ThroughĬ-Flex, officers can take immediate action, control weaponry, and choose an appropriate response. C-Flex ties the ship’s sensory inputs together and is usually the first system to intercept incoming threats and inform officers. For any battle information system to contribute to the chain of command, it needs to integrate seamlessly with other systems, including third party ones.Ĭ-Flex is designed to be the system closest to battle and to contribute with situational awareness and decision support on the battleships. C-Flex: Closest to the Battleĭifferent levels of command require different information. In our experience, meeting face-to-face is the only way to make sure our solutions deliver according to the officers’ expectations. To ensure a continuously productive dialogue, we set up workshops and status meetings on a regular basis with participants from both DALO and the navy. When we have the specifications right and we place the actual order, close dialogue and collaboration with developers is still crucial for the end-product to be successful." “Dialogue is essential in all phases of development. The draft is then refined within a feedback loop between the three parties involved until the specifications match operational needs and until everyone involved has a clear and mutual understanding of the functionality objectives and the solution. After, we create a first draft of the specifications for the function. The development process for a new function begins with the briefing. This ensures the best and most precise transfer of information and gives the developers a better understanding of operational needs,” Bredsgaard Krogh explains. “In practice, we try to put operatives and DALO employees in the same room with engineers from Terma. This ensures that command-and-control systems are always ready to support the operations and missions the Danish Navy participates in. The other agreement between DALO and Terma is concerned with developing new capabilities and functions for C-Flex. It makes sense that Terma is responsible for investigating the root cause of any issue onboard, as the investigation often begins in C-Flex itselfĮffective Collaboration Yields Better System Development The role of the C-Flex system as an integrator between external data sources, intricate sensors, and compound weapons systems often makes the C2 system the first place where an issue is detected. On a battleship, the key challenge is to make complex systems communicate with each other. And we are always the first people to investigate an issue, fix it, or point out the third-party system causing the problem. In other words, Terma holds the responsibility for the entire system to work. The agreement includes a so-called “integration responsibility,” which simply means that any problem with any of the C-Flex vessels is Terma’s problem. According to Bredsgaard Krogh, the latter one makes it easier to keep the Danish fleet up to date. Knowing Who to CallĭALO and Terma have two agreements: a development agreement and a maintenance agreement. In my view, this kind of personal relationship between my staff, the operatives on our vessels, and the developers and engineers at Terma is critical for a prosperous partnership,” Bredsgaard Krogh says. A relationship, I find, relies on trust and respect for one-another. “We have a close relationship with the people at Terma. Bredsgaard Krogh heads the naval acquisition section at the Danish Ministry of Defence Acquisition and Logistics Organisation (DALO), and he and his staff have daily contact with We asked Michael Bredsgaard Krogh about how he sees the partnership with Terma. Today, C-Flex is in operation on the twelve largest vessels in the fleet, including the three ships in the frigate-class (Iver Huitfeldt). Since 1989, the Danish Navy has sailed with our C-Flex command and control solution on their largest vessels. For more than 30 years, the Royal Danish Navy has used Terma as their primary supplier of many different naval solutions varying from radar and sensor systems to effective self-protection products and entire command and control systems (C2).
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