RAFAEL's Suite for Future Armored Vehicles (IAV 2019)

On 11/02/2019 Jane's posted a video from IAV (International Armored Vehicles), showing an interview given by Shmulik Olanski, Head of Innovation Programs Center, Land and Naval division.

In the interview, Olanski talks a lot about Rafael's evolving future armored vehicle suite intended to provide mission support to the two crewmembers, also known in Israel as the Carmel.
In the Carmel project, three teams, or three companies, were pitted against each other in a $100m competition between Rafael, IAI, and Elbit, to design a cockpit for the next generation AFV of the IDF.

One of the key aspects of the cockpit are the ability of the crew to observe their surroundings almost seamlessly and thus prevent casualties from small arms fire when crewmembers stick their heads out of the vehicle.

I remind that the concepts are as following:

Elbit - IronVision helmet mounted system.
Rafael - Panoramic wide screen setup.
IAI - Combination of wide screens and a helmet.

IAI has still not presented its concept in a visual way, nor has publicly revealed any details about it, other than it being a combination of Elbit's and Rafael's concepts.

Elbit's concept was also revealed a while ago:

Elbit has also presented a prototype at roughly when Rafael only began working on their solution, but that won't seem to be an issue, except for one thing:
Elbit's solution has already been picked for the Merkava 4 Barack MBT, Eitan IFV, and presumably also the Namer AFV.

This may create some bias within the IDF for Elbit's system for the Carmel, however the Carmel is supposed to be a clean sheet design, and the competition is only supposed to examine various concepts, not the end product's performance.

It is also in my belief that Elbit's control of the BMS market will not affect the competition.

The purpose of this post is to provide a brief summary of the pros and cons of each of the presented solutions.

Rafael

Pros

• Crewmen can point to the other crewman on the screen, and be sure they are observing the same thing. Especially useful in ambush scenarios, or in recon duties when the BMS is not yet fed with the target data or cannot pick up the target.
• Easy data input via touching the screens.
• More intuitive for a larger crew - a 3rd human crewman may be added for special missions.
• More rugged.
• Can possibly display other critical mission data when external cameras are offline.
• May be used to interface with other systems in the tank during the mission, when cameras are online.
• Stimulates team-work.

Cons

• Coverage is limited to the location of the screens, requires movement of the independent panoramic sights to observe high elevation targets, which may take up some of the visual space for the other crewman.
• Either analog and thus inferior movement of the independent sights or complex eye tracking technology.

Elbit

Pros

• More intuitive for the single crewman, seeing everything right in front of his eyes.
• Easier to operate the independent (TC or gunner's) sights.
• Possibly less complex technology to move the independent sights (inertial navigation vs eye tracking).
• May interface with different sights without interfering with the work of the other crewman.
• Higher coverage.

Cons

• Harder to communicate with the other crewmen over shared objectives.
• Stimulates solo operation.
• Less rugged.
• If external cameras go offline, the vehicle's backup interface and systems may be more difficult to operate.
• Difficult data input, may require separate computer or only allow commander to do so via less intuitive methods.

Those were just the pros and cons I could think of in the total span of maybe 5 minutes. 

Carmel

Now onto examining the video itself:

Here we can see one of the points I was talking about earlier. The man on the left points for the guy on the right, allowing easy interaction between the two crewmembers who can easily be distracted by vast amounts of incoming data.
Touching the screen also allows the crewmembers to easily lay new data for each other and on the BMS. For example selecting a target and classifying it as hostile/non-hostile.

The Carmel in this video, seems to be more clearly defined as a tankette, rather than an IFV, which on the concept level seems to replace the MBT altogether, or rather add a brand new vehicle which is yet unknown how it will fit in existing formations.
It could be an organic addition to infantry or recon battalions, but no doctrine has been developed for such a vehicle. Even in the Russian army where they have at least once considered purchasing BMPT vehicles as tank escorts, there is no solid doctrine proposal.

Same old Trophy system with no changes may indicate that no serious work has yet been done to integrate Iron Fist's launchers onto the Trophy system, even though the IDF required it for the Barack MBT.

Or it could just be a matter of editing choice, choosing to focus on the situational awareness technologies rather than unrelated APS development.

Another image here shows that Rafael chose to use 2 independent cameras, one for each crew member, which may be a result of the requirement to allow every crewmember to assume the role of the other in case the other is incapable of fulfilling his mission (injury/death). 

But what's more interesting is that Rafael proposed using 2 RCWS as well. 

The merits of such a proposal are disputable, but if two separate sights are already required, then adding an RCWS is considered an inexpensive upgrade, and could make engagement of targets more comfortable for the crew, knowing each one can control an MG at any given time for self defense in tight areas.