Answers to ques recd 22 Jan 10_Amend 2.doc

Page

12 & 13

19 - 21

ITEM 0006

000601

000602

000603

ITEM 0009

000907 -000912 With service changes on the Generation 4 Inmarsat constellation in just the past few months, is the government aware that Aero-H+ services are supported on both the I-3 and I-4 satellites and may be priced slightly differently?

Recommend the government modify the SLINs to differentiate Aero-H+ / I-3 with Aero-H+ / I-4 datalink and crew deck and cabin voice.

We were not aware of price differences between I-3 and I-4.

Concur. We will add additional SLINs to differentiate between I-3 and I-4.

001002BA : 8 kbps per minute

001002BB : 16 kbps per minute

001002BC : 32 kbps per minute

001002BD : 64 kbps per minute

001002BE : 128 kbps per minute Concur, will add SLINs

001101 &

001102

Are the various base maintenance functions capable of any and all equipment modifications required to reconfigure avionics equipment?

Yes, either through organic maintenance capability or through vendor support contracts.

6.1 6.2

6.3

6.4

6.5

6.6

6.7

For clarification, Xantic and France Telecom no longer exist as separate entities. Is the requirement to have agreements with the I-3 Aussaguel, Perth, Eik, and Santa Paula GES operators and the I-4 Paumalu, Burum and Fucino SASs for the use of each of these stations?

Is the government still receiving itinerant charges? If so, for what service(s) and what percentage of the overall usage does it entail?

Yes, the intent is to cover all third-party providers as well as vendor’s primary network.

Itinerant charges are very minimal, less than .01%. Most occur in special local airspace.

AMC/A6IE will staff your questions and provide the applicable information or contact with the appropriate action officers.

What are the typical and projected PDC volumes, in characters per month, transiting the ground-ground network?

What is the average PDC size in characters?

How many PDC messages are received on the ground-ground network per month?

Yes, US only.

This service has not been used recently, to our knowledge. However, some of the delivery orders do carry the service.

Does the government require a flight tracking capability and what is the expected source of this position information?

What weather data products are required and how are they intended to be used? For example, for dispatch, or uplink to the aircraft via which medium/media and what protocols?

What airport data is required and how is it intended to be used?

To be answered in a separate amendment.

What is the breakdown between domestic and international?

What are the typical and projected flight plan volumes, in characters per month?

What is the average flight plan size in characters?

Do flight plans ever have to be filed with other than civilian ATC authorities?

618 TACC electronically files all Flight Manager monitored missions. Total sorties per month averages 18,600. Average flight plans per month is 13,140. Each flight plan is a single message. Some sorties will have multiple flight plans filed and cancelled due to delays and mission changes. AMC is converting all their flight plans to the international format (Form 1801) flight plan. In the last week, only 7 domestic format (Form 175) flight plans were filed. By the end of September 2010, anticipate all flight plans will be the 1801 format.

From a sample of 6 1801 flight plans, average characters in a plan were 529 with a minimum size of 222 and maximum of 748. Average characters per month estimated at 6,955,440.

Flight plans are filed with the appropriate Air Traffic Services agencies including air traffic centers and departure/arrival airfields.

· SATCOM ACARS (KBits)

· AOC Data (KBits)

· ATS Data (KBits)

· Engine Data (KBits)

· Other (KBits)

· SATCOM Voice (minutes)

· Aero-H Crew deck

· Aero-H Cabin

· Aero-H+ Crew deck

· Aero-H+ Cabin

· Aero-I Crew deck

· Aero-I Cabin

· VDL2 (32.5 Kbps) (KBits)

· AOC Data (KBits)

· ATS Data (KBits)

· Engine Data (KBits)

· Other (KBits)

· VHF ACARS (2.4 Kbps POA) (KBits)

· AOC Data (KBits)

· ATS Data (KBits)

· Engine Data (KBits)

· Other (KBits)

· HFDL (KBits)

· AOC Data (KBits)

· ATS Data (KBits)

· Engine Data (KBits)

· Other (KBits)

· HF Voice (contacts)

· VHF Voice (contacts)

· SwiftBroadband

· Voice (4.0 AMBE and ISDN) (minutes)

· Data (Background IP in MBs and Streaming IP in minutes)

· Swift 64 (if available)

· ISDN (minutes)

· MPDS (MBits)

· Mini-M (if available)

· Voice (minutes)

· Data (minutes)

· D-ATIS (requests) for “All Regions Outside the Asia Pacific Region and “Asia Pacific Region”

· Oceanic Clearances (requests in KBits)

· Pre-departure Clearances (requests)

In addition, a projected 5-year forecast is requested for the above services to correlate with anticipated or planned modifications or usage.

We will provide the requested information as a separate amendment.

(1) Government network/command and control interface system protocol and interface definition for transmission and receipt of datalink messages, text messages, and/or file transfers.

(2) Aircraft number listing of all aircraft covered by services, to include:

a. MDS types under this RFP

b. Number of Aircraft within each MDS

c. Breakdown of modified and to be modified aircraft within each MDS (as applicable) during the 5-year period of performance.

(3) Printout of each MDS’ most current ORT configuration

(4) The CMU part numbers and AOC database part numbers for each MDS.

(5) The Inmarsat SDU part numbers for each MDS.

Vendor needs to specify their need date to the government in the transition plan for all interface information.

Government will not provide avionics specific equipment and configuration unless vendor can justify a need to know. Government will provide message addressing information for each MDS as required to route downlink message traffic, send uplink messages, or send acknowledgement (protocol overhead). Vendors are encouraged to provide remommended ORT tables for all of the aircraft.

AMC will provide the following documents for their current data link message exchanges on Delivery Order 01, 02, and 29:

(1) Interface Requirements Specifications and Design Document for the Aircraft Communications Addressing & Reporting System (ACARS) to Global Decision Support System (GDSS).

(2) Interface Design Document for the C5 Aircraft Communications Addressing & Reporting System (ACARS) to Modernized Global Decision Support System (GDSS 2).

(3) Interface Design Document for the C17 Aircraft Communications Addressing & Reporting System (ACARS) to Modernized Global Decision Support System (GDSS 2).

(4) Interface Design Document for the C/KC135 Aircraft Communications Addressing & Reporting System (ACARS) to Modernized Global Decision Support System (GDSS 2).

Aircraft number listing information will be provided in a separate Excel spreadsheet.

001002 – Swift Broadband Data

Unit of Measure is listed as “Kilobit”; should it be the industry standard “Megabyte”?

Will change spreadsheet SLIN entries to reflect Mbit

001002 – Swift Broadband Data

Which Swift Broadband Data service is required?

Will add SLINs

001004 – Mini M Data Service

Unit of Measure is listed as “Kilobit”; should it be “Minute”?

Will change spreadsheet SLIN entries to reflect Mins

001006 – Swift 64 Mobile Pack Data Service (MPDS)

Unit of Measure is listed as “Kilobit”; should it be the industry standard “Megabit”?

Will change spreadsheet SLIN entries to reflect Mbit

000103 (and similar CLINS) - Flat Rate per Aircraft Model

Design Series (MDS)

(Volume discount once ______ total MDS kilobits are reached in a given month)

Unit of Measure is listed as “Each”; please clarify. MDSs are different sizes.

Each refers to the MDS volume discount rate, one price for each MDS on a delivery order.