Colonel Ransom to speak at military/aerospace conference

The Colonel's keynote, entitled The Future of Test Equipment Acquisition for the Ministry of Defence, reviews the relationship between the Ministry of Defence (MoD) and its suppliers and outlines its effect on upcoming programmes such as the digital diagnostic and repair (DDR) facility.

Colonel Marcus Ransom says: "Virtual instrumentation - that is, software-defined architectures and modular hardware - is an essential technology that will form the core of future test systems for the Ministry of Defence."

Commissioned in 1977 into the Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers, Colonel Marcus Ransom completed a degree in Mechanical Engineering at the Royal Military College of Science, Shrivenham, followed by the Officers Long Aeromechanical Engineering Course, qualifying in both the Avionic and Aeromechanical disciplines. His service then took him to Germany, the Falkland Islands and on exchange with the Canadian Forces before he returned to take a Masters' Degree in Defence Technology. Since then, he has held a Scientific Research post in the Defence Research Agency (Fort Halstead), established a new Aircraft Maintenance Battalion (7 Bn REME) and commanded the Army's Electrical and Mechanical Training School in Bordon, Hampshire.

As a Weapons Staff Officer and Chartered Engineer, he was responsible for Army Aviation Communications including the design and implementation of the Apache AH Mk 1 to Bowman interface. He then joined the 3.5billion ASTOR programme in the Defence Procurement Agency, where he was the lead Requirements Manager before being promoted into his current appointment.

Colonel Ransom is the Team Leader for the Deployable Support and Test Equipment Integrated Project Team within the Defence Equipment and Support Organisation. This team of 130 civil servants and servicemen acquires, supports through life and disposes of a very wide range of workshop test, repair and maintenance equipment ranging from deployable electro-optical automatic test equipment to heavy vehicle lifts, armoured vehicle power pack repair and equipment to aircraft pylon test equipment. His annual resource totals circa 48million across 100 contracts.

Speaking with authority

Ajit Gokhale, Managing Director of National Instruments UK & Ireland, says: "We are delighted to welcome Colonel Ransom as our guest keynote speaker. As an engineer and leader of one of the UK's largest consumers of automated test equipment, the Colonel offers one of the most knowledgeable voices on the trends that are impacting how the military acquires automated test equipment."

The Colonel's speech will be followed by a presentation by Tim Fountain, National Instruments' Military and Aerospace Market Development Manager, detailing how software-defined instrumentation makes building test systems easier.

Other industry leaders speaking at National Instruments' Military/Aerospace Solutions Conference include representatives from BAE, Goodrich and Intel, who will present case studies describing how they have used NI LabVIEW, PXI and other hardware and software products to shorten test times and increase productivity.

Registration for the Military and Aerospace Solutions Conference is free. Register online at www.ni.com/uk/milaero, call +44 (0)1635 572498, email [email protected] or use the form on this page.