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2008
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The Charles E. Varnell Memorial Award for Small Business
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 Solacoms pioneering spirit and quest for excellence were put to the ultimate test in 2007 with Lockheed Martins FS21 program for their contracted Flight Service operations for the FAA. The project includes the system design and supply of communications infrastructure and network for three large hub facilities and 17 smaller control locations providing communications coverage throughout the mainland United States, Puerto Rico, and Hawaii. Lockheed Martin's FS21 system is a fully integrated, nationwide networked solution that is the technology benchmark for the industry. |
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 While the original study envisaged a system being deployed in the 2010 timeframe, the FS21 project required a faster implementation period. Incredibly, the digital VCCS platform designed by SolaCom was engineered, tested and installed in less than a year.
The recently completed Leesburg Hub is a state-of-the-art Automated Flight Service Station located near Dulles International Airport in suburban Northern Virginia. Specialists at the facility provide aviation services such as weather briefings, in-flight information, flight plan filing, Notices to Airmen (NOTAMS), clearances, and more to pilots.
Now fully operational FS21 provides all flight service specialists and pilots access to flight plan information from a single, common database. In excess of 15,000 calls are now being handled by the system every day.
FS21 implements many of the ideas envisioned by the FAA for a seamless adaptive communications system, providing for dynamic changes in demand and system states using communication assets that are transparent to the user. The approach taken by SolaCom is to leverage its proven digital ATC platform to implement a hybrid system that merges the best of two worlds: the speed and reliability of Time Division Multiplexing (TDM) networks, and the enhanced capabilities of todays voice over IP (VoIP) network. This architecture is similar to one recommended by the Government Electronics Technology and Information Association (GETIA) in a study commissioned by the FAA in 2003.
FS21 is in line with the NextGen Vision, using existing technology to provide important and tangible operational benefits now and in the future to user of the National Airspace System (NAS). |
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