The Army's annual Arcane Thunder event in 2027 will feature two components: communications exercises in the continental United States and an overseas demonstration with partner nations, according to a request for information posted last week.

In 2023, the Army’s 2nd Multidomain Task Force, based in Germany, began conducting Arcane Thunder as a live-fire exercise in which U.S. forces collaborate on capabilities such as reconnaissance, target development and precision targeting.

In 2027, the CONUS-based portion of the exercise will involve “realistic red teaming and execution of multidomain mission threads” while the OCONUS portion will include “select technologies from the CONUS iteration” and include “partner engagement,” according to the RFI.

Arcane Thunder 2027 will involve soldiers conducting multidomain operations “in several environments and locations while an increasingly adaptive enemy disrupts and denies specific capabilities such as open maneuver, communications and resupply,” the notice states. The exercise is meant to test how technologies perform in realistic, austere environments.

Focus areas for technologies that will be used in next year’s Arcane Thunder include:

• Artificial intelligence-augmented command and control
• Multidomain targeting and sensing
• Network autonomy
• Robotics
• Additive manufacturing
• Cyber-electronic warfare information convergence

In its message to industry, the Army notes it is trying to synchronize its precision effects through a “complex network architecture with the ability to receive and distill raw data from multiple sensors.”

“This architecture must also have edge computing capabilities, data transport and storage capabilities, and the ability to transfer unclassified data to higher classification domains virtually. We aim to identify, co-develop, and integrate capabilities that enable decision dominance and convergence of kinetic and non-kinetic effects across all domains,” the service states.

Additionally, the Army states in the notice that industry solutions must “account for constrained placement and access” and be able to operate in denied and degraded environments.

Next year will be the first year the Army plans to combine Arcane Thunder with its Dynamic Front exercise -- a live-fire simulation 56th Multi-Domain Command Europe conducts across Europe with NATO allies and partners.

The RFI will remain open through June, and vendors that are selected will be notified in the fourth quarter of calendar year 2026. The exercise is set to take place between April and June 2027, according to the notice.