European Defence Agency, Polish MoD and Rheni GmbH have signed a contract for the provision of the J1 Functional Area Service (J1FAS) software to the Polish Operational Headquarter (OHQ) in Krakow in the context of the EU Visegrad Battlegroup commitment. The contract runs until the end of 2019.

(Picture source: European Defense Agency)

Rheni GmbH will host the J1 FAS software on a dedicated server to provide reliable J1 FAS services to operational users within Operational Headquarters. It includes preventive and corrective maintenance as well as training packages. The OHQ located within the Land Operations Centre-Land Component Command in Cracow, has been formed in order to fulfil the tasks related to the 6 months standby period of the EU Visegrad Battlegroup. The next period will begin in July 2019.

The contract is the result of a close cooperation between the EDA, the Polish MoD and Rheni GmbH to define the requirements and evaluate the services required. EDA has been in the lead of the process up to the signing of the contract and will continue to be fully responsible for its management throughout the implementation.

J1 FAS is a software tool developed to help the J1 (human resources) branch of EU headquarters managing the in-processing and out-processing of personnel during all phases of an operation. From an operational point of view, J1 FAS allows much more accurate and faster in-processing of personnel coming from Member States all over the EU and enables important personnel management information to be synthesized from the database.

The software has been used previously by the Greek OHQ in support of Operation EUFOR RCA in 2014 and to support various EU military exercises (MILEX). It is in continuous use in EUNAVFOR MED Operation Sophia Operational Headquarters in Rome since 2015. As a result of the high satisfaction rate and demand from various users, a framework contract that can provide a catalogue of support arrangements for a rollout of the J1 FAS to HQs was put in place in June this year.