Spanish Army shares its experience of using its BMS with Thales
On 7 November, a delegation of senior Thales staff from 15 countries in Europe, North America and Asia Pacific visited the Spanish Army's Brigada Guadarrama XII at the El Goloso military base near Madrid.
The visit underscored the importance of collaboration between the armed forces and industry in developing best-in class advanced Battlefield Management Systems and associated radio communications solutions. Thales systems have been deployed by the Spanish Army on international missions including Latvia, Mali and more recently Lebanon. The experience of using the BMS in the theatre of operations was very revealing for Thales professionals and will help to adapt the company’s command-and-control systems and communications solutions to the real-life needs of operational users.
The Thales delegation was led by Christophe Dumas, Vice President, Radio Communication Products, and José Sarnito, Director of Defence, Aerospace and Security for Thales in Spain. This business generates annual sales of more than 1 billion euros from key products for the defence sector both in Spain and worldwide, with equipment such as PR4G, SOTAS or Nextwave.
One of the most relevant developments for the market today is the SYNAPS software-defined radio family, which is Thales's proposed solution for the Spanish Army’s new 8x8 vehicles and the progressive replacement of legacy radios to modernise its radiocommunications capabilities. Operational services provided by SYNAPS, including simultaneous voice, messaging, video, chat and Blue Force Tracking, as well as the system’s excellent range performance, will be a real benefit for collaborative combat.
The visit was an opportunity to strengthen the foundations of collaboration with industry, and to stress the importance of a solid defence industry: European actors working alongside local actors to develop high value added solutions for legacy systems that meet the latest requirements on the battlefield at optimum cost, as has been the case with the Spanish Army’s BMS.
Spanish high technology in international missions
The BMS-ET is one of the most advanced command-and-control systems on the market. It is a complete solution developed to support the work of commanders when planning and conducting missions in the theatre of operations.
The system allows Spanish units and vehicles to share information in real time. Vehicle operators thus have a complete vision of everything that happens in their environment and are able to coordinate and react to any situation in their decisive moments.
The BMS-ET also improves the interoperability of Spanish armoured units with the systems deployed by other NATO countries, which is critical to the success of international missions.