The U.S. Army’s Program Executive Office Intelligence, Electronic Warfare and Sensors has approved the Mounted Assured, Positioning, Navigation and Timing System Generation, or MAPS GEN, II for full-rate production.
The PEO IEW&S clearance allows the Project Manager Positioning, Navigation and Timing’s Mounted PNT product office and its partner vendor, Collins Aerospace, to move forward with the manufacturing and deployment phase of MAPS GEN II, the Army said Tuesday. The office will also prepare the technology for initial operating capability.
Table of Contents
Culmination of ‘Hard Work and Dedication’
Lt. Col. Damian Dixon, product manager at Mounted PNT, attributed the achievement to “team effort,” noting the production approval was secured after more than “six years of hard work and dedication.” “We remain committed to collaborating with Collins Aerospace as we move into this next phase for MAPS GEN II,” Dixon added.
Combat Operations in GPS Degraded Environments
MAPS GEN II employs sensor fusion algorithms and non-radio frequency sensors to distribute PNT data, supporting combat operations in environments with degraded or denied military GPS. It will allow Army ground soldiers to maneuver, shoot and communicate, and supply PNT data to clients on a single platform.
In August 2024, Collins Aerospace secured a $96.8 million contract to deliver MAPS devices, which will be installed in ground vehicles, watercraft, munition systems and other platforms operated by the Army and the Marine Corps.
Related Articles
Gregory Barbaccia, federal chief information officer and a 2025 Wash100 awardee, has shared his insights on how the federal government should advance digital transformation. “I notice a lot of the government considers itself to be ‘digital,’ but in reality, we’ve only digitized, not transformed. Sure we went 0-1, but that should have just been the beginning,” Barbaccia wrote in a LinkedIn post. He noted the lack of automation and that workflows remain unchanged despite the replacement of paper ledgers with spreadsheets. “Files are shared over email instead of through real-time collaboration tools,” he added. Advancing Digital Transformation in Federal Government
The Federal Communications Commission has adopted new rules that seek to eliminate unnecessary paperwork and address regulatory barriers to the ground-station-as-a-service, or GSaaS, business model as part of efforts to drive innovation in the U.S. space economy. FCC said Thursday the new rules establish a process for ground station operators to secure a baseline license without first identifying a satellite point of communication. A simple FCC notification will be required for each new point of communication. According to FCC, the change would eliminate nearly half of earth station modification applications. “Making the smallest change to a satellite system or earth
The General Services Administration has announced a OneGov agreement with Amazon Web Services that will provide up to $1 billion in direct incentive credits to federal civilian agencies. According to GSA, the direct incentive credits, aggregated across the agencies, will include savings on core AWS cloud services through AWS credits, infrastructure and application technologies modernization through AWS modernization credits, access to AWS training and certification through training credits and a streamlined engagement model with greater savings for direct contracts through direct partnerships. Advancing America’s AI Leadership The agreement is expected to accelerate large-scale IT transformation and boost AI innovation across