Evolving the Tactical Edge: Delivering Unified Capabilities (UC) and Mobile Enterprise Connectivity to the Deployed User

The Defense Information Systems Agency (DISA) is at the forefront of providing IP based enterprise services to Department of Defense (DoD) users. One of the key technologies being deployed by DISA today is Unified Capabilities (UC), which is comprised of IP-based voice, video, web conferencing and IM/Chat applications. These enterprise UC services will allow the Military Departments (MILDEPs) to transition from legacy technologies, previously provided within their Local Area Networks (LANs), to a converged cloud-based solutions that will provide better collaboration capabilities and reduce information technology costs [1]. While these new enterprise UC services should provide enhanced capabilities at a reduced cost for strategic users, there are challenges with extending these services to deployed, tactical users that may be utilizing legacy equipment and do not always have connectivity back to the Defense Information Systems Network (DISN) backbone. In order to overcome these challenges, tactical DISN gateway access nodes will need enhancements to allow tactical users to leverage enterprise UC services when there is stable connectivity back to the DISN, but also continue to provide these UC services to tactical users when connectivity is unavailable. This paper explores upgrades to DISA´s Deployable DISN Access Node (DDAN) as a proof of concept system to provide enterprise UC services to the tactical edge. In addition to evaluating the feasibility of accessing UC services via a deployable tactical suite, this paper also evaluates the benefits of using the suite to deliver these services to mobile devices (e.g., Cell phones, laptops, and vehicles) using wireless connectivity.