Army Hopeful Troubled Headset Program Is Finally Looking Up

Photo-illustration, Army photo

The Army’s Integrated Visual Augmentation System program has faced numerous setbacks over the last few years, but the service still believes in the technology and is optimistic the latest version can unlock the transformational warfighting advancements the Army and developer Microsoft envision.

Based on Microsoft’s commercial HoloLens technology, the Integrated Visual Augmentation System, or IVAS, is meant to replace the Army’s current night vision and Nett Warrior situational awareness platforms, integrating their capabilities into a single mixed reality headset to improve soldier lethality and mobility.

The Army in March 2021 awarded Microsoft a 10-year contract worth up to $21.9 billion for IVAS, which was one of 24 technologies former Army Chief of Staff retired Gen. James McConville declared later that year the service would put “in the hands of soldiers” by the end of fiscal year 2023. While the system does have a number of user touchpoints under its belt, the initial feedback from soldiers was far from positive.

During an operational test with the system in June 2022, soldiers were “more successful accomplishing their operational missions with their current equipment than with IVAS 1.0. Soldiers hit fewer targets and engaged targets more slowly” when equipped with IVAS, according to the Director, Operational Test and Evaluation’s 2022 annual report.

Additionally, “the majority of soldiers reported at least one symptom of physical impairment to include disorientation, dizziness, eyestrain, headaches, motion sickness and nausea, neck strain and tunnel vision,” the report stated.

Lt. Col. Denny Dresch, IVAS product manager in the Army’s Program Executive Office Soldier, said in an interview the system’s poor performance in the 2022 test was largely caused by three factors: software-based issues resulting in low reliability and stability, an unsuitable low-light sensor and an uncomfortable form factor.

In December 2022, the Army and Microsoft went back to the drawing board to redesign the system to address those three issues, and in August 2023, the service took delivery of 20 prototypes of the updated headset, known as IVAS 1.2.

The Army took the IVAS 1.2 prototypes to Fort Drum, New York, for a user assessment to “put the system through its paces,” Dresch said. “We went to that user assessment saying, ‘We have a design plan. This plan is an 18-to-24 month plan. Are we where we need to be in our design at this point in time after nine months of putting this together?’ And by and far from a technical perspective, absolutely … the program is on track with where we’re at for design — and some elements we’re exceeding where we thought we would be.”

Along with the technical progress, Dresch said soldier feedback of IVAS 1.2 was generally positive coming out of the August user assessment.

“The soldiers felt very good about the sensor suite. We had previously worked out a lot of the reliability issues, so the systems were much more stable than what they were in that June of [2022] operational test, and then a lot of positive feedback on the form factor,” he said.

Whereas IVAS 1.0 “hugs to your face like a pair of ski goggles,” IVAS 1.2 features a hinge mechanism that allows the operator to raise the headset when not in use, Dresch said. “And quite honestly, that in itself played a lot into their feedback in terms of comfort and being able to get it off your eyes when you’re looking around during the daytime or if you have to do something else.”

The updates to IVAS 1.2 “mitigated” many of the physical side effects as well, with reports of symptoms “exponentially lower than what we’ve had previously,” he added.

With the user assessment at Fort Drum validating the IVAS 1.2 redesign, the program has now entered phase two, which — along with continuing to iron out any lingering issues regarding reliability, the low-light sensor and the form factor — is largely focused on what Dresch called “producibility” — in other words, determining if IVAS can be manufactured at scale.

With just the 20 prototypes produced for phase one, Microsoft will deliver 280 more IVAS 1.2 systems for phase two so the service can have “confidence in the production phase that we can produce these at scale at the end of phase two.”

In a conversation with Microsoft on the condition of background, the company told National Defense that while it is primarily known for its software, a dedicated portion of Microsoft’s business is focused on hardware and manufacturing, and the company is confident it can meet the Army’s requirements for producibility and ruggedization.

Another focus for phase two is building out the system’s ability to ingest sensor feeds from other sources. Dresch said as a “digital architecture,” IVAS must have the ability to push data and pass information “back and forth on the battlefield.”

While the Army is “still laser-focused” on making the system’s reliability, low-light sensor and form factor right, at the end of phase two the plan is to integrate IVAS with a tactical cloud package that possesses “higher capacity processing capability to be able to run models … to understand information and make recommendations on information that’s being presented,” he said.

Microsoft said the company recognizes that on the modern battlefield, data will be critical to mission success, and IVAS is designed to ingest a range of information — regardless of the source of the data — to give soldiers critical situational awareness when and where they need it.

Phase two of IVAS 1.2’s development will consist of four sets of deliverables — the first of which was delivered in January and included 10 prototypes that participated in another user assessment at Picatinny Arsenal in New Jersey — and will culminate with a company-level operational test in spring 2025, Dresch said.

“Pending a successful test,” the program office will go back to the Army with feedback, which will then inform a full-rate production decision, he added. The full-rate production decision is expected by fourth quarter of fiscal year 2025, according to the Director, Operational Test and Evaluation’s 2023 report on the program.

While IVAS 1.2 is considered the production representative variant, the Army still has plans for IVAS 1.0, as well as another version called IVAS 1.1. David Patterson Jr., director of public affairs and strategic communications for PEO Soldier, said in an email IVAS 1.1 features the improved low-light sensor but has the same form factor as IVAS 1.0.

Some positive feedback from the June 2022 test was how IVAS provided “within the heads-up display a way for you to do mission planning and rehearsals” and “build out operations in an augmented reality environment,” Dresch said. “And then because of transport layers, I can call people in to look at the same environment and then we can … rehearse our operations before actually executing them.”

The Army is planning to use IVAS 1.0 systems in its schoolhouses as mission-planning tools to train “leaders … how to leverage a mixed reality or [augmented reality] environment” to orchestrate operations and “how to do it over time and space when we’re not all co-located,” he said. The service so far has fielded 50 IVAS 1.0 systems to Fort Moore, Georgia, and plans to send headsets to Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri, and Fort Sill, Oklahoma, as well, he added.

Meanwhile, the Army is conducting a “limited safety release” of IVAS 1.1, which “will go to, most likely, operational units that will put this into their formation” to “then understand how do we use this digital architecture that is IVAS, and how do we use this platform of augmented reality on the battlefield to inform how we fight?” Dresch said.

Those operational units will use IVAS 1.1 in “some of the larger collective exercises and training that they do, and then that will inform the Army, ‘This is how you levy augmented reality on the battlefield,’” he said. The plan is for the limited safety release to go to infantry, Stryker and armored brigade combat team units in the first quarter of fiscal year 2025, the 2023 DOT&E report stated.

Overall, both the Army and Microsoft expressed confidence that the IVAS program is back on track.

Maj. Gen. Joseph Hilbert, the Army’s director of force development, G-8, said during a March media briefing that for fiscal year 2025, the service is requesting $256 million in procurement funding and $98 million in research, development, test and evaluation funding for IVAS. Assistant Secretary of the Army for Acquisition, Logistics and Technology Doug Bush said all of that investment is tied to IVAS 1.2.

While the system still has to “go through a lot of testing,” the Army believes and hopes IVAS 1.2 is the “combat capable version” the service needs, and its planned 2025 investments in the program are “based on our hope for success there,” Bush said.

Microsoft said it believes IVAS is transformational technology that will change the way the Army executes missions in the future, and is a game changer for soldier safety and effectiveness.

“We’re feeling really confident,” Dresch said. “The soldier [feedback] continues to indicate that the program’s moving in a good direction.” ND

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