I/ITSEC 2022: First team to bid for British Army CTTP strategic partnership reveals itself

Raytheon UK has announced it has formed a partnership with Capita, Cervus, Improbable Defence and Rheinmetall to bid to become the strategic training partner for the British Army’s Collective Training Transformation Programme (CTTP).

The CTTP seeks to transform how the British Army conducts collective training, factoring in the increased complexity of potential warfare scenarios. It will include modernisation and replacement of currently out-of-date training with live, virtual and constructive (LVC) systems.

The MoD will award a single-source contract worth more than £600m ($742 million) for the first ten years, plus an additional £200m in investment money to get the programme going. The winner of the single-sourced contract will be selected in 2025.

In an exclusive press briefing, the Raytheon UK-led Omnia Training team members told Shephard they can provide ‘unrivalled expertise’ to deliver CTTP.

Referring to the company’s work on the RN’s Project Selborne, Raytheon UK's MD for cyber, space and training Jams Gray told Shephard: ‘Raytheon’s track record in training in the UK in terms of transformative training is now second to none.

'We intend to bring that background with the navy to the army: supply chain management, best-of-breed programme delivery, training needs analysis, transformative training.’

Gray explained that Raytheon will not only focus on digital simulations and ways to integrate that into British Army training but also look at how to make training more efficient.

Raytheon, Gray said, began selecting its preferred team members around 18 months ago.

One of the challenges the MoD is facing is to make up for the shrinking size of the army with more efficient training and modern equipment, as well as try to reduce the cost of training.

CTTP will initially focus on the land domain only, but the MoD is clear about the need for a joint training capability. (Photo: UK Crown Copyright) 

Another Selborne contractor, Capita (which leads that programme), will also bring its sailor training transformation experience to the bid.

‘We bring that knowledge about delivering large-scale complex transformations and that piece around culture and partnering and flexing to meet the needs of the customer,’ Richard Holroyd, MD of Capita Defence, Fire and Security, said.

‘One of the things that Capita brings with it is that learning of how to operate with our defence customer in a very pioneering way with that ability to flex in order to meet the ever-changing threat dimension,’ he added.

Similar to Selborne, Omnia would focus on delivering a data-driven, individual-oriented education and training system under the CTTP.

Data analytics company Cervus will help to organise and collate data across the consortium to ensure that information is used efficiently.

Alan Roan, MD of Cervus, told Shephard a key aspect is to 'give the results into the hands of the end user because the best way of learning is self-learning, understanding where you've gone wrong, so you can then enhance the collective'.

Roan said the UK already has the infrastructure to support an individual learning system. Under the Defence Learning Management System, personnel can access their own data. ‘Our challenge is making sure that we capture that in such a way that we can stream it into that individual’s training record,’ he explained.

Improbable Defence will focus on synthetic solutions, synthetic integration and the integration of multiple businesses’ different systems with synthetic environment platforms, the company’s CEO Joe Robinson said.

In accordance with the Integrated Review and the Future Soldier plan, the army said it will put data exploitation and digitisation at the forefront of training design. Plans are to create fully immersive environments that replicate the complexities of conflicts.

Defence and the broader national security community making leaps and bounds around the provision of secure cloud was going to be really important for CTTP.— Joe Robinson, CEO of Improbable Defence.

Such solutions will require a reinforced and bolstered digital infrastructure that the UK is yet to acquire. Robinson said investment in ‘world-class communication networks is at the heart’ of solving that infrastructure challenge.

‘Then you need somewhere to store data and process data and manage data and that's obviously the cloud, and clearly, defence and the broader national security community making leaps and bounds around the provision of secure cloud was going to be really important for CTTP as well as other programmes,’ Robinson added.

He said Improbable Defence can provide its ability to bring data into models, and then take those models from an ecosystem of providers and integrate them into a large-scale highly complex, flexible series of synthetic environments for soldiers to train at scale.

Rheinmetall will contribute with its experience in delivering and managing synthetic design, integration and training capabilities.

Shephard understands that the MoD has shared its approach to and some of the requirements for CTTP with industry and has received several expressions of interest. Other companies, however, are yet to reveal their selected teams but some may choose to do so during I/ITSEC next week.

CTTP will initially focus on the land domain only, but the MoD is clear about the need for a joint domain training capability.

Raytheon UK is part of the Selborne consortium and is the prime contractor on the RN’s Dreadnought Crew Training programme as well. Omnia Training, therefore, might be a strong contender from an interoperability perspective.

Taking a wider look at other complicated UK training programmes and the MoD’s track record in managing them, it will have to make a wise selection for the CTTP.

Shephard's I/ITSEC 2022 coverage is sponsored by: