The Naval Surface Warfare Center, Crane Division, the naval laboratory and a field activity of Naval Sea Systems Command, held Silent Swarm 2024 from July 15 to 26 at the National All-Domain Warfighting Center in Alpena, Michigan.

The NAVSEA said Monday the two-week electromagnetic spectrum operations experimentation event was sponsored by the Office of the Undersecretary of Defense for Research and Engineering’s Integrated Sensing and Cyber division.

A total of 50 different technologies were featured during the annual event, which is in its third year. Only 17 technologies participated in the inaugural event in 2022, but that number doubled the following year.

Silent Swarm 2024 not only saw the influx of more technologies, it also welcomed more international partners. Australia and the United Kingdom were active since the planning stage while four more partner nations participated during the execution of the event.

Robert “Ice” Gamberg, project lead for Silent Swarm, noted that the event has grown larger and more complex since the maiden event. “It’s been an evolutionary change. We have matured our processes and we have a more diverse collection of technologies across multiple domains and participants from industry, government research labs, and academia this year.”

The U.S. Navy veteran added that the event was structured to allow for innovative excursions and teaming. “Silent Swarm execution highlighted the power of a collaborative environment focused on a central hypothesis to drive technical and tactical experimentation objectives.”

Gamberg cited a particular development as proof of the benefits of collaboration between participating teams. The project involved an uncrewed surface vessel using an uncrewed air vehicle and an unmanned underwater vehicle with all three platforms delivering electromagnetic spectrum operations capabilities.

“The teams were iterating, trying new ideas and creating unique partnerships and platform, payload pairings in real time,” said Gramberg.

Sondra Laughlin, deputy project lead for Silent Swarm, highlighted the event’s unique testing environment for the participants, saying “The multi-domain component at NADWC adds a significant dynamic environment for live experimentation. Unmanned underwater, surface, airborne, and ground vehicles together in one event…it’s fascinating. Innovation and execution of that level of learning environment is central to the success of Silent Swarm.”

Laughlin also pointed out that the organizers wanted participants to interact and create possible collaborations. “We’ve put intention into how participants can network with each other at Silent Swarm. There’s space and planned structure in the planning workshops to help them find complementary technology partnerships that can experiment together at Silent Swarm.”

Join the GovCon International Summit and learn about the evolving defense landscape from our esteemed guests. Register here.

The Defense Logistics Agency must “operate on a wartime footing” amid a strategic environment characterized by contested logistics, where adversaries continually challenge the efforts of the U.S. military “across all domains and at all levels, overseas and at home” and where enemies have gained the ability “to interdict, reduce, disperse and deny our ability to sustain at both operational and strategic levels,” according to U.S. Air Force Brig. Gen. Chad Ellsworth.

The commander of DLA Aviation made the remarks as part of his keynote address on the third day of the 18th annual Tinker and the Primes conference, which took place at the Reed Conference Center, near Tinker Air Force Base, from Aug. 5 through 8, according to a news article posted Tuesday on the DLA website.

The theme for this year’s conference was “Forging Readiness and Accelerating Innovation for Great Power Competition.”

In light of the changes to the security environment, “traditional models of operation may no longer suffice” and just as military services are “re-optimizing for great power competition,” so must the DLA evolve, Ellsworth said.

To help with this effort, Ellsworth, who had taken charge of DLA Aviation in July, called on industry partners for increased engagement to help identify capability gaps, improve contract delivery and ensure “a more resilient, agile logistics enterprise.”

The DLA official also called on partners in the military to share emerging threats and best practices and explore collaboration opportunities.

“By working together and supporting each other, we can overcome the challenges of a contested logistics environment and help guarantee the readiness of our forces,” Ellsworth said.

The initial round of the Department of Defense’s Rapid Defense Experimentation Reserve, or RDER, focused on transitioning commercial prototypes for service branches’ use has drawn over 200 proposals.

At least seven projects are already pipelined in the stepped-up technology acquisition, with surveillance and communication technologies dominating the funded lineup, according to a Breaking Defense report.

The RDER-funded efforts include the development of new systems for surveillance balloons, underwater communications and targeting nodes. Other projects consist of technologies geared at enhancing communications, sensors and technical capabilities of already-developed platforms, such as unmanned speedboats.

Heidi Shyu, under secretary of defense for research and engineering a Wash100 Award winner, announced in December that RDER will transition its first projects to production in fiscal year 2024.

The Pentagon has sought a $687 million RDER budget for FY 2024 and $450 million for FY 2025, with five RDER projects already included in the funding request.

DOD officials are considering support to an additional 11 first-round projects with the most potential, Shyu’s office disclosed. A second round of RDER screening on 51 projects is ongoing, with 25 prototypes already funded for field testing, the office added.