Polish SIGINT System for the Armed Forces

The procurement concerns supply of a broadband UKF radio intelligence system, within the scope of a development project which is being realized in line with the procedures set by the 72/MON decision, issued by the Polish Minister of Defence on 25th March 2013, pertaining to the acquisition process regarding the equipment and services for the Polish Armed Forces.

Detailed requirements pertaining to the SIGINT systems, contained within the Terms of Reference and Initial Tactical-Technical Assumptions remain classified. The data above is only going to be disclosed to the contractors who are invited to place their initial offers.

The Armament Inspectorate defined the following tasks which are to be completed by the contractors:

• Adapt (tailor) the existing solutions or design, for the military purposes, proper transmitters and radio bearing finders, operating within the UKF band;

• Develop the required software for managing the SIGINT suite, along with relevant specialized software that could be used for signal analysis.

If the requirements are defined as above, most probably the finders and transmitters that are already being used are going to be applied within the newly established suite (most probably of the Western origin). Thus, above all, the Polish entities will focus on development of the systemic software, required to control the system and analyse the collected data. This procurement mode will also be a result of one of the offer assessment criteria: delivery deadline.

Within the scope of the tender, the contractor is required to create a prototype for the SIGINT reconnaissance system which is going to be accepted in a qualification test programme, in line with the development works procedure contained in the Annex No. 4 of the 72/MON decision. Should the research have positive results, three more systems are going to be ordered by the Polish Armed Forces. However, these systems would be received by the military, and the reception is going to be realized by one of the Regional Regional Military Representation Offices. Assessment of compliance, regarding the requirements of the technical specification, is going to be realized in line with the National Defence and Security Products Compliance Act of 17th November 2006.

Selection of the contractor will be based on three criteria: price (weight of 70), guarantee (weight of 20) and delivery deadline (weight of 10). Requests, regarding the inclusion in the proceedings, may be placed until 31st May 2016.

We do not know what military units would receive the newly manufactured systems. The announcement suggests that the Armament Inspectorate neither wants to acquire vehicle-based equipment, nor does it want to create mobile systems, thus we may assume that the organ considers to use the new devices to equip specialized SIGINT or EW centres, or install the new equipment onboard two new Polish reconnaissance vessels: ORP „Hydrograf” and ORP „Nawigator”.