04-02-2009

Chapter Name: The Hague (The Netherlands)

By: Air Cdre RNLAF retd. Ir. Gerrit Schoonderbeek

Summary of Meeting:

The first meeting in the new year of AFCEA Chapter The Hague was organized on 4 February 2009. It was hosted by Business Group (BG) IVENT at Airbase Soesterberg, the Netherlands. BG IVENT is the Department for Information/Data Management and Technology of the Netherlands Ministry of Defense (MODNL)

Chapter Vice President, Air Commodore RNLAF (ret) Gerrit Schoonderbeek welcomed the participants and reminded them of the new meeting program and schedule for the year 2009. He noted with pleasure the large number of members present (over 70!) and then introduced the first speaker of the day: Mr. Adriaan Blankenstein, the Commander of BG IVENT.

Mr. Blankenstein gave an inspiring overview of his organization, which consists of 6 main departments: Service and Support, Purchasing, Operations, Documentary Information, Research and Innovation Center (RIC) and the Joint CIS Group.
Services provided, consist amongst others of: Consultancy and Advise, System Management and Control, Network Management, Project Management, Documentary Information Services, Telephony, Email and Internet services and Functional and Applications Management.
IVENT owns and controls 2 Command Centers (24/7), 3 secure Data Centers and a Back-up Center. It also works for other Ministries in the Netherlands, like Foreign Affairs, Home Affairs and Justice.

The next speaker, Mr. Hans Loermans, Senior Advisor at the Research and Innovation Center of IVENT, gave an overview of activities for the next few years to reconfigure and consolidate the Computer/Data Centers of the MODNL. In particular he highlighted the measures to be taken in the field of power consumption (reduction) and air conditioning.

The last speaker was Mr. Teus van der Plaat, Head of the Research and Innovation Center of IVENT, who briefed those present on his vision for a new, modern military owned private GSM Network. It turns out, that the construction of a mobile telephone network nowadays seem to be almost 10 times cheaper than that of a fixed telephone network. Worldwide there exist already over 3500 million GSM users and in Europe the penetration of GSM has reached more than 100% per household!
Mr. van der Plaat discussed his technical option with so-called Pico-Cells in a free frequency guardband. The range of the cells is roughly 100 - 150 m and per cell about 50 - 100 users could be connected. To introduce such a system in the Netherlands Armed Forces, means that some changes need to be made to Dutch Laws, some of which are already in progress!
The SIM (Subscriber Identity Module) card technology is already mature and can include, according to Mr. van der Plaat, the needed security functions like PKI (Public Key Infrastructure), etc.

The meeting was concluded with the traditional lunch.

Definition of used acronyms:
BG = Business Group
IVENT = Department for Information/Data Management and Technology of the MODNL
MODNL = Netherlands Ministry of Defense
RNLAF = Royal Netherlands Air Force
Ret = Retired
RIC = Research and Innovation Center
CIS = Communications and Information Systems
24/7 = Operational for 24 hours/day; 7 days/week
GSM = Global System for Mobile communications
SIM = Subscriber Identity Module
PKI = Public Key Infrastructure

Guest Speaker(s):

Speaker’s Full Name	Position	Rank	Branch of Service	Organization
Adriaan Blankenstein	Commander IVENT	Civilian		IVENT/MODNL
Hans Loermans	Senior Advisor RIC/IVENT	Civilian		IVENT/MODNL
Teus van der Plaat	Head RIC/IVENT	Civilian		IVENT/MODNL

Photograph #1:

				The Commander of IVENT, Mr. Adriaan Blankenstein, receives a Certificate-of-Appreciation for hosting Chapter The Hague and for his introduction to IVENT, by Chapter Vice-President, Air Commodore RNLAF (ret) Gerrit Schoonderbeek
Position	Full Name	Rank	Branch of Service		Organization
Left	Adriaan Blankenstein	Civilian	Commander		IVENT/MODNL
Right	Gerrit Schoonderbeek	AirCdre	RNLAF		Vice-President Chapter The Hague

Photograph #2:

Chapter The Hague Vice-President, Air Commodore RNLAF (ret) Gerrit Schoonderbeek hands a token of Appreciation to Mr. Hans Loermans, Senior Advisor at RIC/IVENT, for his presentation
	Position	Full Name	Rank	Branch of Service	Organization
	Left	Hans Loermans	Civilian	Senior Advisor RIC/IVENT	IVENT/MODNL
	Right	Gerrit Schoonderbeek	AirCdre	RNLAF	Vice-President Chapter The Hague

Photograph #3:

				Mr. Teus van der Plaat,Head of RIC/IVENT, receives a Certificat-of-Appreciation for his presentation from Air Commodore RNLAF (ret) Gerrit Schoonderbeek, Chapter The Hague Vice-President
Position	Full Name	Rank	Branch of Service		Organization
Left	Teus van der Plaat	Civilian	Head RIC/IVENT		IVENT/MODNL
Right	Gerrit Schoonderbeek	AirCdre	RNLAF		Vice-President Chapter The Hague

Photograph #4:

Part of the interested audience during the presentations by IVENT at Airbase Soesterberg