L3Harris leverages Ukraine support into NGC2 development

Russian forces field the Krasukha-4 electronic warfare system. (Russian MoD)

Programme officials at L3Harris are leveraging the company's ongoing support of Ukrainian forces to inform development efforts for the US Army's Next Generation Command and Control (NGC2) programme.

The company's ongoing work providing tactical communications capabilities to Ukraine in its war against Russia is “helping define and advocate for positions we are taking on technologies we are developing” for NGC2, according to Samir Mehta, president of Communications Systems at L3Harris.

The crux of the NGC2 is to establish a common data layer accessible across echelons that would break down data access stovepipes based on the mission, said Network Cross-Functional Team (CFT) Director US Army Major General Patrick Ellis.

Rather than delineate combat data flows by mission – C2, intelligence, and fires – battlefield information would be funnelled into a common data layer, accessed through a series of applications developed through an applications layer, he said in January. NGC2 was officially stood up as a Program of Record (POR) in September 2024.

Company officials working on NGC2 capability development are “making sure we understand what vulnerabilities could exist because of peer capabilities” demonstrated by Russian forces on the battlefield, he told reporters during a 29 April briefing in Washington, DC.

Since the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, L3Harris has delivered over 40,000 tactical radios to Ukrainian forces for the duration of the war, according to Mehta. “We do not deliver these radios, and then they just operate freely,” he said.

“We are getting constant feedback from our customers … as to how they need to be upgraded on a regular basis” from a hardware and software perspective, according to Mehta.