Viasat developing wearable MOJO Mini variant

Viasat's Move Out/Jump Off (MOJO) Mini Next expeditionary tactical gateway. (Viasat)

Satellite communications (satcom) provider Viasat is developing a wearable variant of its Move Out/Jump Off (MOJO) Mini tactical satcom gateway, with programme officials working to mature the yet-to-be released prototype system, Janes has learnt.

Programme engineers at Viasat have designed the wearable MOJO Mini prototype, along with a vest-based mounting system with integrated computing and power management capability, and this is ready for demonstration, said David Schmolke, vice-president of Mission Connections and Cybersecurity at Viasat.

“We even integrated high assurance encryption capability” he said of the wearable prototype satcom gateway system, dubbed the Secure Wireless Hub (SWH), during a June interview with Janes.

On the compute side, the new SWH prototype “can host a lot of the functionality of that common operational picture (COP) integration” and intermesh that functionality with the data from the tactical satcom radios the user is already equipped with, Schmolke said.

“They are already carrying a Link 16-enabled radio, or something along those lines ... they can high-end their existing [tactical] radio ecosystem” and have COP data integrated into that ecosystem, via the MOJO Mini prototype, he added.

If applicable, the prototype can also incorporate the user's Android Team Awareness Kit (ATAK) application for an additional layer of mobile, cellular data into the ecosystem, he said.

The wearable variant “is not formally on the market yet, but its sort of like at [technology readiness level] 6 or 7 capability”, according to Schmolke.