LONDON, England, 11 February 2005. Britain's Joint Rapid Reaction Force (JRRF) is receiving an advanced new communications network which will provide a greatly increased effective command and control capability for Royal Navy, Army and Royal Air Force units deployed anywhere in the world.
The multi-million pound secure system, known as Cormorant, uses the latest technology and is compact enough to be air-transportable, allowing communications to be quickly established between units and back to the UK as soon as the JRRF arrives in a foreign trouble spot.
The project, which is managed by the Abbey Wood based Theatre and Formation Communications Systems Integrated Project Team (TFCS IPT), will provide a step-change in the communications technology available to the Joint Task Forces Headquarters (JTFHQ) providing secure voice and data communications and supporting the ever increasing bandwidth demands of modern information systems.
Minister for Defence Procurement, Lord Bach, said: "The Strategic Defence Review identified the need for British Forces to be able to deploy rapidly anywhere in the world. This led to the creation of the JRRF, a highly mobile and potent force that can go anywhere in the world.
"When the force deploys it must do so rapidly, and it is key that it has good communications when it reaches its destination. The communications systems previously used by the JRRF were originally developed for use in the Cold War in Europe or bought ad-hoc. Cormorant will see the introduction of a state-of-the-art communications system that is light, flexible and secure -- an ideal communications system for the JRRF. I am also delighted that the Cormorant project is excellent news for British industry, creating or sustaining over 330 jobs in the UK, many in South Wales. "
The system was supplied by EADS based in Wales as part of a manufacture and support contract worth £114million over the first three years. The system, which was declared in-service last December, is expected to be in service for the next 20 years. For more information, see www.mod.uk or www.eads.net.
