Lockheed Martin has delivered the first Integrated Combat System (ICS)-enabled baseline to the US Navy, a development that advances the service’s long-running effort to move surface combatants toward a more modular, software-defined combat architecture. The delivery marks a concrete step in the Navy’s broader push to accelerate capability refresh cycles aboard its warships.

The first ICS enabled baseline is named Aegis BL9.C3.0. It was complied using the company`s Forge environment, which functions as an agile, continuous integration/continuous deployment (CI/CD) software factory.

What is an ICS?

The Integrated Combat System is a scalable, net centric combat management system. It utilizes common software and compute infrastructure, to rapidly field capability across all domains to the US Navy’s surface fleet.

The ICS is built around a software foundation named Common Source Library (CSL). It serves as a single software repository, which will provide each surface platform a set of common software applications to execute multi-domain missions. The CSL acts as an enabler for quick software updates for responding to evolving threats.

What the ICS baseline delivers?

The Integrated Combat System is designed to replace the traditionally siloed approach to shipboard combat management, where individual weapons, sensors, and communications subsystems operate on discrete, vendor-specific processing environments. Under the ICS framework, these functions are consolidated onto a common computing infrastructure, allowing software updates to propagate across combat functions without requiring the hardware replacement cycles that have historically slowed modernization.

The delivery of the first ICS-enabled baseline marks the start of a six‑month operating cadence for updates and certifications that will be fielded across the surface fleet. The six-month cadence keeps the ICS adaptable and continuously refreshed with cutting edge capabilities.

Chandra Marshall, vice president of Multi‑Domain Combat Systems at Lockheed Martin said, “The first ICS‑enabled baseline delivery highlights Lockheed Martin’s commitment to and partnership with the U.S. Navy to accelerate the transition to a common, fully integrated combat architecture in a continuously evolving warfighting environment.”

“Each baseline upgrade delivered and integrated into the ICS further reinforces and expands the already proven Aegis integrated air and missile defense capability,” added Marshall.

Engineering rationale behind the shift

The move toward open-architecture combat systems has been a stated priority for the US Navy for well over a decade, driven largely by the pace at which commercial processing hardware and software evolve compared to the multi-decade service lives of surface combatants. Legacy systems like the AN/SPY-1 radar paired with Aegis Combat System were purpose-built integrations that performed reliably but required substantial re-engineering to absorb new threat responses or sensor technologies.

Implications for fleet modernization

The delivery of a verified ICS baseline gives the Navy a platform for testing next-generation combat capabilities before they reach operational hulls. This is particularly relevant for DDG-51 Arleigh Burke-class destroyers, which form the backbone of the surface fleet and are scheduled to remain in service for decades.

The scalable architecture also has procurement implications. If combat software can be updated independently of hull construction schedules, the Navy gains flexibility to respond to evolving threat environments, such as hypersonic missiles or unmanned surface vessel swarms, without committing to new shipbuilding programs as the primary modernization lever.

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