Northrop Grumman says the B-2 Spirit stealth bomber has taken one step closer to the next level of performance after undergoing a broad upgrade with new open mission systems or OMS software.
The effort is to ensure relevance and lethality for the B-2 until it is retired by the B-21 Raider.
It will increase the rate of weapons to add; it will sustain continuous software updates, and accommodate new mission requirements coming into existence.
Northrop Grumman claims that with SR 1 fielding the B-2 program finally marked the latest major milestone. As indicated, it is confirmed to have been in operation since July 17, when the B-2 commemorated its first flight milestone 35 years ago.
Co-developed with the Air Force and Northrop, SR 1 is the Spirit Realm software factory to be used for streamlining the software improvement work over the B-2.
The enhanced communication and weapon systems allow an increase in the fighter’s level of combat effectiveness but come backed by an open mission systems architecture.
“SR 1 provides mission-critical capability upgrades to the communications and weapons systems via an open mission systems architecture, directly enhancing combat capability and allowing the fleet to initiate a new phase of agile software releases,” Northrop Grumman said.
The Spirit Realm Software Factory is less than two years old, and the few key objectives are risk and time reduction of flight tests by doing high-fidelity ground testing; increasing the number of data test points through targeted upgrades; improving functional capabilities through frequent automated testing; and enabling more capability upgrades to the B-2.
It would be particularly important in fast-paced updating capability as the Air Force starts to field new weapons; its continuous update of targets and integration into an evolving long-range kill chain is critical.
It has also better displays, flight hardware, and other survivability improvements for the B-2.
According to Northrop’s acting B-2 program manager Jerry McBrearty, “We are rapidly fielding capabilities with zero software defects through the software factory development ecosystem and further enhancing the B-2 fleet’s mission effectiveness.”
The B-2 will be the first legacy nuclear weapons platform to exploit the Department of Defense DevSecOps processes and digital toolsets, enabling rapid integration of new and future weapons that will increase deterrence capability.
Although the SR 1 was never designed using digital methods as its replacement, the B-21 Raider does, it is applying that technology to design, manage build, and test B-2 software.
The digital tools link with those developed for other legacy systems, which enables quicker testing and fielding while also identifying and mitigating risks sooner in the software development process.
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