Lieutenant General (Ret.) Thomas J. Trask

• Thinking ahead 5 years: Increased NATO air power capability and Russia’s perspective on NATO air power

• Current and projected force structure and supporting technology; increasing 5th generation aircraft in current fleets

• Enhancing readiness for high-intensity missions and operating in a contested environment

• Decreasing vulnerability to advanced ground-based threats

• Key priorities: SEAD mission, advanced datalinks, AESA radars, munition stocks, electronic warfare

Embraer has achieved very high reliability and availability levels for the C-390 because it matched its experience in commercial aviation to apply advanced design and manufacturing techniques to meet the stringent reliability and availability requirements demanded by today’s air forces.

• Concept - How the Design process can deliver modern, affordable, low risk solutions with high availability rates 

• Implementation – Combining rugged structures, Health Management Systems, and incorporation of Maintenance Steering Group (MSG)-3 philosophy 

• Delivery – The overall reduction of resource demand across the Defence Lines of Development

• Maintaining cutting-edge performance of air platforms over longer life cycles: How has sustainment needed to change over the years as platforms intended to serve for 20-30 years are now in service for 40 ad 50 years?

• How to balance increasing sustainment cost with reliability and safety?

• Lessons learned from the 60-year service of the T-38

• Creating and justifying a sustainment plan resilient to changing budgets, requirements and the industrial supply chain.

• Multinational collaboration and partnerships in enhancing sustainment: Balancing incentives across stakeholders—OEMs and the industrial base, operators, maintenance depots and materiel commands

• Key investment priorities: Leveraging tenets of Industry 4.0: Additive manufacturing in mitigating supply shortfalls; HUMS—enabling near real-time extraction of digital data from key systems; AI & Machine Learning in data analytics; Establishing ways to swiftly source and certify new technologies.

Lockheed Martin has been providing air power solutions for decades. We understand the threat, now and in the future. Our platforms are proven, and offer complementary capabilities that air forces around the world depend on to be ready at any moment. Our platforms form the backbone of NATO and allied coalition fleets. And we continually work to modernize and sustain these fleets, ensuring readiness at affordable costs. 

• Identifying the multiple complementary threats to overwhelm the adversary

• C2 constructs to enable synchronising effects and decision-making at scale and speed

• Networking sensors with processors and shooters 

• ISR for multi-domain situational awareness

• Information Operations: Realising the potential of non-kinetic options

• NATO models for MDC2Key enabling technologies to enable MDC2

• Identifying the key mission sets after “shock and awe”

• Generating and sustaining air missions: aerial refuelling, ISR, armed overwatch, strike

• Dealing with adversary autonomous systems and ROE

• Continuing to support front-line forces: conducting intra-theatre airlift in contested environments

• The logistics and resupply mission in the European theatre: identifying bottlenecks for rapid deployment of air and joint forces

• Sustaining access to and communicating accurate information in the context of the contemporary threat environment

• Finding ways to safely share information between NATO and its partners

• Capitalising on the information capabilities of air assets to enable heightened situational awareness

• Beefing up capabilities to effectively counter propaganda: Social media and decreasing the power of false accusations

• Creating a roadmap to fight the information campaign as a pillar of deterrence

• Wargaming as a tool to identify unexpected behaviours and potential stumbling blocks

• What strategies can be adopted to speed up acquisition or minimise schedule slippage on major programmes?

• How can the best strategies be identified? What realistic hurdles can arise from the implementation of such strategies?

• Focusing on mature or adapting commercially available technologies: Lessons learned from previous acquisitions.

• Assessing the impact of industrial consolidation and mitigation strategies.

• Principals of agile acquisition and how they relate to technological advances in manufacturing.

• Key investment priorities to 2025 in Eastern Europe.