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Next Generation Sonobuoys - Ultra Maritime - June 2024

Ultra Maritime Receives $99 Million Other Transaction Agreement from U.S. Navy for Q53H Sonobuoys

COLUMBIA CITY, Ind. – Ultra Maritime has been awarded a Sole Source Firm Fixed Priced contract in the amount of $99,999,738.00 for the AN/SSQ-53H Sonobuoy Low Rate Initial Production (LRIP) for the Navy in support of annual training, peacetime operations and testing expenditures, as well as, to maintain sufficient inventory to support the execution of major combat operations based on naval munitions requirements process.    

“With our LRIP award for the Q53 sonobuoys, we at Ultra Maritime are honored to play a pivotal role in advancing anti-submarine warfare capabilities for the U.S. Navy and our allied nations,” expressed Ed Cook, Vice President and General Manager of Ultra Maritime U.S. “Our dedicated team of engineers and manufacturing experts work tirelessly to rapidly design, test and deliver hundreds of thousands of sonobuoys annually, reinforcing naval defense operations globally. This commitment underscores our unwavering dedication to enhancing maritime security and safeguarding international waters.”

Ultra Maritime recently made the largest investment in company history for a more streamlined production capability and reliable delivery of these new sonobuoys. The company offers a full range of sonobuoys and is the only manufacturer of G size (half-size) buoys used internationally.

Ultra Maritime Announces Liz Baker as Vice President of International Business Development

Ultra Maritime is pleased to announce Liz Baker has joined our team as the Vice President of International Business Development, reporting to Mark Kenny, Senior Vice President of Strategy, Technology and Business Development. In this role, Liz will oversee the strategy and execution of partnerships for all Ultra Maritime lines of business in NATO countries and other international markets.

“I am delighted to be joining Ultra Maritime as Vice President of International Business Development at such an important time for our business and when Ultra Maritime’s solutions have such a significant role to play in protecting us and our allies around the globe,” said Liz.

Liz joins Ultra Maritime following nine years with Thales in the UK, where she was responsible for all UK Exports, successfully guiding the organization towards its largest ever export win and order intake. Latterly, she focused on domestic and export sales in the Under Water Domain for Thales in the UK, as well as running the company’s relationship with BAE Systems. Prior to this, Liz led government campaigns in the UK for Airbus Defence & Space, and worked as a consultant for other major defense primes including QinetiQ and General Dynamics.

Liz holds a Masters in Natural Sciences from Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, and a diploma from the Chartered Institute of Marketing. She is a fluent French speaker and has lived in Europe and Asia. Welcome aboard Liz, we are delighted to have you as part of the Ultra Maritime team!

Next Generation Sonobuoys - Ultra Maritime - June 2024

Ultra Maritime Receives $49 Million Other Transaction Agreement from U.S. Navy for Q62 Next Generation Sonobuoys Under the Naval Aviation Systems Consortium

Ultra Maritime Receives $49 Million Other Transaction Agreement from U.S.
Navy for Q62G Sonobuoys under the Naval Aviation Systems Consortium

Ultra Maritime is the first and only qualified provider of the Q-62 and Q-53 sonobuoys.

COLUMBIA CITY, Indiana – July 29, 2024 – Ultra Maritime has been awarded a Sole Sourced Firm Fixed Priced contract in the amount of $49,000,000.00 for the AN/SSQ-62G Sonobuoy Low Rate Initial Production (LRIP) for the Navy in support of annual training, peacetime operations and testing expenditures, as well as to maintain sufficient inventory to support the execution of major combat operations based on naval munitions requirements process.

USS Fitzgerald with Ultra Maritime NGSSR

USS Fitzgerald Successfully Completes Sea Trials with Next Generation Radar

Photo credit to the official USS Fitzgerald (DDG 62) Facebook

The USS Fitzgerald (DDG 62) recently completed sea trials, equipped with Ultra Maritime’s cutting-edge AN/SPS-73(V)18 Next Generation Surface Search Radar (NGSSR). This state-of-the-art radar system, built on a software-based architecture, prioritizes safe navigation, surface search, and periscope detection capabilities. NGSSR represents the pinnacle of surface search radar technology, incorporating lessons learned from the 2017 collisions involving USS Fitzgerald (DDG 62) and USS John S. McCain (DDG 56). With its versatile and software-defined features, NGSSR replaces the Navy’s current AN/SPS-67, legacy variants of AN/SPS-73, BridgeMaster E-series, and commercial-off-the-shelf radars.

Ed Cook, Vice President/General Manager of Ultra Maritime US, emphasized, “Following the tragic incidents involving the USS Fitzgerald and USS John S. McCain, our dedicated team at Ultra Maritime worked tirelessly to provide the U.S. Navy with a crucial technical solution for enhanced navigation safety. The successful deployment of NGSSR on board the USS Fitzgerald not only marks a significant milestone for our program but also highlights the unwavering dedication, persistence, and collaboration between Ultra Maritime and the Navy. We take immense pride in our purpose, which is to protect our Navy and Nation through innovative, mission-ready solutions.”

Quantum computers - innovation that matters

Innovation That Matters: Unlocking Real Value From Your Technology Investments

As the Chief Technology Officer for a company whose purpose is ‘innovating today for a safer tomorrow’ it probably comes as little surprise that I am never far away from the topic of innovation.

As our teams work to ensure decision advantage for our customers in some of the world’s most demanding situations, we must constantly interrogate whether the solutions we are developing will truly solve their most complex challenges. Because if they don’t, they hold little value – however compelling they might seem. What we are constantly striving for is innovation that matters.

But when we think about what such valuable innovations look like, it quickly becomes clear that there is no single answer. Instead, we see several distinct ‘types’ of innovation. And while their goals are the same – delivering new and useful capabilities – they each come with their own specific challenges that must be overcome:

Technology-Led Innovation

When people picture innovation, it is usually of the technology-led variety. Typically this starts with a new technology being created, maybe a new metamaterial or advanced algorithm. Scientists and entrepreneurs then look for applications for the technology – and not always with immediate success.

An excellent example of this today is quantum computing. The field currently attracts significant commercial and academic investment, and it is easy to see why. The promise of the quantum bit (qubit) sits at least on par with the invention of the first transistor in its significance, with systems able to solve problems that are impossible for the class of computers we possess today.

Commercially, it is broadly assumed that the advent of operationally relevant quantum computers will have a profound impact on industries as far ranging as finance, drug design, logistics, and cyber security. But the key word here is assumed. We are at such an early stage in the technology’s development that it is hard to argue that such commercial use cases are little more than (educated) guesses based on what we think the systems will be capable of.

Timing can also be an issue. Known quantum applications, such as Peter Shor’s proof that a quantum computer could crack prime factorization-based encryption exponentially quicker than any classical computer, could require a device containing millions or billions of qubits. Today’s best machine has 127.

We’ve already seen what this can lead to: artificial intelligence has already been through several so-called ‘AI winters’ when early predictions of its potential have not been quickly realised. Only now, with the right convergence of algorithm, compute power, and data have widely usable AI applications begun to emerge. This begs the question of whether we are due a similar ‘quantum winter’.

None of this is to say that quantum computing won’t reach commercial viability, but this is key to technology-led innovation’s challenges: how long that takes and the applications that can actually be realised remain uncertain. There is little to reassure us that quantum computing will have a true value generating application in the foreseeable future.

It is 25 years away, promise. Some of the most compelling new technologies can remain frustrating just out of reach (Credit: xkcd)

As this example shows, the challenges with operationalizing technology-led innovation in a corporate setting are twofold:

  1. high failure rate: the technology is simply not yet a feasible alternative to current solutions, and
  2. low uptake rate: what we call the ‘valley of death’ for technology innovation

These challenges make technology-led innovation unpalatable to undertake for most companies. But with the exciting potential of so many technology-led innovations clear to see, how can companies effectively utilize them while avoiding the issues above? One good approach is to form strategic partnerships with those who specialize in technology-led innovation across domains the company cares about.

As an example, at Ultra we have created the Resilient Machine Learning Institute (ReMI):  a collaboration between Ultra, École de Technologie Supérieure (ETS), and McGill University. ETS and McGill bring cutting-edge AI/ML capabilities being developed in an environment that is happy to work on technology with a high failure rate and long timeframes. Ultra brings domain knowledge and an ability to deliver the technology into the hands of operators. With this partnership, we are able to successfully deliver technology-led innovations that possess real value for our customers.

User-Challenge Driven Innovation

User-challenge driven innovation is perhaps the type of innovation that most corporate R&D programs attempt to employ. Here the innovation is driven by some insight into unmet or undermet user needs. These innovations can certainly be emergent or disruptive technology, but can just as easily be readily available commercial off the shelf (COTS) technology simply integrated in a clever way.

I like to specifically call out undermet needs; often there is already a solution to the user’s needs in place, but this shouldn’t scare off corporate investments if insight shows the user’s needs are not completely satisfied.

One of the best examples of user-challenge led innovation to solve some undermet user need is the original iPhone. Before its launch, many argued that the iPhone would flop because the consumers’ needs were being adequately met with existing products. They already made calls with a cell phone, took photos with digital cameras, and listened to music on mp3 players like the company’s popular iPod. But Apple sensed an opportunity and their instinct was correct. Consumers did indeed want an integrated platform with an easy to use UI/UX and the rest is history.

Uncertain beginnings: many weren’t convinced the original iPhone would be a success (Marian Weyo / Shutterstock.com)

We usually see two reasons for failure when companies attempt user-challenge driven innovation:

  1. lack of customer intimacy within the product design/engineering teams
  2. too much of a focus on features with too little focus on solving customer challenges.

To avoid the first failure, companies must ensure the product design teams are working hand-in-glove with the customer facing teams—the tighter the connection the better. Together, these teams must develop and fully understand the use case. That is, the pattern of life and pain points of the user as well as the ecosystem that the technology will live in. And to avoid the second failure, companies must fund solutions to user challenges based on clearly defined use cases, not just technology development. The key here is in the formulation of milestones, which are traditionally features and capability drops. Instead, milestones should be customer challenges solved.

At Ultra, we call this approach ‘mission-focused innovation’. Replacing milestones and deliverables on R&D project plans and roadmaps with customer challenges has the effect of focusing teams on understanding real needs and developing solutions instead of technology for technology’s sake. We don’t develop algorithms, we squeeze insights out of a universe of data. We don’t develop radios, we deliver the right information to the right place at the right time to ensure information advantage.

Intersectional Innovation

The final type of innovation, and perhaps the most important source of innovation for most companies, is intersectional innovation. It brings together different disciplines, domain knowledge, and perspectives to solve the most seemingly intractable problems.

One of the best examples of intersectional innovation is Claude Shannon’s channel capacity, which is the foundation of all modern wireless communication. Shannon effectively brought together two disparate disciplines at the time – electrical engineering and mathematics – to look at the transmission of information over a noisy channel in a way that no one had and solved a critical open problem in the process.

The challenge for companies here is simply one of consistent focus. Many corporations fall into the pit of focusing exclusively on user-challenge driven innovation, thus missing the vast opportunity to deliver intersectional innovation through properly leveraging the breadth of internal knowledge at their disposal.

There are many ways to foster intersectional innovation when a company has decided to deliberately unlock it. Innovation conferences, with attendance from a broad cross section of the company, can bring together a wide range of diverse expertise to look at existing challenges in new ways. Meanwhile, R&D proposals can include a section that describes how multiple perspectives are being operationalized to solve customer problems.

At Ultra this is a real focus for us. We have launched several initiatives designed to bring together our brightest minds to form a greater whole. We hold yearly innovation conferences, while our Ultra Labs team are constantly seeking out and combining the best ideas from across the business. Our recently launched Ultra Fellows programme brings together eight of our most renowned interdisciplinary experts to help formulate a holistic perspective to our technology strategy.

Innovation That Matters

As I talk to CTOs and business leaders across the industry, many companies are feel they could be doing more with their technology investments, with internal innovation programmes often failing to generate the value necessary to deliver on the company’s strategy.

But creating innovation that matters is always possible. While every type of innovation brings its own challenges, there are solutions to all of them.

Of course, there is a lot a more work that goes into successful innovation than just knowing how to manage these different approaches. But knowing what it is you are really trying to achieve is an essential first step in making every exciting concept you are working on a valuable reality.

Anti-Submarine Warfare Solution

Ultra Maritime and UMS SKELDAR Receive a Contract to Evaluate UAS Based Anti-Submarine Warfare Solution

Dartmouth, Canada: Ultra Maritime (Ultra) and UMS SKELDAR are pleased to announce that they have been awarded a 2nd Phase contract under the Department of National Defence’s (DND) Innovation for Defence Excellence and Security (IDEaS) program, which will explore the development of a Rotary Wing UAS to provide an Anti-Submarine Warfare (ASW) sonobuoy dispensing capability, based on the SKELDAR V-200 Uncrewed Aircraft System (UAS).

This innovative program will review how a medium-sized UAS can be used to deploy sonobuoys for the purpose of tracking potentially hostile submarines operating in the open ocean or close to coastal areas that could pose a threat to the Royal Canadian Navy (RCN) or other forces. Andrew Anderson, Chief Technology Officer, Ultra Sonar Systems, explains: “We are constantly reviewing new technologies to determine how they can be used to tackle the threat from hostile submarines. The scope of this program is to evaluate the technical and operational feasibility of deploying sonobuoys from a Class II Rotary Wing UAS, to provide the warfighter with another tool in the ASW toolbox.”

Richard Hjelmberg, Vice President Business Development for UMS SKELDAR, adds: “We are delighted to be a part of this contract with Ultra. Using Rotary Unmanned Aircraft Systems to help conduct ASW will provide many benefits, not least enabling rapid deployment capabilities, a smaller logistical footprint on Canadian Armed Forces (CAF) ships and a cost-effective alternative to current methods. At UMS we are proud of our innovation leadership when it comes to advances in rotary-wing UAS platforms. Our SKELDAR V-200 platform is a prime example of this, with a capability of completing remote automatic flights, exceeding six-hour flight times thanks to the robust heavy fuel engine and the ability to provide a high degree of maintainability and minimum turn-around times. These credentials we believe are the perfect fit for this program.” The SKELDAR V-200 has advanced intelligence-gathering capabilities when equipped with multiple sensors. Flight times can exceed six hours, and the heavy-fuel engine combined with efficient maintenance procedures and ease of access to the engine compartment allow for highly efficient routine service processes.

MADOC sonobuoy contract

Ultra Awarded MADOC Next Generation Sonobuoy Contract

Columbia City, IN: Ultra Sonobuoy Systems (Ultra) has been selected as a qualified vendor for a Multiple Award Delivery Order Contract (MADOC). This contract will provide a vehicle for Ultra to supply the U.S. Navy (USN) with next-generation sonobuoys for the next five years.   The USN Navy purchases roughly $300 million a year in sonobuoys. Ultra is the world’s leader in providing more than 200,000 sonobuoys to the United States, United Kingdom, Canada and other navies around the world.

Ultra has a well-established history of providing best-in-class sonobuoys to the USN and its international allies. This award reflects the USN’s continued trust in Ultras’ ability to continue to develop, produce and deliver world-class products that are used every day to ‘Find, Fix and Finish’ the threat. Ultra remains committed to reducing the cost of ‘washing water’ to the USN and its Allies across the entire anti-submarine warfare mission profiles.

Eric Webster, President of Ultra Sonobuoy Systems, commented: “We are very excited to be chosen by the U.S. Navy to provide next-generation sonobuoys to support the fleet. With conflicts increasing with our near-peer rivals, the importance of anti-submarine warfare and the need for greater quantities of increasingly more capable sonobuoys continues to grow. I am extremely proud of the Ultra team’s focus to deliver innovative solutions and ensure continuity of supply to the U.S. Navy.”

NAVAIR Public Release 2022-588 Distribution Statement A – Approved for public release; distribution is unlimited.

Hiring Practices in Defense Industry

What Home Buying and Hiring Talent Have In Common

If you have been trying to buy a house recently you know the market has been crazy, homes are selling faster and for more money than ever. Today’s candidate market is not much different. We are seeing candidates being offered higher salaries than in the past due to companies competing for talent. One cause is that in a post Covid-19 world more companies are allowing remote work which gives a candidate the option to work for a company they would not have been able to in the past due to location. How do we compete with this?

The Talent Acquisition team within Ultra has been encouraging hiring managers to have a plan when looking to hire a new candidate. plan should include thinking to themselves “Am I willing to pay top dollar for a strong candidate?”, “Can I train a junior candidate and teach them what they need to know?” and “Can this job be done remotely?”. Asking these questions will help go a long way in being realistic and prepared when interviewing candidates.

How do we compete with these other companies? There are multiple ways that we can get the talent we need even in a tough market. First, we need to move quickly. Often the ones who act first will get their top choice in a candidate. This includes interviewing as soon as possible, limiting the number of interviews and making a quick decision about whether to move forward with an offer or not. Next, presenting a strong and competitive offer. If a candidate is given an offer that is in-line with what they requested that will give them less to have to think about, it does not mean that there will not be some negotiation, but it will show the candidate that Ultra is serious and wants them to join us. 

All this plays into providing a good candidate experience. The candidate will remember how they were treated throughout the process and that will have an impact on their decision. It is important to remember that the recruitment does not stop after an offer is accepted. The future employee will remain excited, engaged, and committed if the hiring manager stays in communication with them leading up to the start date. Something as simple as a quick text message or email just to check in can go a long way to ensure that the candidate will not back out.

It is very much a candidate’s market right now. Potential future employees are interviewing the company just as much as the company is interviewing them. They want to know what exciting projects will be offered, what is the career development plan and what a company’s views on work/personal life balance are. Think back to when you were interviewing, what were some of the reasons you accepted the offer to come work at Ultra? We need to remember what it was like being a candidate and how we hoped to be treated through the interview process and give that same experience to those that we interview.

There is no such thing as the “perfect candidate”. A good hiring concept is the 80/20 rule. Can this candidate do 80% of the job and do they have the ability and potential to learn how to do the remaining 20%? If the answer is yes, then the hiring manager should feel confident in their own ability to develop the candidate in the areas that need to be improved on.

When it comes to hiring there is no exact science. We need to understand that we are working with people and people can be unpredictable. The best way to hire top talent is to collaborate with fellow stake holders. This would include the hiring manager, Human Resources, and the Talent Acquisition team. When everyone is aligned it reflects on the hiring process and allows for clear communication and a speedy result to help find, interview, and hire top candidates.

Finally, wishing those looking for a new opportunity and hiring managers all the best in their searches.

Ready to solve problems we don’t even know about yet? Search current opportunities at Ultra Maritime on our website.