SIGMA · Satellite-enabled Interoperable system ensuring GOVSATCOM services’ reliability, optimal traffic Management, security and long-term Availability for EU and national public authorities

In the recent years, Satellite Communication gained significant momentum in ensuring global connectivity and reliable communication for defence, security, humanitarian and emergency response. The EU GOVSATCOM initiative paves the way towards a new SatCom solution for a broad range of EU and national entities. To improve the GOVSATCOM capabilities and provide end to end security and interoperability between SatCom services and with the terrestrial communications networks, the SIGMA project proposes the development and demonstration of a technical solution incorporating pooled and shared capacities from different satellite systems. The proposed SIGMA technical solution aims to integrate SatCom-On-The-Move operating in X-band, military Ka-band and civil Ka-band with 5G user equipment to the terrestrial networks. The integration and routing of the traffic will be managed by a Traffic Management software and a Software-Defined Wide Area Network Router. End-to-end security is provided by an encryption module that incorporates Advanced Encryption Standard algorithm. Demonstrations of the new solution in a real user environment will be conducted in 3 use cases specified by national agencies (end users) in 3 different EU countries. Specifically:-In Luxembourg with Corps Grand-Ducal d'Incendie: simulating emergency response to flooding situation.-In Germany: with University of Bundeswehr Munich and the German Armed Forces: responding to Search & Rescue operations in isolated areas.-In France: with Service Départamental d’Incendie et de Secours: responding to a terrestrial network outage during a cultural/sporting event.The consortium, which includes 5 companies and a research centre from 4 different countries, will also allocate considerable effort into the dissemination, exploitation and communication activities to pave the way for taking the results of SIGMA to the market in the shorter possible term.