A decade and a half after contracting for a new ground control system to manage its GPS satellites, the Pentagon has finally gotten its hands on the thing.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The Space Force officially took ownership of the GPS Next Generation Operational Control System, or OCX, from contractor RTX on July 1.\u00a0\t\t<\/p>\n
Accepting OCX does not mean it is already being used operationally, however. Integrated systems testing and readiness exercises must follow first. But if all goes well, OCX will enter operations late this year, said Col. Stephen Hobbs, commander of Mission Delta 31.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Hobbs\u2019 Delta, which operates the GPS constellation, worked with Space Systems Command on transition exercises, trials, and rehearsals prior to acceptance, he said in a release<\/a>.\u00a0The update is key to enabling enhancements like anti-jamming, improved accuracy, and secure geolocation using M-Code.\u00a0<\/p>\n It has been a long<\/a> and arduous<\/a> road to develop OCX, which began<\/a> with prototyping contracts back in 2007. In 2012, the Air Force estimated that OCX would enter operations by June 2017 with a program cost of $3.7 billion, per the Government Accountability Office<\/a>. If current estimates<\/a> hold, it will enter service in December with a program cost of $7.7 billion.\u00a0<\/p>\n The Air Force selected Raytheon to build the system in 2012; by 2016, delays and extra costs had mounted so much that the Air Force had to declare a Nunn-McCurdy breach, indicating \u201ccritical\u201d cost and schedule overruns. Even after the program was certified to continue, delays continued.\u00a0<\/p>\n Raytheon, now called RTX, delivered a \u201cBlock 0\u201d capability in 2017, which was limited to launch, checkout, and testing for use on the first GPS III satellites. It took eight years more to deliver Blocks 1 and 2, which enable command and control of the satellites. \u00a0\t\t<\/p>\n Former space acquisition executive Frank Calvelli called OCX \u201ctroubled,\u201d an \u201calbatross,\u201d and a \u201cproblem child.\u201d The scale and complexity of the project wer what caused oll the delays. Trying to create an entirely new, very large software system all in one go is now viewed as an outdated approach, compared to modern software practices which favor breaking down development work into manageable \u201csprints\u201d and making rapid, iterative updates.\u00a0 <\/p>\n Cordell DeLaPena, program executive officer for military communications and position, navigation, and timing, called OCX the \u201chardest\u201d program he\u2019s ever worked in his 25-year career.\u00a0<\/p>\n The next phase for OCX is already underway: Block 3F will enable it to control new GPS III Follow-On satellites, expected to start launching in 2027. In its 2026 budget request, the Space Force asked for $70.9 million to work on Block 3F, as part of a ramp-up in \u201csoftware development and factory testing.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A decade and a half after contracting for a new ground control system to manage its GPS satellites,…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":69440,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[24],"tags":[29540,48981,48982,48983,25592,159,783,48984,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-69439","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-space","8":"tag-gps","9":"tag-gps-modernization","10":"tag-mission-delta-31","11":"tag-ocx","12":"tag-rtx","13":"tag-science","14":"tag-space","15":"tag-space-systems-command","16":"tag-united-states","17":"tag-unitedstates","18":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/114867665839772161","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/69439","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=69439"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/69439\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/69440"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=69439"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=69439"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=69439"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}