AT&T Completes “Smart Warehouse” Tests for Department of Defense

AT&T announced yesterday it has completed its first milestone toward proving the capabilities of its 5G network solution to enable “smart warehouse” applications for the Department of Defense’s Naval Base Coronado in San Diego. AT&T’s 5G network solution demonstrated data throughput speeds greater than four gigabits-per-second with less than 10 milliseconds of latency using AT&T 5G spectrum and a private 5G Core and Radio Access Network (RAN). This performance was demonstrated with commercially available commodity mobile devices at a testbed facility in Richardson, TX.

In October 2020, the Department of Defense (DoD) announced $600 million in awards for 5G experimentation and testing at five U.S. military test sites, representing the largest full-scale 5G tests for dual-use applications in the world. DoD has gone on record saying it seeks to remain at the forefront of cutting-edge 5G testing and experimentation to strengthen our Nation’s warfighting capabilities as well as U.S. economic competitiveness in this field. 

Two of the U.S. military sites where it is testing 5G capabilities as part of DoD’s Tranche 1 experiments are:

1. Naval Base Coronado, San Diego, CA – 5G Smart Warehousing

The objective of this project is to develop a 5G-enabled Smart Warehouse focused on transshipment between shore facilities and naval units, to increase the efficiency and fidelity of naval logistic operations, including identification, recording, organization, storage, retrieval, and transportation of material and supplies. Additionally, the project will create a proving ground for testing, refining, and validating emerging 5G-enabled technologies. 

2. Fort Hood, Killeen, TX – Augmented Reality/Virtual Reality Training

This DoD 5G project was originally designated for Joint Base Lewis-McChord in Tacoma, WA. It has been relocated by DoD to U.S. Army base Fort Hood near Killeen, Texas. The objective of this project is to enable modular, deployable and secure 5G connectivity on currently available training devices, specifically the Instrumentable Multiple Integrated Laser Engagement System (I-MILES) and the U.S. Army’s Integrated Visual Augmentation System (IVAS). DoD is testing 5G support for tactical edge use cases that integrate I-MILES and IVAS with Augmented Reality and Virtual Reality (AR/VR) capabilities to conduct mission planning, distributed training, and operations.