WASHINGTON — Geospatial intelligence specialist Maxar Technologies will keep developing immersive training and simulation software under terms of a newly announced U.S. Army contract.
Maxar on Feb. 27 said it was selected for an additional phase of prototype work on One World Terrain, or OWT, which compiles realistic and, in some cases, extremely accurate virtual maps of territory across the globe for military purposes.
A spokesperson told C4ISRNET the company can’t share the exact value of the deal “right now,” but said the latest phase “is worth tens of millions for a one-year” period of performance. Three phases of the OWT prototype project were previously said to be worth nearly $95 million.
The original OWT contract was awarded in 2019 to Vricon. Maxar acquired the data and analytics firm in 2020 for $140 million.
OWT is considered a critical component of the Army’s Synthetic Training Environment, or STE, which is meant to provide soldiers complex practice arenas that reflect real-life conditions near and far.
In the latest phase of work, dubbed 3b, Maxar will “focus on enhanced conflation with open-source geospatial data and enhanced training areas using multisource collection, high-resolution insets,” according to a company statement. In a previous phase, 3a, the company focused on improving 3D terrain fidelity and refining automation processes, among other tasks.
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“The evolution of OWT shows how 3D terrain and information services are becoming essential tools for planning and decision-making, not just for the U.S. Army, but for a wide range of military, civil and commercial institutions,” Tony Frazier, a Maxar executive vice president and general manager, said in a statement.
OWT was used on a small scale at the Army’s Project Convergence in 2020, Defense News reported, and was employed by more than a dozen systems at the same networking experiment in 2021.
Frazier described OWT as on track to becoming “the Army’s authoritative source for foundation geospatial content and terrain data — from training to operations and targeting.”
Maxar is the No. 78 largest defense company in the world when ranked by revenue, according to Defense News analysis.
Jen Judson contributed to this article.
Colin Demarest was a reporter at C4ISRNET, where he covered military networks, cyber and IT. Colin had previously covered the Department of Energy and its National Nuclear Security Administration — namely Cold War cleanup and nuclear weapons development — for a daily newspaper in South Carolina. Colin is also an award-winning photographer.
