The U.S. Air Force has awarded Lockheed Martin a 2-year, $24.7 million contract to continue development of a web-enabled mission execution system that will allow Joint battle commanders to work together to carry out battlefield strike missions in real time.

The Web-Enabled Execution Management Capability (WEEMC) is designed to allow numerous commanders to collaboratively plan and execute time-sensitive strike missions, as well as search and rescue efforts. The system will link Army, Navy, Air Force, Marine, and Special Operations systems into a unified application, giving warfighters instant, integrated access from any command and control location, including Navy ships, Air Operations Centers (AOCs), or forward deployed command posts.

"Planning and executing a Joint fires mission takes numerous warfighters working together to quickly assess the situation, determine the right course of action, and forward the mission plan to the right friendly units in the field," said Spider Richardson, Lockheed Martin's vice president of command and control systems. "WEEMC makes that collaboration faster, easier and more accurate than ever, giving commanders a common targeting and execution system they can tap into from anywhere on the battlefield."

WEEMC's web-based infrastructure allows more users to access the system from more locations, and also cuts down significantly on the amount of specialized hardware and software required to run the application. WEEMC is also built on the latest standards for net-centric technologies, and is fully compliant with the future Global Information Grid and Net-Centric Enterprise Services architectures. The system's open architecture enables machine-to- machine interfaces with numerous other current and future battle management applications. WEEMC will be fielded with the Global Command and Control System - Joint and the Command and Control Personal Computer.

In addition to an improved net-centric architecture, WEEMC offers additional mission coordination management applications that are not available today. Warfighters from all services will be able to collaborate in near-real time on combat search and rescue, special operations forces, and intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) missions.

The contract was awarded under the Air Force's Network-Centric Solutions (NETCENTS) contract, a potential $9 billion indefinite delivery / indefinite quantity contract awarded to Lockheed Martin and other prime contractors in September of 2004.

Headquartered in Bethesda, Md., Lockheed Martin employs about 130,000 people worldwide and is principally engaged in the research, design, development, manufacture and integration of advanced technology systems, products and services. The corporation reported 2004 sales of $35.5 billion.

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SOURCE: Lockheed Martin