JP 9102 – the backbone that makes next-gen capabilities possible: Airbus

Space is often described as the ultimate high ground, in fact, it is the motto of Australia’s recently formed Defence Space Command, with many nations recognising the growing need for sovereign, integrated, and resilient space capabilities. 

While it will surely be superseded by the upcoming Defence Strategic Review, the 2020 Defence Strategic Update (DSU) highlighted the growing importance of space to Australia’s national security and multi-billion dollar, multi-decade investment in critical, tactical, and strategic defence capabilities — and one can be safe in assuming, space will only figure more strongly in the Defence Strategic Review. 

Viewing the 2020 Defence Strategic Update as a “foundation”, we get a better understanding of the capabilities the Commonwealth is eager to pursue and develop, with an emphasis on building and delivering true sovereign capability in country, with Australia’s growing space sector growing from strength to strength. 

The DSU emphasised a number of critical capabilities across the space domain that will become increasingly fundamental to the Australian Defence Force’s capacity to deliver “impactful projection” as identified by the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Defence Richard Marles at the launch of the Defence Strategic Review, namely:

• The government will significantly increase investment in Defence’s space capabilities, totalling nearly $7 billion in investment, to deliver  space situational awareness, including sensors and tracking systems;
• This also includes plans for a network of satellites to provide an independent and sovereign communications network and an enhanced space control program; and
• Additionally, the government will continue investment in space situational awareness, including sensors and tracking systems. 

At the core of this multi-billion investment is JP 9102 which will deliver a next-generation, transformational “sovereign satellite communications” capability for the Australian Defence Force — bringing the nation a strategic game changer and placing it among the ranks of a select few nations that possess such strategic capabilities. 

One of many contenders is the Airbus-led industry consortium, known as Team Maier, which draws on the operational experience, technical skill, manufacturing capacity, and economies of scale from across the team to present the Australian Defence Force with a unique opportunity that is focused on proven and future-proofed capability to survive in a contested operational environment. 

As part of its offering, Airbus and Team Maier’s supply chain will incorporate five indigenous businesses and 12 Australian small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) that will be onboarded into the Airbus supply chain, with a total of 43 SMEs receiving a technology readiness uplift to help compete in global markets — broadly equivalent to inclusion in the various global supply chain programs. 

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Building on this commitment to the Australian industry, Airbus and Team Maier have identified the significant economic impact their offering would have not just directly for the Australian economy, but specifically for enhancing the capacity, competitiveness, and resilience of Australia’s growing space sector. The company has identified a number of key initiatives, including: 

Skills and workforce development: 

• $12.5 million investment in educational facilities and learning opportunities; 
• A sustainable pipeline of local talent through 110 scholarships and 36 international scholarships to support the development of a globally competitive and capable space workforce; and
• 115 graduate, PhD, and VET scholarships. 

Innovation and R&D investment:

• $8.6 million five-year R&D program call for innovation projects – creating a continuous cycle of innovation;
• $16.6 million investment in JP 9102 payloads – accelerating space-specific innovation; and 
• $35.7 million investment in strategic national facilities for Australia – including satellite assembly, integration, and testing for harsh environments. 

Interoperability with the United States, the United Kingdom, and more broadly, NATO nations, is a critical component of the Team Maier offering, with Richard Franklin, managing director, United Kingdom, Airbus Defence and Space, explaining to Defence Connect the importance the company has placed on building true interoperability into the Team Maier offering for JP 9102, saying, “We run to NATO standards, our system is fully interoperable with the US and the WGS networks, and indeed our main customer for the repositioned SkyNet satellite over the Pacific is the United States Marine Corps — we demonstrated this when our carrier had 300 US Marines and 10 F-35Bs that required constant contact with the United States” during the Queen Elizabeth Carrier Strike Group’s Indo-Pacific tour in 2021. 

Bringing this capability into the Indo-Pacific, particularly during the Carrier Strike Group cruise, brought the capability into a contested environment which provided the company the opportunity to demonstrate its resilience, particularly in the face of active Chinese spoofing and interest in the capability, with Franklin adding, “We deployed through the Indian Ocean and got to the South China Sea, where China tried to show that it could project its force too and was really actively testing how we would respond. 

“That included into the SATCOM spectrum ... they were actively testing how we would react and would change our operations. We provided the comms with 100 per cent success throughout the operation and all the way back (to the United Kingdom) we had no loss of signals, no loss of terminals, and together, it was deemed an absolute success. We also learned an awful lot, we learned and had to test for things we haven’t faced for 10 years — this really helped shape the thinking of the design for this next generation of what in Australia is part of the JP 9102 program,” Franklin expanded.  

The final pillar for the Team Maier offering is an emphasis on sovereignty, from the workforce development and training, including the Defence personnel who will, like their British counterparts, be moulded, trained and developed into experienced space system operators by the Airbus-led team, through to the next-generation of engineers, infrastructure developers, and small-and-medium businesses that form part of the complex, yet thriving supply chain. 

Stephen Forshaw, Airbus chief representative, Australia, New Zealand and the Pacific, told Defence Connect, “It [sovereignty] is a decision to be made. I think Australia, an opportunity to have a sovereign capability and that is certainly what we would suggest from the operational sovereign capability, that is the ability to operate the system, the satellites, the comms without recourse to anyone else, and of course, the establishment, or rather furthering the development of a strong satellite capability.

“Our approach is very much to take the sovereignty approach, we’re very much a partner within Team Maier, working with partners like UGL and Blacktree Technologies,” Forshaw added. 

Building on these point, Forshaw highlighted the critical role the 9102 program will play in the future of the Australian Defence Force and the suite of capabilities planned and expected to be developed and delivered in the coming decades as a result of the findings and recommendations of the DSR and the outcome of critical security pacts, like the AUKUS agreement, telling Defence Connect, “ultimately, this will form the digital backbone of the ADF, it will give it a peerless capability to absorb, analyse and communicate critical information in a highly contested environment.”

Team Maier is the teaming arrangement led by Airbus Defence and Space to deliver next-generation military satellite communications (MILSATCOM) capability to Australia under the JP 9102 program.  Team Maier’s proposed solution is low-risk and battle-proven, based on the UK Ministry of Defence’s Skynet 6A system, which has already been deployed in support of UK Carrier Strike Group operations in the Pacific Ocean. 

It will be fully operable with systems used by the US, the UK, and other Five Eyes nations, as well as offering additional benefits that will enable the solution to be deployed as a two-satellite rather than a four-satellite system, helping the ADF to keep costs down.

Airbus Defence and Space is a highly experienced developer and operator of MILSATCOM capabilities, having managed the UK’s Skynet 5 capability since 2003. It has also delivered MILSATCOM capabilities for the Egyptian, French, German, Malaysian, Spanish, and the UAE governments.