Collins Aerospace Unveils Game-Changing Air Launched Effects in Showcase for Army’s Future Vertical Lift Initiative

Collins Aerospace has effectively showcased an immediately available Mission Systems solution to aid the functions of Air Launched Effects (ALE) from Army Aviation’s Enduring and Future Vertical Lift (FVL) fleet. Comprising an aerial vehicle, various payloads, and a Mission System, these ALE represent a vital component of the FVL aircraft’s capability to enhance the organic range, lethality, and survivability of manned systems with Operator-on-the-Loop autonomy.

The RapidEdge™ Mission System showcased by Collins serves as the central processing unit of the system and incorporates communication radios, solutions for managing various classifications of data, mission computing capabilities, and autonomous functionalities for ALE.

Throughout the demonstration, Collins’ equipment situated in a lab in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, was linked to the hardware at the company’s newly established Customer Experience Center in Huntsville, Alabama. The RapidEdge™ Mission System expertly executed tactically significant ALE actions while communicating through a cross-domain multi-level security framework. The company’s Mission System empowers multiple ALEs to function as a collaborative unit with synergistic abilities while simultaneously alleviating pilot workload. Moreover, the open system design facilitates the seamless integration of an array of payloads and datalinks.

“We developed our RapidEdge™ Mission System solution for this sector with a robust and resilient open systems strategy at an elevated technological and manufacturing readiness level,” stated Heather Robertson, vice president and general manager, Integrated Solutions for Collins Aerospace. “The offering is set to satisfy the Army’s demanding program timeline while providing critical capabilities to the warfighter.”

Further verification of this high readiness level was illustrated by the recent live flight of the Collins Mission System solution while physically integrated into the Altius-700 aerial vehicle from Area-I, reaffirming the capability to deliver a solution in alignment with the Army’s FVL timeline.