Leonardo, all about the Space Cloud project for the Italian armed forces
What does the "Military space cloud architecture" study project assigned to Leonardo by the Teledife contract management of Segredifesa consist of for the development of a military space cloud architecture, the first in Europe.
A constellation of cyber secure satellites orbiting the Earth to provide a space cloud for Defense.
This is the objective of the "Military space cloud architecture" (Milsca) study project assigned to Leonardo by the Teledife contract management of Segredifesa as part of the national military research plan. The Italian aerospace and defense giant announced this today.
The project will provide the Italian government and military with high-performance computing, cloud and artificial intelligence (AI) and storage capabilities directly in space. For the first time in Europe, explains the note from the group led by Roberto Cingolani, similarly to what happens with the terrestrial cloud, the project intends to define a spatial architecture capable of providing government bodies and national armed forces with a computing capacity and high-performance storage directly in space.
On the other hand, the number one of the former Finmeccanica company recalled last week in a parliamentary hearing that "In 2017 I joined Leonardo, as head of technology, and I said that we were digitally behind. I made a proposal to the board of directors which was well evaluated on supercomputers, supercloud, fast interface and now we are among the top 3-4 in the world for cloud computing in Aerospace & Defense”.
And Leonardo's digital race is paying off, so much so that according to the company, the Space Cloud project for Defense also lays the foundations "for future uses to support civil Earth observation programs and space exploration missions towards the Moon and Mars which could in turn benefit from an in-orbit cloud computing architecture to download and process data more quickly.”
All the details.
WHAT THE SPACE CLOUD DEVELOPED BY LEONARDO WILL BE LIKE
The Space Cloud, which will be tested through the creation of a digital twin of the architecture, will be able to store over 100 terabytes of data generated on Earth and in space on board each satellite in the constellation. It will be able to perform processing with a power exceeding 250 TFLOPS (250 thousand billion operations per second) at single precision, adopting advanced algorithms, which exploit artificial intelligence, machine learning techniques and big data analysis and communicating and exchanging data autonomously with the other satellites.
THE TARGET
According to what the note from the Piazza Monte Grappa company indicates, "having a secure supercomputer and cyber archive system in space will in fact be able to guarantee users access to strategic data such as communication, earth observation and navigation data, everywhere, even in the most remote places, and at any time. Not only that, a Space Cloud system significantly reduces data processing times, processed directly in orbit, providing real-time information, thus facilitating multi-domain and multi-nation operations. Thanks to the transfer of only the information of interest to Earth, the transmission networks will be left free for other connections and the storage of data in orbit will also represent a useful back-up of the Earth centers most exposed to natural disasters".
IN COLLABORATION WITH THALES AND TELESPAZIO
The Space Cloud project sees Leonardo at the forefront with the participation of the two space joint ventures with the French Thales: Telespazio (made up of 67% by Leonardo and 33% by Thales) and Thales Alenia Space (made up of 67% by Thales and 33% of Leonardo). In this regard, it should be remembered that Cingolani anticipated last October that the company was working on increasing the weight of satellite production in the Thales Alenia Space joint venture and for this reason had started talks with the French Thales.
THE ROADMAP OF LEONARDO'S SPACE CLOUD
With a duration of 24 months, the study includes a first phase for the definition of the system architecture and a second phase which will end with the development of a digital twin of the satellite with the HPC together with the demonstrator of the multi-constellation satellite terminal for simulate, in a digital environment, the different application scenarios.
THE ROLE OF DAVINCI-1
These tests will be carried out thanks to Leonardo's supercomputer, the davinci-1. In Genoa, in the Fiumara Tower, the Italian giant has installed the davinci-1 , Leonardo's new supercomputer included among the top 100 in the world for computing power and performance. The Piazza Monte Grappa company has invested 8 million euros in the supercomputer. Leonardo's davinci1 High Performance Computer is equipped with an architecture that integrates the flexibility of the cloud with supercomputing capabilities and cybersecurity technologies.
Returning to Milsca, the study will be a precursor to a further experimental phase which, if confirmed, will involve the deployment of a constellation of demonstration satellites in orbit.
FIRST PROJECT IN THE FOLLOWING OF LEONARDO'S NEW INDUSTRIAL PLAN
Finally, Space Cloud is a hi-tech and multi-domain project, which exploits Leonardo's combined capabilities in data acquisition, management and cyber protection, Artificial Intelligence and supercomputing with the davinci-1 HPC. As the company note underlines, the development of Milsca is the first project in the Space domain that fits within the growth guidelines of Leonardo's new Industrial Plan. The latter, whose two pillars will be based on cybersecurity and space as announced by CEO Cingolani , will be presented on 29 February to the board of directors and from early March to international markets.
“In a multi-domain scenario, management, security and rapid exchange of an ever-increasing amount of data, much of which is tactical, become strategic elements for the country's defense. We will be the first in Europe to develop a Space Cloud project – commented Simone Ungaro, Leonardo's Chief Innovation Officer – demonstrating feasibility and benefits deriving from the use of an architecture of this type and enabling a new paradigm of cloud & edge computing . Leonardo's know-how will allow the development of a Space Cloud network to contribute to digitalisation and technological innovation processes, responding to the challenges of the future to guarantee the needs of government bodies and national Armed Forces".
This is a machine translation from Italian language of a post published on Start Magazine at the URL https://www.startmag.it/innovazione/leonardo-tutto-sul-progetto-space-cloud-per-le-forze-armate-italiane/ on Mon, 19 Feb 2024 15:15:22 +0000.