controlled Trials and Demonstration site.

Project Consortium

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The nature of the work to be carried out requires a multidisciplinary team to cover the different aspects of the activity. Therefore, the Integrated Project Team (IPT) incorporates 21 consortium partners – 4 OEMs, 3 Mid-Caps, 8 SMEs and 6 RTOs – from 10 different countries across the EU. It is led by SENER Aerospace & Defence (project coordinator) and Vetronics Research Centre EU (technical coordinator).

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