ISSUE 155 | JULY 2021 AN INSIDE LOOK INTO LIFE AT DEFENCE EQUIPMENT & SUPPORT STATE-OF-THE-ART DUKE OF CAMBRIDGE INDUSTRY VIEW Night vision goggles Cuts steel in Glasgow Response to DSIS 2 desider July 2021 desider July 2021 3 In this issue ForewordBY SIR SIMON BOLLOM SENIOR INDUSTRY LEADER4 6RESPONSE COMMENT TO DSIS OPTIMISING TYPE 26 8DELIVERY 10STEEL CUT In a rapidly changing environment, there is Our openness and commitment to work with While the environment in which we operate a demand for greater pace of delivery across our allies through international programmes is changing, our mandate remains the same: THERMAL SIMULATOR the UK’s defence industry. and initiatives will continue as we maintain we must deliver cutting-edge capabilities The new Defence and Security Industrial delivery of world-class equipment and support. to our armed forces, using public money in 12VISION 14ARRIVAL Strategy (DSIS) represents a transformational Involving industry earlier in our procurement the smartest way possible. We must also shift in the government’s approach to the process will ensure that we benefit from play a pivotal role in supporting the MOD’s defence and security sectors. It will ensure innovative technology and encourage new contribution to achieving the Government’s that the UK continues to have competitive, competitors to enter the supply chain. Through target of net zero carbon emissions by 2050. innovative and world-class defence and security this, DE&S will strengthen the productivity and Harnessing the social value model will help us industries, driving investment and underpinning resilience of the defence sector while better deliver economic, environmental and social our national security. protecting the supply chain. benefits through the contracts we award, and DE&S is central to realising this Grasping the opportunity to transform help develop low carbon solutions to improve transformation. Our DE&S 2025 Strategy, acquisition and procurement for defence, we defence capabilities and reduce support costs. published in May, sets out our response to can lower the cost and improve the pace of We aim to deliver safe, secure and innovative the Integrated Review and DSIS with a strong delivery. We are working with Head Office and solutions at greater pace and are driven by our emphasis on pace and agility and digital the Front Line Commands to drive the reform commitment to the service men and women of solutions. There is the opportunity to be of our acquisition and approvals processes. the UK armed forces. genuinely transformational in this space to meet This, alongside a review of the regulations CELEBRATING QUEEN’S military demand in a hyper-competitive world. governing defence competitions, will be Introducing a more nuanced approach key to the success of UK defence. I have 1825 YEARS BIRTHDAY20 to procurement, we are moving away from the upmost confidence that DE&S will OF ABW HONOURS competition by default. National security, continue delivering some of the most prosperity and opportunities for international complex projects and support arrangements partnerships must be kept at the at the – at increasing pace – through our people, forefront of our priorities. technology and innovation. Cover: The Thermoteknix miniature ClipIR XD-E Thermal Clip-on System 4 desider July 2021 SENIOR LEADER COMMENT Adrian Baguley, DE&S Deputy CEO and Director Strategic Enablers Talks to Desider about Acquisition Transformation. Acquisition Transformation - building a system founded around accountability, transparency and trust in professionalism. More than ever the nature of national security threats and the pace of technological change necessitate that we become better and more agile in managing the acquisition of military capability. The acquisition system can experience multiple tensions which may then lead to misaligned incentives and behaviours and ultimately a low trust environment. There isn’t a single root cause of these issues, nor are there simple fixes for the elements that contribute. If there were, our predecessors would have ‘solved’ these problems years ago. However, when we succeed in aligning these incentives the system can deliver extraordinary results, at pace; drawing on the best talent in different parts of the acquisition system, we SENIOR LEADER COMMENT work together in harmony and with high levels of trust to achieve success. The challenge is to embed those behaviours across defence as usual way of operating. Caroline Boughton, an experienced Project Director herself, is leading the latest proposed acquisition changes in Head Office under the Acquisition and Approvals Transformation Programme (AATP), which has been developed to reduce the average time taken to deliver capability to the front line. What is refreshing about AATP is that we all recognise the need to build a system that is both tailored and proportionate to the risks and complexities of the projects that we manage and based on bringing professional experience to both deliver • Create new systems aligned to agile We have worked with the AATP team to design and assure our projects, removing layers of approaches to capability delivery where it and deliver the changes through a series of bureaucracy in the system. The current is vital to improve pace in order to exploit short sprints over this year that are already wave of the AATP programme is looking to technological advantage; paying dividends. achieve the following: • Better manage categories of equipment We employ some of the government’s • Tailor and streamline assurance and and services to harness our pan-defence most experienced and talented acquisition approvals. If we get this right it has the buying power and deliver better value professionals and the DE&S volunteers in these potential to take months out of our and faster routes to market. sprints are making a huge contribution that will assurance, approvals and decision As the MOD’s principal delivery agent, benefit us all in time. We are always open to timelines. It will also allow us to make and the organisation that manages many of change and improvement. If you have any ideas better use of scarce resource and government’s largest and most technically on how we can further change the system for focus where we can deliver the most complex acquisition projects, DE&S has a great the better then do please get involved int the effect and learning; self-interest in seeing the system improved. sprints – don’t be a spectator! 6 desider July 2021 desider July 2021 7 FEATURE FEATURE Kevin Craven, DE&S’ crucial role in shaping, ADS Interim delivering and modernising the Chief Executive UK’s future defence capabilities Talks to Desider about Permanent Secretary to the Ministry of how industry need Defence, David Williams, on DE&S’ role to respond to the in modernising Defence capabilities. Defence and Security I can’t think of a more important and interesting Industrial Strategy. time to be part of Defence. The COVID-19 response has underlined the relevance of the armed forces to the day-to- day lives of people in this country and to the Government’s wider domestic agenda. The Integrated Review and Defence Command Paper have set out a direction and purpose for us to organise around and focus on. And the FEATURE increased defence budget from the spending review gives us a fighting chance of delivering on that ambition. But this isn’t just going to happen by itself. DE&S are FEATURE In March we saw an important moment for defence and This approach will give officials greater freedoms to take pivotal to our new direction and must work together with security in the UK, as the Government set out its strategic procurement decisions that could raise the level of domestic our partners to ensure that we step up to deliver and approach and priorities for security, defence, development content in programmes, prioritise the UK supply chain, and seize these opportunities. and foreign policy. contribute to the Government’s Social Value and Levelling For me, that means looking at the roles and While the Integrated Review set out a comprehensive Up agendas. Recognising that delivery of the strategy is all responsibilities in Head Office, in the Frontline Commands, vision for the UK’s role in the world in the coming years, important to the Defence Enterprise’s credibility, industry is and in our enabling organisations so we are all clear for business the publication of the Defence and Security looking forward to working in partnership with the MOD what is expected of each other and of the teams we are Industrial Strategy (DSIS) was an important step. on this new way forward, and on development of a new working in. It means having a clear view of the skills and Taken together with the Defence Command Paper, the Land Industrial Strategy. capabilities - and the mindset - we need to make a reality two documents set out UK priorities for equipment, The time to judge whether the approaches set out by the of the Integrated Review. It means making real, tangible capability and technology development, and the approach DSIS and elsewhere have achieved their aims will come when progress on our transformation and reform programmes. to future procurement. they can be evaluated against key milestones. The full range Both the Integrated Review and Defence Command The Command Paper set the tone for much of the detail of policy changes, new initiatives and promised strategies will Paper obviously have a focus on the introduction of new laid out in the DSIS. It describes how the UK will adopt a take several years to be put into practical effect. capabilities and the technological advantage we want our more strategic approach to industrial capability, and “provide Early opportunities to apply this new approach to armed forces to have in the future. greater flexibility in designing capability and acquisition procurement, such as the recently launched Fleet Solid With the focus on a persistent presence, on competition strategies” to boost domestic skills, technologies and Support Ships competition, can show the commitment to and on forward deployment; there is a real premium on capabilities.