Forging Secure Communications
for Mission Effects in the Battlespace
As a global leader of wireless communication, Domo Tactical Communications (DTC) prides itself on developing leading edge communication technologies for successful operations in demanding environments. Steve Beeching, Senior Vice President and MD, Europe and the Middle East, and Andrew Dobson, Business Unit Director, Military, talk to Soldier Modernisation about how the market is changing and what DTC is doing to stay abreast of the demands and challenges of the global geopolitical situation.
For Steve Beeching, the current geopolitical situation means a frenetic fight for information and data advantage. From the speed at which such information is gained to the accuracy of that information. “We're very engaged in the Information power struggle down to the tactical edge where interference, electronic warfare and various other elements are playing a large role in how we deliver information and data advantage into the hands of users. This is critical to support making the best decisions which are often time sensitive, whether that be kinetic or non-kinetic, or influencing the grey zone,” he tells Soldier Mod. “Threat actors are moving faster than ever before. The pace of change and the ability to deploy into these regions has never been so rapid, demanding abilities to securely communicate across joint friendlies and forces, across continents as well as perform within deployed isolated and contested environments. At DTC and Codan, these user mission demands are driving us to support advantage in power competition, where we focus on information advantage for our users at the speed of relevance.”
Its focus on a customer-facing approach means DTC not only sees their customer's challenges but can evolve in line with them, explains Andrew Dobson. In addition, the company's size and agility makes it well placed to adapt and innovate at pace.” We have a good background in being agile and creating resilient technologies that meet the immediate threat. It's almost like a game of cat and mouse. We develop something, it gets combated, we do remediation work, so things are changing on a weekly basis.”
Examples of that highly-adaptive way of working and being focused on providing mission outcome solutions at pace - include DTC's development of the smallest ultra-low SWaP UAV 2x5W radio as well as the provision of a communications link from Hawaii to the US West Coast with a single watt. The DTC DNA ensures we're trying to look at things that matter for users, to develop them at pace and deliver them straight away,” says Beeching. “This iterative business approach is not really about just innovating the best technology, it's about innovating solutions that deliver the outcomes needed for customers' missions. Our sustaining experience across many tactical environments along with the closeness in which we work with users (in these environments), is allowing us to focus, invest heavily and to rapidly provide these world-leading solutions ready for deployment.”
DTC's operation across its four market verticals, including non-military, allows it to create, an 'overview of network demands and capabilities', explains Beeching. “For example, the demands of supporting some of the world's largest sporting events across the globe provides invaluable expertise that adds to the company's ability within the battlespace. Furthermore, it ensures that our approach to make rapid incremental changes reflects leading commercial technology into the emerging aspects and pace of change in the battlespace. Beeching continued “one of the most important recent evolutions is our move to a multi -waveform solution. Whilst DTC own's and develops waveforms, we have growing cooperation between our partners in the sector and an ability to now offer third party waveforms on our solutions solely aimed at creating benefits for the user.”
While the backdrop against which companies like DTC operate is in constant flux, some things remain constant - including the company's values, which both Beeching and Dobson attribute to its success and ability to keep up with the changing geopolitical situation. “Every conversation is based around putting the customer at the centre of what we do and being relevant to them; trying to meet their challenges and being as agile as we can in order to do it,” confirms Dobson. “We take each customer individually and develop against their needs into a common platform so others can get the benefit from it.” On top of that, the drive to be mission outcome-focused reduces the potential for over-engineering and delays. “We want to create solutions at the speed of relevance,” clarifies Beeching. “So, whilst there's more conversation in industry around new ways of working, DTC is already delivering against processes of, 'how do we do spiral-iteration and deploy prototypes early to users, take feedback that evolves them moving forward whilst maximising sustainability for forward and backward compatibilities. The requirements don't need to provide the challenges or costs of renewing entire networks each time.” He continued “I believe all these things are at the core of our business, it's in our DNA, it's our Be Brilliant behaviours - we collaborate to be ahead of the adversary and our trusted partnerships focus on attaining tactical advantage for customers.”
The trust and honesty developed in these partnerships encourages our customers to be more receptive to an iterative solutions-driven way of working, as proving true capabilities is key to staying ahead in the current geopolitical situations, says Beeching. “Look at what's happening in some of the conflicts at the moment. It's less about traditional air superiority and mass manoeuvres, it's much more deployed and emergent. Communications need to be integrated, resilient and manoeuvrable, it's responsiveness and agility to deploy capabilities that effectively realise mission effects and protect lives. The changing face of conflicts means a new paradigm of industrial engagement: it begins with the way in which we support each other, how industry engages with customers and industrial shift to outcome-based deliveries. The process is moving in this direction, albeit slower than desired, it also needs our customers to be more receptive to outcome driven requirements and solution bake-offs rather that detailed specifications and traditional paper tenders. It's not about specifying solutions but more, 'Please give me this outcome, on this date, to deliver a capability that achieves this....'. It's always an interesting conversation with users when we surmise that, 'I can't image when Elon was asked to fly astronauts to space, that he was provided a specification for the whole mission from suits to the rocket. Can you image the effort and detail, rather than empowering industry to do it the best way and achieve delivering people to space and back again safely'. The outcome evolution empowers innovation to give the right and best capability much faster. When we all start to work this way, it demands those deep trust relationships, open conversations, and that solutions are in a constant state of change but in a more sustainable manner and not technically over engineered. When we get to this value way of capability delivery, and acceptance of these different process, I'm sure we'll all look back and ask why it took so long to adapt this new paradigm of working ways.”
With a determination to stay one step ahead of the game, DTC is already looking to the future and how the sector might have to develop. For Dobson that means a level of automation in some of its processes. “We want to take the human out the loop within the battlefield - not in every aspect, but certainly within the configuration, deployment and network management. We want to create adaptive networks to threats without a human in the loop and I don't think we're far away from it. We're doing the groundwork now, we're doing the integration points, and we're working with partners to understand some of those standards and requirements.”
For Beeching, the future could potentially hold “deployed network clouds within clouds - think of it as communication abilities that reflect the teams of teams approach within most successful organisations. I see the ability to operate totally isolated within your own deployed cloud, to be able to do all the compute you need, including AI and the machine learning, and then connect to other networks at pace to share, then rapidly disconnect given the environment and threats.” This vision empowers providing the full benefit of data and information - all at pace - in the most useful manner for customers”” he says. “Every part of what we do is always leading to creating that network of networks, the integration, the ease of use-by-user. And that's our aim, to provide the right solution, as simple as possible to use, but always ahead of adversaries, business challenges and other elements that affect our eco-system.”
From Soldier Mod's discussion with Steve Beeching and Andrew Dobson, it's clear that Domo Tactical Communications (DTC) is not just responding to the evolving demands of the military sector but actively shaping its future. The interview underscored DTC's deep understanding of the current geopolitical challenges, particularly the race for data and information superiority, and its commitment to enabling users with solutions that are timely, practical, and mission focused.
DTC's emphasis on customer collaboration and rapid innovation allows it to adapt seamlessly to ever-changing threats, exemplified by technologies like ultra-low SWaP radios and adaptable communication networks. Their proactive approach, which includes fostering industry partnerships and envisioning the integration of autonomous systems and modular cloud networks, reflects a forward-thinking strategy that prioritizes speed, adaptability, and operational outcomes. What stands out most is their ability to translate complex challenges into actionable, user-centred solutions, ensuring that DTC remains a trusted partner in navigating the complexities of modern warfare.
For more information please visit:
https://domotactical.com
