Boeing`s Virtual

Fence
Preamble
• Illegal crossing into the United States along the Mexican border
started to reach epidemic proportions in past years and still
remains a major concern.
• Fear of drug smuggling, illegal immigrants and possible terrorist
incursions has made the issue of homeland security one of the
major “hot buttons” in the political arena.
• The Mexican/US border runs for nearly 2000 miles, much of it
across desert wastelands and inhospitable and remote areas.
• Establishing any sort of border security, in the wake of the 9/11
attacks was, therefore, a national necessity, but a daunting and
difficult task.
• The Department of Homeland Security (DHS), organized
following the attacks on the World Trade Center towers, was
charged with the responsibility of securing all borders and
points of illegal entry into the United States, in cooperation with
Customs and Border Protection.
• As part of its mandate, DHS has developed plans for creating a
more secure and stable border with Mexico to prevent the
continuous flow of undocumented immigrants, drugs and
potential terrorists.
 Briefing on SBInet & Project 28
• In November 2005, DHS proposed a project to physically and
electronically seal the stretch of the desert between the US
and Mexico under a multibillion-dollar contract named the
SBInet – Security Border Initiative Network
• In May 2006, President Bush called SBInet “the most
technologically advanced border security initiative in
American history”.
Project 28 was the name given to this U.S. border protection program
that ran along a 28-mile (45 km) stretch of the US-Mexican border in
Nogales, Texas.

This was to be the pilot stage in the SBInet project that

eventually would be used to monitor and control some 6000
miles of border with both Mexico and Canada.

This first phase of SBInet, was scheduled to be completed in

mid-2007, but did not become operational until late 2007. It
involved the placement of 9 high-tech surveillance towers
that monitor activity using radar, high-resolution cameras,
and wireless networking, looking for incursions to report to
the Border Patrol.
• In addition, SBInet sought to provide a "common operating
picture" of the border environment that could be shared
with DHS components and federal, state, and local partners
to provide comprehensive situational awareness, improving
interoperability.

• US Government through the Department for Homeland

Security, chose to outsource the entire project to private
firms. (design and build the programs, conduct oversight of
them). The Government`s only role was to be the force
responsible for apprehending the people first detected by
the SBInet.

• In late 2006, Boeing was selected as the major contractor for

the SBInet project. This project was beyond anything Boeing
had attempted before. The SBInet contract gave Boeing full
responsibility for developing, deploying, and maintaining a
system that was able to accomplish the goals.
• In February 2008, authorities said that the project did not
work as planned, nor did it meet the needs of the US
Border Patrol. As a result, the deployment of about 100
miles (160 km) of virtual fence near Tucson - Yuma,
Arizona and El Paso - Texas was then rescheduled and
projected to be completed by the end of 2011, rather than
2008.

• On January 14 2011, Secretary of Homeland Security,

Janet Napolitano, made it official: The Virtual Fence
Project was to be officially cancelled. „SBInet cannot meet
its original objective of providing a single, integrated
border security technology solution.”
The Virtual Border Fence - a combination of physical
fencing and "invisible technology"
• The system used a chain of 100-foot (30 meters) tall
towers that each scanned a 360-degree radius for a
distance of 10 miles. The towers employed a series of
seismic, infrared, and video sensors automatically to
detect people, animals, or vehicles crossing the border,
classify their threat level, and alert officials. Individuals
monitoring the information at the command center
would then be able to relay this information in real time
to officers on the ground.

• Additional capabilities included satellite phones and

laptops in border patrol vehicles that allowed officers
on the ground to link up with the sensor system
via satellite.
 Next, we'll see how these various technologies work
together to make a virtual border fence.
So how can a "virtual" fence
work? Whenever a suspicious
person or potentially illegal
activity was detected near one of
the fence's components that
information transmits to the
Border Patrol offices. Agents in
those offices notify agents in the
field. The exact coordinates
appear on laptops that the agents
have in their vehicles. Images,
coordinates, radar scans and all
other information are combined
to make a Common Operating
Picture.
Using aerial photos of the border
area, Boeing attempted to figure
out how long it takes someone
illegally crossing the border to
"blend into" nearby urban areas.
Physical fencing has been built at
those spots, rather than along
the exact border. The area
leading up to that demarcation
would have been closely
monitored by the virtual fence.
Privacy remained a concern
for residents of towns near
the virtual fence. Many
residents of these
communities enjoyed their
secluded living conditions.
Given their extremely long
range and proximity to some
towns, the tower-mounted
cameras could have been
used to look into private
homes and businesses. The
territory along the Arizona-
Mexico border contains
important migratory routes
for animals and several
national parks. The virtual
fence's towers, vehicles and
helicopters could disturb
animals in the area.
Residents near the towers
have raised concerns,
questioning why most
towers are miles from the
border and whether they
will allow unscrupulous
agents to peer into their
bedrooms.
• The first $20 million pilot phase, Project 28, was
supposed to be completed by mid-June 2007

• Boeing selected more than 100 subcontractors to

build various components of the system, with its
project managers maintaining overall control of the
development process.

• Boeing has had trouble getting the different

components to work together without glitches
Why did the project fail ?
The problems that sank the SBInet project were
complicated and came from multiple sources.
• Integration risks – failure of tests, delays in completion.

Technical challenges of managing 100 subcontractors all

required to provide critical components that Boeing
would have integrated.

The structure of the project was unwieldy and there was

a sheer number of distinct elements and technical
systems Boeing attempted to integrate, among which
new and unproven technologies.
• Technical and coordination problems
The pyramid-like management structure led to cost
overruns and poor quality. Multiple subcontract tiers
created a conflict of interest because Boeing was also in
charge with the oversight. They fused the oversight
function with the engineering and construction function.
Everybody was in the same tent and nobody was
watching out for the owner – in this case the US taxpayer.
Those problems included Boeing's use of inappropriate
commercial software, designed for use by police
dispatchers, to integrate data related to illicit border-
crossings.
• Physical constraints
Boeing had difficulty in integrating the software and
cameras continued to fail due to the extreme heat of the
Arizona desert. Add here the characteristics of terrain.
• Schedule related risks - Completion time delays and
postponements

Beset by continuing problems, Boeing had also revised its

estimates for the completion date to 2016, more than
seven years after the date in the original plan.

No reliable schedule of when workings and other milestone

activities would occur and how long would they take or how
they were related to each other.
• Poor budgeting and cost estimation – no reliable
estimates of costs and meaningful forecasts of
quantifiable or qualitative benefits over the system`s
useful life
This led to a rapid and steep escalation of projected costs.

(In the nearly 3 years after original testing was done on one
section of the fence, SBInet had cost the government $670
million dollars with the end nowhere in sight. Although the
total project cost was anticipated at $1.1 billion, congressional
groups argued that the final cost of the project could soar to
over $30 billion. Originally promising to complete SBInet for
$1.1 billion, Boeing`s revised estimates went to $2.5 billion and
then, just few months later, to $8 billion. This project was seen
as “gaming with the taxpayers money.)
• Lack of transparency and no rigorous oversight of
project

The project had effectively shut out most federal agencies

and oversight groups. It was difficult to get accurate
project status information given the government`s
decision to “farm out” border security to private
contractors.

Congressional investigators found that DHS officials

where simply standing by, while Boeing provided
information that was replete with unexplained
anomalies, thus rendering the data unfit for effective
contractor management and oversight.

The Border Patrol agents (the people who would have

implemented the system everyday) were not consulted.
• Feasibility of the project was also put under question

Many critics questioned the feasibility of the original

intent of the project itself, wondering about the
likelihood of ever effectively sealing a border that runs
through some of the most inhospitable terrain in North
America.

• No clear goals and expectations

DHS, Customs and Border Protection and Boeing

underestimated the complexity of building the system.
The project lacked a clearly defined approach.
Questions:

1) What problems do you see emerging from a project such as

SBInet where the government allows the contractor to
determine scope, manage all contractor relations, and decide
how to share project status information with oversight bodies?

• From the start the project suffered from poor contractor

oversight and ambiguous and shifting goals, resulting in
numerous delays, cost overruns, and failures to meet
product requirements.
• Oversight, particularly early in the project’s development, is
critical. It is during the early phases of the project that most
technical decisions are made, that overall project scope is
frozen, and that project capabilities and standards for
evaluation are determined. Thus, when the government
gave this power to the contractor without sufficient checks and
balances, they opened the way for overruns, poor technical
quality, and loss of accountability.
• The level of planning and coordination required to timely
complete a project like this one and also to remain in the
budget, almost defies human capability.

• They should have broke it down into smaller, simpler

components, increasing the likelihood the thing can
actually be built.

• And also, oversight from the US government through the

DHS, from the first stage of the project through its whole
cycle, would have been absolutely required.

• DHS had not employed the kind of acquisition

management and discipline needed to reasonably ensure
that the proposed system capabilities would be delivered
on time and within budget.
• 2) Consider the following two arguments: “The failure of
SBInet was due to poor scope management” versus
“SBInet failed because of poor oversight and project
controls.” Take one side or the other in this argument,
and justify your response.

A case can be made for either position in this example.

1 - The project was poorly scoped, mainly due to an

inadequate understanding of the technical requirements
for developing and maintaining a virtual fence across a long
border. Even the pilot project on the 28-mile test section
of the border was not technically sound and demonstrated
a number of flaws within the system.
Successfully integrating complex components is a
substantial risk in any project containing multiple,
complicated subsystems. Integration risks become
especially pronounced in situations where integration
essentially defines the project.

So complicated was the challenge, in fact, that the

virtual fence failed a series of initial tests, significantly
delaying the full deployment of Project 28.
2 - On the other hand, there was a continued lack of
oversight of the project through much of the
early qualification phases, when Boeing was vetting
suppliers, trying to determine the project’s scope, and
creating a management structure that seemed designed
to promote overruns and poor quality.

• DHS has failed to properly communicate and supervise

its primary contractor Boeing; the program suffered
major cost overruns and failed to deliver on project
goals due to limited input from end users, shifting
priorities, and poor communication.
• More rigorous oversight of SBInet from DHS would
have been an absolute must, especially because lack
of proper oversight on the life cycle management
process from the contractor, generated absence of
accountability for the use of taxpayers money.

• It is actually surprising that the project was cancelled

as early as it was. Under similar circumstances,
federally funded projects have been much bigger
black holes for budget and schedule overruns.
THANK YOU !