Airbus-led team wins RIFAN 2.1 contract
An Airbus-led industrial consortium has received the RIFAN 2.1 contract from the French defence procurement agency, the company announced on 4 March.
The €150 million contract will run for up to eight years. The consortium also includes Naval Group and Rohde & Schwarz.
The contract covers work to maintain and adapt the French naval forces' existing IP network, RIFAN 2, to the needs of the navy, to integrate new ships and address hardware and software obsolescence.
The work will also enable future front-line frigates and replenishment tankers to be integrated into the RIFAN 2 network. The network adaptations will involve both its central architecture and an update of the cybersecurity incident monitoring and detection system.
A total of 63 ships are equipped with the RIFAN 2 network, which is designed for the exchange of data of various classification levels between ships at sea and on-shore command centres. The network transmits data from applications specific to the coordination of carrier group operations and those dedicated to the daily and logistical management of life on board. The system uses satellite connections, such as Comcept or Syracuse, and also the radio communication systems allowing all-Internet Protocol exchanges between ships, with a range of several dozen nautical miles.
RIFAN 2 also provides overall network management and cybersecurity incident monitoring capability.
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