Demonstrating through-life and NEC requirements for defence systems

There are two major transformations currently occurring that significantly impact acquisition and management of military systems. Network Enabled Capability (NEC) demands careful consideration of interoperability for delivered systems; new systems must be introduced such that they are interoperable with current systems and legacy systems must be managed (upgraded, modified etc.) such that interoperability is maintained and, preferably, enhanced. Eventually, NEC considerations should become ‘business as usual’, but for the time being special consideration is needed. The second transformation is the introduction of the concept of Through Life Capability Management (TLCM). Although new systems have always been planned with consideration of their maintenance etc., TLCM has a wider scope. It requires consideration not only of the individual systems’ life cycles, but of the management of the super system in which new systems will operate. The whole life costs, risks, and development must be considered by systems designers and owners. These transformations are linked; interoperability is a key requirement of TLCM. Through a concept mapping of TLCM, Yue & Henshaw (1) have shown that TLCM implies a need for new approaches (new thinking) in defence systems design and acquisition. Also TLCM requires the defence supply chain (industry) to have a changed engagement in the delivery and management of systems. This, in turn, requires changes to the industry-customer relationship, such that new approaches to collaboration are a vital ingredient necessary for adherence to TLCM principles. The NECTISE (Network Enabled Capability Through Innovative Systems Engineering: www.nectise.com) programme was a large academic-industry research programme (part sponsored by industry) to investigate the implications for systems engineering arising from NEC and TLCM considerations. The programme included ten UK universities, and industry technologists and systems engineers from land, sea, air, and C4I domains. NECTISE considered systems processes and approaches from all parts of the capability management process (planning, design, change, and realisation in military operations). A number of new tools and processes were developed and an important part of the programme was to demonstrate these in context and together. This demonstration was achieved through development of a scenario that considered the full systems acquisition and management process. By linking a set of vignettes with different timeframes it was possible to track an exemplar system through the planning to realisation and use stages. The scenario development drew heavily on the TTCP GUIDEx approach to defence experimentation; this enabled effective multi-disciplinary collaboration and integration of many different research threads. This paper will describe the scenario planning activity and outcome and illustrate the manner in which linked research outputs were integrated into a systems engineering demonstration. The importance of systems architecting, both to the demonstration and (more importantly) as a key underpinning skill for TLCM and NEC will be emphasised. The approach taken in this demonstration of research has implications for the approaches that should be taken for defence procurement decision making in a TLCM and NEC characterised acquisition environment. These are described and the implications of TLCM for decision making is also highlighted

Managing innovation: a multidisciplinary scenario development approach

The UK Ministry of Defence (MoD) is focusing on and shifting toward a Network Enabled Capability (NEC) approach for improved military effect. This is being realised through the physical networking and coherent integration of existing and future resources including sensors, effectors, support services, and decision makers. This paper is a case study (for NEC) of how the development and use of scenarios for demonstrating academic research can aid and help manage innovation. It illustrates the development, use and application of a multiple stakeholder scenario within the NECTISE research programme that helped establish and exploit a collaborative multidisciplinary working environment and how it helped manage innovative academic research. Our experience suggests that this approach can support the engagement of multiple stakeholders with differing perceptions and priorities and will provide a scenario development strategy for improved research and innovation for many other large systems

A reference ontology approach to support global product-service production

The need to innovate and compete drives organisations to constantly seek new approaches to facilitate business and commerce. As market places become ever more globalised and digital economies grow, these organisations rely more heavily upon systems to design and deliver their products and services. Hence, when developing and operating a global production network the need for systems to interoperate between different domains and contexts within a global production network becomes paramount if organisations are to succeed. This paper puts forwards a reference ontology that has been developed to enable the interoperation of software tools involved in the global production of new product-services systems (PSS). It sets out the levels of the reference ontology, detailing closely the product-service aspects. This has been developed using a formal logic based approach. An example knowledge base has been created from industrial end user information with queries applied to this to provide a set of results showing the ability of the reference ontology

An ontology supported risk assessment approach for the intelligent configuration of supply networks

As progress towards globalisation continues, organisations seek ever better ways with which to configure and reconfigure their global production networks so as to better understand and be able to deal with risk. Such networks are complex arrangements of different organisations from potentially diverse and divergent domains and geographical locations. Moreover, greater focus is being put upon global production network systems and how these can be better coordinated, controlled and assessed for risk, so that they are flexible and competitive advantage can be gained from them within the market place. This paper puts forward a reference ontology to support risk assessment for product-service systems applied to the domain of global production networks. The aim behind this is to help accelerate the development of information systems by way of developing a common foundation to improve interoperability and the seamless exchange of information between systems and organisations. A formal common logic based approach has been used to develop the reference ontology, utilising end user information and knowledge from three separate industrial domains. Results are presented which illustrate the ability of the approach, together with areas for further work

An ontology supported risk assessment approach for the intelligent configuration of supply networks

As progress towards globalisation continues, organisations seek ever better ways with which to configure and reconfigure their global production networks so as to better understand and be able to deal with risk. Such networks are complex arrangements of different organisations from potentially diverse and divergent domains and geographical locations. Moreover, greater focus is being put upon global production network systems and how these can be better coordinated, controlled and assessed for risk, so that they are flexible and competitive advantage can be gained from them within the market place. This paper puts forward a reference ontology to support risk assessment for product-service systems applied to the domain of global production networks. The aim behind this is to help accelerate the development of information systems by way of developing a common foundation to improve interoperability and the seamless exchange of information between systems and organisations. A formal common logic based approach has been used to develop the reference ontology, utilising end user information and knowledge from three separate industrial domains. Results are presented which illustrate the ability of the approach, together with areas for further work

'Good engineering governance': an issue for ergonomists

Engineering Governance can be summarised as two questions: 'Are we doing the right things?' and 'Are we doing those things right?'. It forms a part of Corporate Governance, and in the manufacturing domain it is the key to long-term survival amid changing commercial contexts. The paper will outline some of the ergonomics issues of importance in this topic; 'ownership' of goverrnance; implications for design, production and operation; and, perhaps most important for Ergonomists, the resulting implications for the design of jobs. These implications cover organisational discipline, the inclusion of suitable, 'effort-free' metrics in engineering processes, the allocation of responsibility and authority over resources, support for individuals, the need for trust and a culture of honesty and reliability, and the necessity for organisational follow-through