First files moved under the Defence Investment Agency confirmed

Of course the one day that I try to rest amd relax, we have to have something drop. Credit to my self-declared bestie Kyle Duggan for first breaking this story. He kept on top of it! I think we should officially be listing him as a defence journalist.

Anyways, we got our first confirmed projects placed under the Defence Investment Agency today thanks to a written question by Scott Anderson, Conservative MP for Vernon-Lake Country-Monashee. In it he asked:

“With regard to the Defence Investment Agency under Public Services and Procurement Canada: what projects are currently being managed by the Defence Investment Agency, broken down by (i) air, (ii) land, (iii) sea, (iv) space, (v) cyber, (vi) emerging technologies, (vii) training and simulation, (viii) surveillance and reconnaissance, (ix) command, control, communications, computers and intelligence (C41), (x) joint support and sustainment, (xi) missiles, rockets, ammunition and other munitions, (xii) personal equipment and protection systems, (xiii) real property?”

The Defence Investment Agency was first announced on October 2nd. Doug Guzman, former Group Head, RBC Wealth Management and Insurance and Managing Director at Goldman Sachs started his role as CEO of the new Defence Investment Agency (DIA) only on November 12th

A response to that question was posted today by Jenna Sudds, Minister of Government Transformation, Public Works and Procurement. In it we have confirmation that eight projects have been placed under the new Defence Investment Agency as of October 20th.

These include:

• Air Capability Program – Multi-Function Support (CC-144), to which info at this time is extremely scarce

• CC-130J Hercules In-Service Support & RCAF105 Block 8.1 Upgrade

• Arctic-Over The Horizon RadaR

• Canadian Patrol Submarine Project

• Defence Enhanced Surveillance from Space Project

• Enhanced Satellite Communications Projects

• Operational Training Infrastructure Enterprise Modernization

• Airborne Early Warning & Control

None of these are to terribly shocking to be on the list. We already knew that the Canadian Patrol Submarine Project, the largest and most high-stakes project currently on the docket, was placed under the Defence Investment Agency from the start.

A-OTHR is another obvious one. Not to be confused with Polar Over-the-Horizon Radar, which is quite common, the A-OTHR covers the area from the Canadian border up to the Archipelago, while Polar covers the Area of the Archipelago and Arctic circle.

That has already been contracted in partnership with Australia, where we will use the technology from the existing Jindalee Operational Radar Network (JORN) to set up our own system. These two projects represent the main anchors of NORAD modernization, replaving and expanding upon the existing Northern Warning System.

The C130J Block 8.1 configuration upgrade will modernize the existing J fleet with a new Flight Management System, Enhanced Comms/Navigation links, Updated IFF, and new Landing Systems.

Meanwhile the Operational Training Infrastructure Enterprise Modernization will modernize the RCAFs training environments in anticipation of new assets such as the F-35, P8 and CQ-9B. It will bring the RCAFs training Infrastructure in line with the RCAF Training Modernization Strategy.

It will include modernization of Air Weapons Range Security, Airspace Reconfiguration, Range Communications, Range Instrumentation, Electromagnetic Spectrum and Threat Environment, Targets, Range Operations and Training Support Facilities.

I of course already wrote a bit ago on the AEWC project. The last major inclusions are space related in the Enhanced Satellite Communication - Polar (ESCP-P) porject and Defence Enhanced Surveillance from Space Project (DESSP). We just talked about DESSP yesterday funny enough.

ESCP-P aims to acquire a Ultra-High Frequency (UHF) narrowband and wideband satellite communications (SATCOM) capability for Canada’s North (65°N - 90°N latitude) in competents to other SATCOM projects like the Tactical Narrowband Satellite Communications – Geosynchronous (TNS-GEO) system, which itself is just the American Mobile User Objective System (MUOS)

Both rhese projects are considered high-prioirty and achievable before their projected 2035+ timelines. Their inclusion is a good sign that the Federal Government has a heaby desire to quickly speed up these projects, something I have previously advocated for.

Of course with the initial list the Army is losing out. There are exactly zero Army projects on the list at all, in fact, the Air Force dominates most of them. The big exception to this is the Canadian Patrol Submarine Project. Of course over the next year we're going to see more projects slowly rolled in to the Defence Investment Agency.

The plan remains to spend the next year slowly getting the organization started up and running, after which they will take responsibility for projects over $100 million in value. Of course there's justifiable reasons for each of these projects to be on the list.

You either have projects of massive scale and Interest to the government (CPSP, AEWC), major projects that are already contracted (A-OTHR) or projects of significance that the government desires to speed up (DESSP, ESCP-P)

There are other projects of significance, of course. I expect that we will see more slowly moved over come the new year. I do wish that we had a proper list that we could see that had all them. The Defence Capabilities Blueprint is also late to be updated, so maybe thats just my annoyance there leaking through. It doesn't even have CPSP!

Either way, im glad to get an update. I had planned to ask eventually, however I kept forgetting too. My bad. I will ask again in a few weeks though, and make it a regular occurrence to bug for info.