BISim wins US Army OTA synthetic training extension

Bohemia Interactive Simulations (BISim), a developer of advanced military training and simulation software, won an Other Transaction Authority (OTA) extension from the U.S. Army to demonstrate technologies for a cloud-enabled, virtual world training capability to meet the requirements of the Army’s revolutionary Synthetic Training Environment (STE) initiative.

The goal of STE is to converge virtual, constructive and gaming training environments into a single, unified architecture. This project will let Army-wide simulation systems use a persistent virtual world for any training need, BISim says, including support for multi-domain operations incorporating cyber and space. Central to STE is a cloud-enabled One World Terrain (OWT) that will let warfighters conduct virtual training and complex simulations anywhere on a virtual representation of the Earth. OWT will leverage cloud technologies to deliver to the point of need, ensuring a common and high-fidelity whole-Earth terrain representation for different simulation systems.

BISim’s STE offering is made up of four core technologies suited to meeting future military simulation requirements (including U.S. Army requirements): a military-specific whole-earth game engine (VBS Blue), deterministic Artificial Intelligence (VBS Control), a geospatial terrain server (STEWS) and component-based development technology (GEARS).

“The U.S. Army’s vision for STE marks a monumental change in how they acquire, develop and deliver new simulation and virtual training technologies to soldiers,” said Pete Morrison, BISim’s Co-CEO and Chief Product Officer, who says the contract means the company is assisting the Army in developing innovative solutions that will shape the future of how virtual training is used to enhance operational readiness.