Adaptive Immersion, a leader in virtual reality training solutions for high-risk operations, announced today that it has been awarded a contract position on the Missile Defense Agency’s (MDA) Scalable Homeland Innovative Enterprise Layered Defense (SHIELD) indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity (IDIQ) contract. The 10-year contract vehicle, with a ceiling of $151 billion, serves as the primary acquisition pathway for the Golden Dome initiative—the most expansive homeland missile defense program in American history.

The SHIELD contract positions Adaptive Immersion to deliver urgent extended reality technology capabilities for training, simulation, and visualization to support the massive multi-domain defense architecture. Golden Dome will integrate space-based sensors and interceptors with ground-based radar systems and sea-based assets to create a comprehensive, layered shield against ballistic missiles, hypersonic weapons, cruise missiles, and advanced aerial threats.

“This contract award represents the convergence of national security imperatives with our company’s core mission,” said Dr. Phillip Mangos, founder and CEO of Adaptive Immersion. “The complexity of modern missile defense operations—where operators must mentally simulate an evolving battlespace and make rapid decisions under stress, with potentially millions of lives at stake—demands the most advanced immersive training technologies available. That is precisely what we deliver.”

The award extends Adaptive Immersion’s established relationship with MDA, building upon the company’s previous work on the RAPTOR program, which developed immersive human-machine interface technologies for multi-domain command and control. Under RAPTOR, Adaptive Immersion created virtual reality-enabled visualization systems that allow missile defense operators to rapidly, accurately and intuitively navigate complex battlespace scenarios for intercontinental ballistic missile defense operations.

Ballistic missile defense represents a uniquely demanding operational environment, a complex system of systems spanning air, sea, land, and space domains. Operators must simultaneously monitor enemy missile tracks, assess threats to friendly assets, detect anomalies in tracking data, and anticipate future launches. As defense officials have described, the mission is akin to “firing a bullet to catch and neutralize another bullet already in flight.”

Command and control personnel operating within this environment must adapt to sudden, unpredictable threats—often within minutes. Like master chess players, they must visualize all potential threats, plan offensive and defensive tactics, and mentally project first, second, and third-order effects of their decisions. Adaptive Immersion’s VR training solutions enable operators to develop these critical cognitive skills in realistic, consequence-free environments before facing real-world scenarios.

“Day 1 readiness for the world’s most dangerous and high-stakes missions is our charter,” added Mangos. “Golden Dome represents exactly the kind of mission-critical challenge that Adaptive Immersion was founded to address.”