Cimarron's number one competency is in Real-time Command & Control systems.
Cimarron got its start in real time systems in 1981 assisting in the development of IBM's Real-Time Energy Management System offering to Arizona Public Service. Cimarron was responsible for providing software and systems engineering support in the development of a large energy network to monitor and control Arizona Public Service’s electric system.
The part of the system that made it "real-time" was modeled from the Real Time Operating System (RTOS) that "flew" the ground control systems for the Apollo program in the 70s. IBM had re-engineered the RTOS operating extension in the late 70s to provide similar real-time control capability for the pipeline and utility market sector. The Utility industry was looking for real-time control technology on the heels of a report by the FCC on the causes and effects of the New York City power grid failure in 1966, where they recommended technology similar to that being used at Mission Control to obtain and react to the real-time state of the electric grid in order to respond effectively to a power failure. A key contributor of the re-engineering was to later be Cimarron's founder, Marvin Triplett.
Leveraging this niche expertise from the utility market sector, Cimarron began working with NASA in 1988 providing real-time development solutions for the Mission Control Center (MCC). Cimarron provided MCC system design, development, implementation, test and verification under the Mission Systems Contract.
Cimarron continues to provide this support for NASA at Johnson Space Center in the MCC under the Facility Development and Operations Contract (FDOC). This support enables real-time ground control to the Space Shuttle and the International Space Station (ISS), as well as many other space vehicles.
As Cimarron presses into the future we have teamed with several companies to provide a Commercial Orbital Transportation System (COTS) for supplying the International Space Station. Cimarron is responsible for providing the ground control system solution for the commercial re-supply vehicle. This effort is an industry leading effort and the first time NASA has contracted private industry to develop commercial re-supply of the ISS.
In developing our solution for NASA’s COTS program, Cimarron has integrated and entire suite of Commercial-Off-The-Shelf products to provide a multi-purpose control system that can be easily configured for our customers needs, whether ISS servicing, payload delivery or multi-vehicle, multi-purpose missions. This unique capability greatly reduces the ground system cost and provides a common system to use for Test, Launch, Mission Planning and Flight Operations. By reducing redundant work needed for separate ground systems at multiple locations this platform facilitates less development cost for ground systems, schedule reduction for redundant ground system work and greater success probability on orbit by using the same system throughout the life-cycle of the vehicle.
