Innovating at the tactical edge: Red Hat at Exercise: HEIMDALL

In Norse mythology, the god Heimdall protects the rainbow bridge Bifröst from invaders, a bridge that connects the realm of the gods to the realm of humans. This legend provided the name for Exercise HEIMDALL, a unique initiative held this past February in the High North of Norway. Organized by the NATO Center of Excellence - Cold Weather Operations, the exercise focused on innovating in extreme environments where the rapid development of autonomous systems is changing how organizations maintain situational awareness and operational resilience. 

Building a foundation of trust

HEIMDALL brought together 13 defense departments and 26 industry partners to solve challenges in some of the most demanding conditions on Earth. In this environment, we forged the collaborative foundations necessary to iterate quickly and harden collective infrastructure against shared global challenges.

Red Hat was on-site and fully immersed in the exercise for the 3-week duration, showcasing our foundational technology alongside our IBM colleagues. Together, we demonstrated how Red Hat's open source, standards-based portfolio helps establish trust and enable effective collaboration across different maritime and aerial systems. For government agencies, trusting a software’s integrity is paramount; building capabilities from open source software offers a transparent path to success.  

The Arctic edge: Intelligent, scalable, and resilient

The exercise demonstrated the practical benefits of a consistent cloud-to-core-to-edge platform in remote or rugged locations.

• Intelligent planning: Mission planning was supported by the IBM Defense Model, a purpose-built AI model trained on the authoritative Open Source Intelligence (OSINT) Janes database. This demonstrates the power of open source AI in delivering up-to-date intelligence for determining optimal sensor deployment or resource allocation.
• Near-edge mission capabilities: During the exercise, autonomous aerial and maritime vehicles delivered more than 15 video and telemetry feeds into IBM/OCTO’s CXEdge application. This sensor fusion package was hosted on Red Hat OpenShift via the IBM Fusion modern application data platform, providing a robust "near edge" environment for virtualization, container management, and DevAI/MLSecOps capabilities. This allowed field personnel to maintain a common operating picture without relying on fixed infrastructure.
• Far edge device management: We extended these capabilities to the "far edge" using Red Hat Device Edge with Red Hat Edge Manager, which supports management and control at scale for a diverse ecosystem of hardware. We demonstrated how a single operator can deploy updated AI/ML models across an entire fleet while fully air-gapped, without the need for complex support chains.

Final thoughts: The shift to software-defined operations

As autonomous fleets grow from dozens to thousands, the management of inconsistent software platforms becomes an operational liability. Red Hat Device Edge with Red Hat Edge Manager serves as a force multiplier for scaling this problem, enabling a single operator to manage thousands of all-domain devices.

These capabilities highlight the importance of flexible, open platforms. Static systems are no longer sufficient; instead, software-defined operations allow hardware to adapt to shifting needs based on the applications or models they run. By using a stable, predictable platform, organizations can mitigate risks while innovating at pace.

In the High North, the clarity was absolute: modern systems will be increasingly automated and carried out by smaller, more numerous assets. Red Hat’s open source solutions provide the infrastructure necessary for this cycle of continuous improvement and reliable operational awareness, no matter how severe the environment.