Plans are moving forward as the Defense Department seeks more robust tools to mitigate adversaries’ jamming tactics against GPS.

“All military services, including the Marine Corps, have been actively involved in Positioning, Navigation, and Timing (PNT)/Global Positioning System (GPS) modernization efforts that will culminate in the fielding of critical Assured PNT capabilities to their warfighters. These new capabilities will enable warfighters to benefit from enhanced PNT capabilities offered using Military Code (M-Code) GPS satellite signals, other signals of opportunity, and a variety of non-GPS sensors,” officials wrote in a request for information published Tuesday, soliciting vendors to participate in the demos.

The Mounted Assured Resilient Navigation, or MARNAV, initiative is Marine Corps Systems Command’s main acquisition effort to field modernized positioning, navigation and timing tools to ground vehicle platforms, according to the service.

“This program will incorporate an M-Code GPS capability along with additional PNT enablers/alternatives to provide a robust Navigation Warfare … compliant capability to the warfighters,” per the RFI.

The program is currently organized into two blocks. For block one, the Corps is leaning on an Army-developed capability, known as Mounted Assured PNT System (MAPS) Gen II, to meet its requirements. In addition to M-code, the system possesses a capability that “leverages a commercial satellite system to provide platforms with PNT information if GPS is compromised or unavailable,” according to a Government Accountability Office report on GPS modernization released in September 2024.

The Marines bought 357 of those systems in fiscal 2023 and planned to buy an additional 345 in fiscal 2024, per the report.

However, for block two, the Corps intends to pursue its own receivers to meet the service’s needs, GAO noted.

“Although subject to change, the current Acquisition Strategy to fulfill the Block 2 requirements is to conduct a full and open competition resulting in the award of a single Indefinite Delivery, Indefinite Quantity (IDIQ) contract. The Government and the winning vendor may then enter the Engineering and Manufacturing Development (EMD) Phase of the program, and that contractual relationship may continue into system fielding and sustainment,” Marine Corps officials wrote in the RFI.

The tech demonstrations that the program manager for tactical communications and electromagnetic warfare systems is gearing up for are expected to help further define threshold and objective requirements for the program. The Corps is looking for companies to “demonstrate currently available, direct, drop-in, M-Code capable replacements” for the Defense Advanced GPS Receiver, per the RFI.

The demos are slated to be conducted at Naval Information Warfare Center–Atlantic in Charleston, South Carolina, between February and May.

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Pentagon officials see quantum sensors as promising capabilities for alternative positioning, navigation and timing (PNT) and intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR).

However, there are challenges involved in deploying the technology that DARPA aims to tackle with a new program that it’s looking to kick off, dubbed Robust Quantum Sensors (RoQS).

The initiative “seeks to bring quantum sensors to DoD platforms. While quantum sensors have demonstrated exceptional laboratory performance in a number of modalities (magnetic and electrical field, acceleration, rotation, and gravity, etc.), their performance degrades once the sensor is placed on moving platforms due to electrical and magnetic fields, field gradients, and system vibrations. RoQS seeks to overcome these challenges through innovative physics approaches to quantum sensing. The forthcoming RoQS program aims to develop and demonstrate quantum sensors that inherently resist performance degradation from platform interferers and demonstrate them on a government-provided platform,” officials wrote in a special notice and future program announcement recently posted on Sam.gov.

DARPA, which reports to the Office of the Undersecretary of Defense for Research and Engineering, hopes to transition RoQS-developed sensors onto U.S. military platforms with associated programs of record to help fulfill requirements. To that end, the agency intends to work with contractors and platform builders to identify systems for quantum sensor integration and also government platform owners to facilitate integration and testing at the end of the program, per the notice.

Pentagon officials and others have been working to mature quantum technology for real-world applications.

Quantum tech “translates the principles of quantum physics into technological applications,” a recently updated Congressional Research Service report explained, including concepts like superposition — or the ability of quantum systems to exist in two or more states simultaneously — and entanglement where “two or more quantum objects in a system can be intrinsically linked such that measurement of one dictates the possible measurement outcomes for another, regardless of how far apart the two objects are.”

Although DOD officials see potential uses for quantum-enabled capabilities in other areas like computing, encryption and communications, sensing is considered by many observers to be the most mature application for near-term use by the Pentagon.

That’s the one “that we know by far the most about,” John Burke, principal director for quantum science in the Office of the Undersecretary of Defense for Research and Engineering, said in June at a tech summit hosted by Defense One.

Such capabilities could provide an alternative to the Global Positioning System in case GPS is denied or degraded in future operating environments.

“You’ve probably heard about jamming and spoofing concerns, for example. So we’re busily working on other quantum technologies to input positioning and timing at the edge of the warfighter so that they don’t rely on GPS all the time,” Burke said. “So that’s sort of the earliest thing we’re working on. There’s a whole slew of technologies under that umbrella. We’re really pushing out on that. So even this year [in] 2024, we’ve got about $100 million coming out to work just on that area. So we’re really pushing hard on that.”

The Pentagon has been using its Accelerate the Procurement and Fielding of Innovative Technologies (APFIT) program to buy a new generation of atomic clocks that could be put into some “strategic assets,” he said, adding that “the first new wave of quantum technologies is really going out today.”

The CRS report noted that successful development and deployment of quantum sensors could boost detection of things like adversary submarines, underground structures, nuclear materials and electromagnetic emissions — and thereby help the U.S. military find concealed objects of interest and enemy forces.

For ISR there’s “an umbrella of remote sensing capabilities and a lot of different kinds of technologies in there. Things like magnetometers to find magnetic objects. You can imagine a lot of things that the military might care about … may have iron in them or steel, things that are magnetic. So we’re tracking trying to figure how to use those in all kinds of different ways,” Burke said.

Currently, quantum technologies are “a little bit expensive,” he noted.

“But that’s okay for certain strategic missions in the military. So we’re starting from those kinds of missions that go with anything — submarines, strategic bombers, long-range sort of missiles … these kinds of assets, to start inserting new technologies,” he said. “We have these things called magnetometers you can put in systems for like this thing called magnetic navigation. It’s extremely robust. We’re really excited about that. There’s navigation technologies. Once we get those established, we can start building up the manufacturing base, first in the Defense Department. That’s the path that we’ve taken. But I think in the long run, you’re gonna see these kinds of technologies proliferate into civilian” sectors.

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Through the Department of Defense’s Quick Start authority approved in December as part of the Fiscal 2024 National Defense Authorization Act, the Air Force has received approval to begin work on a “resilient national GPS position, navigation, and timing capability and [command, control and communications, or C3] battle management for moving target indication,” Kendall told lawmakers Tuesday during a Senate Armed Services Committee meeting.

Specific details on the two Department of the Air Force’s two approved programs remain scarce, but they will likely be included in the department’s budget request for fiscal 2026 that will be submitted next year.

The Quick Start rapid acquisition authority allows the Air Force and other services to begin development on new programs without a congressionally approved budget. The authorities look to address the often long periods between when the services ask for funding for new programs in annual budget requests and when lawmakers pass appropriations — during which those new efforts are effectively in limbo.

“The DAF deeply appreciates the ‘Quick Start’ provision placed in the FY24 NDAA and will take full advantage of this opportunity to save precious time,” Kendal wrote alongside Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. David Allvin and Chief of Space Operations Gen. Chance Saltzman in a joint statement ahead of Tuesday’s hearing in a joint statement.

Kendall proposed the initiative in April 2023 and advocated for it throughout the year, emphasizing that it would effectively move modernization programs through the early stages of development, such as requirement studies, risk reduction and design work, without having to pause for official funding approvals.

The 2024 NDAA legislation puts a $100 million cap across all of the Pentagon’s spending for Quick Start — less than the $300 million first proposed by the Air Force — and requires services to submit a detailed proposal to the secretary of defense about the capability, what gap it is filling, cost analysis and why it cannot wait until the subsequent budget cycle.

Services must also transition programs funded by Quick Start to an acquisition pathway or official program of record for continued development within one year, with the possibility for a one-year extension if approved by a service secretary, per the legislation.

GPS resiliency and enhanced PNT capabilities are some of the Space Force’s top priorities. To date, the service has launched six satellites manufactured by Lockheed Martin for GPS III into the larger GPS constellation, and the remaining four space vehicles will enter orbit in the coming years. 

At the same time, the service is looking into alternative options for PNT and supporting systems — including in collaboration with the other services and the commercial sector — that are not as vulnerable to adversary attacks, interference or degradation during military operations.

As for moving target indication, the Air and Space Forces have begun work to transition part of that mission from airborne platforms to space-based systems. Work done under the Quick Start proposal will likely cover the command, control and communications architecture needed to conduct tactical intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance from space.

The Air Force did not provide additional details about how much money was allocated towards the two programs through Quick Start, nor the scope of work that will be conducted.

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Speaking at a webinar hosted by the National Security Space Association on Thursday, Tournear said the agency wants some of the satellites in SDA’s Tranche 2 and Tranche 3 transport layer to be able to beam an Army-developed alt-PNT signal to users on the ground. 

“We’re working very closely with the Army, who’s been pioneering the alt-PNT across the Department of Defense,” Tournear said. “We’re working with them to be able to broadcast that same signal so it can be picked up by existing, fielded and planned user equipment.”

Agencies across the Defense Department are working on alternative PNT technology, fearing that current GPS satellites and supporting systems would be vulnerable to adversary attacks, interference or become degraded during military operations. 

The specific signal can be received by the Military GPS User Equipment (MGUE) Increment 2 chips, Tournear noted. Provided by the Space Force, MGUE chips enable the armed services to use the GPS constellation’s encrypted M-Code signal.

“We want to be able to go down to existing fielded user equipment, because that’s the fastest way to get the capability out there,” he said. “It’s a lot easier and a lot faster for us to build and launch satellites than it is to field thousands of user terminals.”

Scheduled to begin launching in 2026, the Tranche 2 and Tranche 3 transport layers will be part of SDA’s Proliferated Warfighter Space Architecture (PWSA). Once operational, the constellation will consist of hundreds of satellites in low-Earth orbit carrying critical data relay, missile warning and missile-tracking capabilities. 

Still, Tournear acknowledged that broadcasting the Army’s alt-PNT signal would take a few years to realize. In the interim, SDA is putting a navigation message into the Link 16 payloads on the first operational tranche of PSWA data transport satellites known as Tranche 1, he said. Those satellites are slated to begin launching in September 2024.

Noting that Link 16 was used by the military before GPS came online in the 1990s, Tournear said the military tactical data link was originally planned for navigation and timing purposes.

“It still has that capability. You can embed a navigation and timing signal into Link 16 and you can use it for that,” he explained. “It’s not nearly as good as GPS, but it does give you an alternate.”

Looking forward, the agency is also considering future plans for transmitting alt-PNT signals over L-band and S-band signals. Doing so would require new user terminals to be developed, Tournear said.

That capability could be integrated onto Tranche 3 or Tranche 4 transport layer satellites, he noted.

“We would not buy that and field that. We’re working with the services to make sure that they are in lockstep with us so that they would field such terminals in their equipment, either before or right after we would field the space capability,” he said.

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“Quantum-enhanced navigation will deliver the ability for vehicles to position accurately over long periods when GPS is unavailable or untrustworthy … and [it] secures positioning against jamming or spoofing by hostile adversaries,” the company said in a release. “Existing alternatives to GPS deliver limited benefits, suffering from rapidly accumulating errors that can pose tremendous risks to defense missions. For instance, most naval vessels use backup ‘inertial navigation’ systems which sense motion to aid in positioning, but can lead to a vessel being off course by miles after just hours without GPS ­— enough to steer a ship into an underwater obstacle overnight under poor conditions.”

Quantum information science is a cutting-edge field that encompasses the investigation and application of complex phenomena happening at atomic and subatomic levels to process and transmit information. 

“Q-CTRL’s technology uses the quantum physics of atoms to detect motion and small changes in the Earth’s gravitational field, leveraging these signals to enable navigation over extended periods. Quantum sensors provide very reliable outputs because their signals are derived from the fundamental laws of physics, unlike existing mechanical or electrical systems that degrade over time or under different operating conditions,” per the company.

The firm touted its expertise in “quantum control” and the ability of its software, enhanced by artificial intelligence, to improve the operation of quantum hardware.

The contract announced Tuesday supports the first part of a multiyear effort to “field-deploy and validate” miniaturized systems on military platforms, according to the company. The monetary value of the contract was not disclosed in the release.

The agreement comes as members of the defense tech-focused AUKUS alliance — which consists of Australia, the U.K. and U.S. — have been partnering to develop and share a variety of cutting-edge capabilities, meaning the Pentagon could ultimately benefit from the Australian DOD’s new partnership with Q-CTRL, which has offices in Sydney, Los Angeles and London.

Defense officials from all three countries see opportunities to apply quantum technologies not only to positioning, navigation and timing (PNT) but also to high-performance computing and encryption.

The AUKUS Quantum Arrangement, announced last year, is initially focusing on PNT. Plans called for integrating emerging quantum technologies in trials and experimentation in the coming years.

Quantum is one of U.S. Undersecretary of Defense for Research and Engineering Heidi Shyu’s 14 “critical technology areas.” Quantum sensors could provide “unprecedented accuracy” in positioning, navigation and timing, according to the CTO’s official website.

The Pentagon has requested $75 million in fiscal 2024 for a new Quantum Transition Acceleration project. About $45 million would be used for maturing, demonstrating and transitioning quantum inertial sensors, gravity sensors, atomic clocks and quantum electro-magnetic sensors. The other $30 million would focus on identifying, developing and maturing critical components supporting technology for atomic clocks, quantum sensors and quantum computers.

Additionally, last month the Pentagon announced that a project team led by the Army Research Laboratory in partnership with the Naval Research Lab and Air Force Research Lab won the 2024 Applied Research for Advancement of Science and Technology Priorities program award related to the classical quantum hybrid constructs to advance weapons systems (CLAWS) effort.

“The project team will advance quantum technology applications to kinetic weapons systems, enabling greater precision at longer range, lower collateral damage, and more agile platforms,” the DOD said in a release. “The winning team, comprised of representatives from multiple military Services, will partner with academia and industry in a multidisciplinary effort to develop emerging technologies into disruptive capabilities in areas including imaging, positioning, navigation, and timing, and quantum.”

In budget justification documents for the department’s fiscal 2024 funding request, Pentagon officials wrote that quantum tech is “approaching a tipping point.”

“If the [U.S.] can stay on pace, many important outcomes for the [DOD] can be realized including robust position, navigation and timing for DOD freedom of operations with precision strike even with contests in spectrum, space, or cyber operations,” they wrote.

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The Defense Department wants to field alternative PNT systems in case GPS gets degraded by adversary attacks or other causes.

In July the SDA issued a solicitation for the National Defense Space Architecture Experimental Testbed (NExT) initiative, asking vendors for proposals to develop, manufacture, deploy and operate 10 spacecraft that could host government-furnished payloads.

“The whole concept there is there are a lot of missions that the department can do with a proliferated architecture in low-Earth orbit. There are some of those missions that we’re confident we can do, like this data transport layer and the tracking for missiles. And then there are others that [are] really still more experimental,” SDA Director Derek Tournear said at DefenseScoop’s DefenseTalks conference on Thursday.

He continued: “What is the next-generation tactical data links that our services are fielding? Can we talk to those from space? We think we can … Can we do alternative PNT? We think we can. But other services are developing payloads that we will fly on our NExT satellites, and if those work, then that’s something that we would proliferate in the future tranches.”

The Space Development Agency plans to deploy new tranches of low-Earth orbit satellites every two years that can incorporate new payloads with additional capabilities. The first Tranche 0 systems are scheduled to launch in December.

Payload capabilities that are successfully demonstrated as part of the NExT initiative could potentially be incorporated into Tranche 2 spacecraft — which are scheduled to fly in 2026 — and subsequent tranches, Tournear said.

A separate set of developmental and experimentation platforms with satcom payloads are planned for Tranche 1, he noted, but those systems are not part of NExT.

The first launch of NExT satellites could happen as early as October 2024. The launch of all the initial platforms should be completed no later than October 2025, according to the solicitation.

The plan is to continue the testbed initiative indefinitely, Tournear suggested, and industry will have additional opportunities to compete for the program.

“The whole model for SDA is predicated on this spiral development model where every two years we will put new capabilities in space. And so industry can … invest and create an offering and win a fraction of that market share. And NExT is no different. So, NExT will be re-competed every two years as a way to do this experimentation as [we] ourselves come up with new payloads for our mission partners. We’re going to continually re-compete and apply those,” he said.

The Space Development Agency plans to use other transaction agreements for the program, as it has for other SDA initiatives that are being fast-tracked.

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