Collins Aerospace Leads the Way in Open Systems for Military Avionics With Additional Face Certifications

Collins Aerospace, a leader in developing open systems architecture avionics, recently received new Conformance Certificates from The Open Group Future Airborne Capability Environment (FACETM) for two software products. Collins Aerospace is a unit of Raytheon Technologies Corp. (NYSE: RTX).

The Collins Aerospace Mission Flight Management Software (MFMS-1000) and Localizer Performance and Vertical Guidance Calculator (LPVC-1000), which provide mature software centric solutions on multiple aircraft types, are two of three Collins software applications to receive the certification, marking one of the highest completion rates in the industry. In 2017, Collins’ Avoidance Re-router (ARR-7000) software product was the first to be certified.

“These certifications are a major milestone for us because they align with the Department of Defense’s Modular Open Systems Approach (MOSA) standards,” said Dave Schreck, vice president and general manager for Military Avionics and Helicopters at Collins Aerospace. “These standards have been put in place to ensure products are designed to reduce integration time and ultimately increase rapid, affordable deployments of innovation.”

The recently updated MFMS-1000 provides global civil airspace access with seamless integration of existing mission flight management capabilities in a portable software-only solution. Its design maximizes affordability and portability across disparate aircraft platforms while minimizing the time it takes to field worldwide Required Navigation Performance and Area Navigation (RNP and RNAV) flight procedure capabilities.

The LPVC-1000 is a software component that enables fixed and rotary wing aircraft to perform more accurate satellite-based approaches and landings. These procedures provide savings in time, fuel and emissions for aircraft operators. The flexible design of this software product, along with its conformance to the FACE Technical Standard, allows utilization of the LPVC-1000 across numerous aircraft types for all branches of the military.

The FACE Consortium is a government and industry partnership to define an open avionics environment for multiple airborne platform types. FACE Certification proves that a software component has successfully been through an independent verification and certification process defined by the FACE Conformance Program.