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Archives by category > DARPA (RSS)

Rapid Fire Evening 2011-06-02: Blast Mitigation

Jun 02, 2011 11:00 UTC

  • The UK’s Chief of the General Staff warns that the British Army faces “serious decline” if the government does not fulfill its pledge to increase defense spending after the 2015 general election. Speaking at at the Royal United Services Institute’s Land Warfare Conference General Sir Peter Wall said spending on the army would “require a real-terms growth in the latter part of the decade” in order to avoid such a decline.

  • The Deputy Director of the Russian Federal Service for Military-Technical Cooperation says Russia and the United States will set up a maintenance center for Afghanistan’s Mil Mi-17 helicopters.

  • Israel deploys an Iron Dome rocket interceptor outside a town 4km from the Gaza Strip.

  • Skydex Technologies signs multiple contracts with the US Defense Logistics Agency (DLA) to provide its blast mitigating Convoy Deck product for about 1,000 M-ATV vehicles. 

  • DARPA’s crowd-sourced design crusade comes to the aircraft industry in the shape of a fly-off competition. UAVForge has been launched to demonstrate crowd-sourced design of small, persistent perch-and-stare unmanned aircraft. 

  • As the Pentagon tries to save manpower, USAF proposes building an ‘intelligent robopallet’ to load cargo onto aircraft.

USN Turns to Q for TRITON, to Improve Laser Sub Communications

Oct 06, 2010 15:45 UTC

SHIP_SSN-688_Class_Shallow_Not_Hidden.jpg

SSN-721: Calling Chicago…

DARPA’s TRITON program plans to demonstrate duplex connectivity at submarine keel depths significantly greater than what has been demonstrated in the green, achieving area coverage and bit rates that satisfy existing Navy requirements. On Sept 24/10, QinetiQ North America Operations, LLC received a $31.8 million cost-plus-fixed-fee contract for Phase 1 of the TRITON/ Tactical Relay Information Network program. Work will be performed in Waltham, MA (43%); Ypsilanti, MI (7%); Herndon, VA (30%); La Jolla, CA (1%); Anaheim, CA (18%); Redondo Beach, CA (1%); and Los Angeles, CA (1%), and is expected to be complete by November 2011.

Continue Reading… »

DARPA’s Vulture: What Goes Up, Needn’t Come Down

Sep 16, 2010 16:30 UTC

Advertisement
BQ Vulture concept

Initial Boeing concept

Phase 2 contract for Boeing/ QinetiQ’s SolarEagle. (Sept 15/10)

In April 2008, 3 teams received Phase 1 contracts to begin developing develop a radical new aircraft, under a US Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) program known as “Vulture.” DARPA’s goals for Vulture are not trivial: 5 years on station with a 450kg/ 1,000lb payload, 5kW of onboard power, and sufficient loiter speed to stay on station for 99% of the time against winds encountered at 60,000-90,000 feet.

So, what is the significance of a platform like that, who is competing, and what is happening now? Well, Phase 1 is done, and Phase 2 has been awarded.

  • The Potential, and the Process
  • The Designers & The Designs
  • Contracts and Related Events [updated]
  • Additional Readings

Continue Reading… »

DARPA’s VIRAT: Video Search, With a Twist

Sep 01, 2010 07:12 UTC

VIRAT

DARPA’s VIRAT

Updates re: Kitware’s win. (Sept 1/10)

The proliferation of UAVs and fighters equipped with stabilized, high-magnification video pods and imaging radars has a number of corollary consequences. Bandwidth has become a key battlefield constraint. Specialized reconnaissance fighter aircraft are a dead concept. And some poor analyst has to sift through the video tsunami at the other end, in order to find items of interest.

The USA is using a number of approaches to help deal with the flood, and one unconventional approach involves a DARPA project called VIRAT (Video Image Retrieval and Analysis Tool). It doesn’t recognize faces, perform before/after analysis, or rely on rewinds. Instead, it aims to distinguish certain types of behaviors, so it can provide alerts to intelligence operatives or ground forces during live operations.

  • The VIRAT Concept
  • Contracts & Key Events
  • Additional Readings

Continue Reading… »

Inmarsat to Demonstrate Space-Based BGAN Terminal

Aug 25, 2010 14:44 UTC

I-4 Sat

I-4 satellite

Inmarsat Navigation Ventures, Ltd. in London, England recently received an $18 million firm-fixed-price demonstration contract to develop and certify a transceiver terminal for their 3-satellite I-4 constellation’s Inmarsat Broadband Global Area Network (BGAN) service. The terminals must be capable of operation from on-board low Earth orbit satellites, and the BGAN network will require modifications to support space-based terminal equipment. Under the contract, Immarsat will support the integration of the space-based BGAN terminal with a government demonstration satellite, and support the on-orbit connectivity via the BGAN network for the demonstration satellite mission.

Work is to be performed in London, England (20.60%); Golden, CO (64.76%); Aylesbury, England (11%); Norresundby, Denmark (2.15%); and Ontario, Canada (1.49%), with an estimated completion date of Sept 13/15. One bid was solicited with one bid received by DARPA in Arlington, VA (HR0011-10-C-0149).

Inmarsat currently operates a fleet of 11 satellites, and their customers include governments and the military. In November 2009 they bought managed secureIP provider Segovia, whose clients include the US military. The I-4 constellation is based on EADS Astrium’s Eurostar E3000 bus, but in August 2010, Immarsat announced a $1.2 billion contract with Boeing for 3 702HP-based satellites, in order to field a more advanced I-5 constellation delivering up to 6.25MB/s (50 megabits) each.

DARPA’s Hypersonic Vulcan Engine Meld

Jul 05, 2010 14:01 UTC

Logical progression

GE, United Technologies win Phase II contracts. (July 6/10)

It might not be a Vulcan mind-meld, but it’s pretty close. The Department of Defense’s technology brain trust, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), has given 4 contractors the go-ahead to develop the advanced Vulcan combination engine system for hypersonic flight.

The Vulcan engine will integrate a traditional jet turbine engine that performs well at low speeds, with a constant volume combustion (CVC) engine that performs well at higher speeds. The combination will help the vehicles go from standing starts to Mach 4 or so, where hypersonic engines can take over. DARPA’s ultimate goal is to design, build, and fly Mach 6+ re-usable, air-breathing, turbine-based hypersonic vehicles.

What current engines will the Vulcan program modify? What are the program’s goals? What is its structure? DID has answers…

  • The Logic Behind Vulcan
  • Contracts & Key Events [NEW]
  • Additional Readings [updated]

Continue Reading… »

Modular Space: DARPA’s F6 Program

Apr 27, 2010 17:45 UTC

System_F6_Constellation

System F6 concept

Satellites are currently big, expensive to build and launch, vulnerable, impossible in practice to upgrade on-orbit, difficult to replace – and critical to military effectiveness. That’s a really bad combination. Now add program risk and cost inflation driven by those issues, as the military tries to launch the most advanced technologies it can, in a uniquely ‘no fail’ environment.

DARPA’s System F6 program aims at nothing less than a revolution in satellite technology, aimed at removing those constraints. If successful, it will develop and demonstrate the basic building blocks of a totally new space architecture, in which traditional integrated satellites are replaced by clusters of smaller, cheaper, wirelessly-interconnected space modules that form a “virtual” satellite.

  • Fractionated Space: The F6 Program [updated]
  • Contracts and Key Events [updated]
  • Additional Readings [updated]

Continue Reading… »

You Gotta Have HART: Northrop Grumman Develops ISR Aircraft Control System

Feb 17, 2010 12:37 UTC

DARPA HART System

HART system diagram
(click to view larger)

The US Defense Advanced Research Project Agency is working with the US Air Force Research Lab and Northrop Grumman to develop a web-based system to autonomously control manned and unmanned reconnaissance aircraft.

Getting real-time information in an urban firefight can mean the difference between life and death, success and failure. The Heterogeneous Airborne Reconnaissance Team (HART) program is developing IT capabilities to feed ISR aircraft data directly to the soldiers in the field.

On Feb 17/10, Northrop Grumman received a $46.2 million contract under the HART program to develop technologies enabling command and control of unmanned aircraft for the conduct of urban operations.

Continue Reading… »

Rapid Fire 2010-02-11: QDR Defense

Feb 10, 2010 21:01 UTC

  • Vietnam to pay $1 billion for 12 Russian SU-30MKK fighters.

  • Britain moves toward public-private partnership using S-92 Superhawks, for coastal search and rescue.

  • US QDR author shoots back at critics.

Continue Reading… »

Rapid Fire: 2010-02-08

Feb 07, 2010 20:30 UTC

  • NATO Ministerial: Gates pledges greater sharing of classified technology with allies; NATO chief calls for more resources to train Afghan army and police, while France agrees to send 80 more trainers.

  • European defense ministers call for speedy conclusion to talks on troubled Airbus A400M military airlift program.

  • The US Navy UCAS program receives $2 billion QDR push.

  • US Army pays $253.3 million to service US Stryker vehicles around the world.

  • Australia ready to OK final version of $547 million integrated HF communications system for armed forces.

  • US Navy orders $122.5 million in spares and extra engine maintenance for V-22 Osprey.

  • Obama administration beefs up missile defense budget. BMD report focuses on regional missile threats.

  • Romania to allow US ballistic missile defense inceptor missiles to be deployed, following US cancellation of larger BMD deployments in Poland and the Czech Republic.

  • Boeing gets $99.3 million order to supply 13 more AH-64D Block II helicopters to the US Army.

  • Which defense firms will benefit from FY 2011 defense budget?

  • Northrop Grumman feels Pentagon heat over KC-X aerial refueling tanker RFP.

  • Taiwan’s order for Eurocopter EC225s could strain China-European Union relations – but hasn’t, so far.

  • Asia-Pacific nations revamp their fighter inventories.

  • DARPA has enlightened view on funding for ArcLight, a long-range strike weapon that could be launched using the MK 41 system onboard ships and subs.

  • US military sends bomb-sniffing dogs to Iraq.

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