March 11, 2024 | International, Land
December 2, 2019 | International, Aerospace, Naval, Land, C4ISR, Security
CEO of Leonardo: A two–way street benefits everyone
By: Alessandro Profumo
Rapid changes are taking place around the world, both at the geopolitical and technological level, which are having an extremely disruptive impact on the defense industry and its customers, namely governments.
For its part, technological innovation has reached a pace never seen before. Growing digitalization, big-data processing, robotics, autonomous systems, biotechnology, hypersonics, directed energy: These are just a few examples of innovations that revolutionize industry and governments' approaches to defense and security issues.
In some cases, innovations on the commercial side are driving the technological evolution in the defense sector, with increasingly wider applications from a dual-use perspective.
There is a real two-way street.
The role of government is crucial in developing a long-term investment strategy and identifying the sovereign technologies necessary to maintain a technological advantage over new peers and emerging actors, in symmetric and asymmetric conflicts. Threats to peace and global stability do not solely originate in traditional domains (air, land, sea), but materialize in space and cyberspace, more difficult to protect, as they both lack precise boundaries.
Increasing defense spending is a positive signal, especially when coupled with a strong vision and clear objectives aimed at the development of the right capabilities in an international cooperation framework.
The national defense industry, as a strategic asset of its own country, must be able to capture technological innovation where it is produced, finding effective ways of accessing new ideas and solutions. Secondly, it must be able to manage the dynamics between long development and production cycles that characterize this sector, and technological innovation's fast pace.
The sense of urgency must regard delivering what is needed, when needed, providing the end user with the maximum benefit and anticipating and adapting to changes, while triggering an ever-growing contamination across industries, governments, startups and academia.
A deep interconnection between the defense industry and its customers, working in close synergy, facilitates flexible and adaptable structures capable of responding quickly to new and complex emergencies.
In this perspective, the closer one works with the customer — throughout the entire product life cycle — the more this reverberates positively at the industry level. The shared awareness rising from this cooperation will enable industry to make wise and focused investment decisions in order to develop products and solutions that best fit future market requirements.
Bearing in mind that technology alone is not enough, true success in creating a resilient defense industry also lies in the ability to attract and retain highly specialized human capital as well as involving the supplier base in innovation processes.
A shared road map is, therefore, a priority — industry and governments, working together, side by side, committed to building a safer world.
Alessandro Profumo is the CEO of Leonardo.
https://www.defensenews.com/outlook/2019/12/02/ceo-of-leonardo-a-twoway-street-benefits-everyone
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August 27, 2020 | International, Aerospace
GA-ASI Selects 18 Businesses to Participate in Virtual Blue Magic Belgium
SAN DIEGO, Aug. 26, 2020 /CNW/ -- As part of the second annual "Blue Magic Belgium" industry engagement event hosted by General Atomics Aeronautical Systems, Inc. (GA–ASI), 18 Belgium-based companies have been selected to present their ideas and cutting-edge capabilities to a panel of GA-ASI technical experts. The panel will evaluate the companies in a virtual interview setting and make decisions on which capabilities can support the development of MQ-9B SkyGuardian®, the GA-ASI Remotely Piloted Aircraft (RPA) selected by Belgian Defense. The presentations will be held during the week of Sept. 21 and unlike the first Blue Magic Belgium (BMB) industry outreach event in 2019, this year's event will be held virtually due to travel and in-person meeting restrictions stemming from the coronavirus. "We're very excited to host our second Blue Magic Belgium event," said Linden Blue, CEO, GA-ASI. "Our first BMB event was a great success as we identified four Belgian companies who are now part of our SkyGuardian development team. We look forward to the same success this year. We know that attracting new Belgian businesses means more jobs for Belgium and it helps GA-ASI produce the best RPA for Belgian Defense and all NATO countries." As part of last year's event, AeroSimulators Group (ASG), AIRobot, ALX Systems and Hexagon joined Team SkyGuardian, which already included these five Belgium companies: SABCA, Thales Belgium, ScioTeq, ST Engineering and DronePort. GA-ASI is working with these companies now to generate next-generation capabilities for their RPA. The companies participating in Blue Magic Belgium the week of Sept. 21 will be Airobot, AKKA BENELUX, Altran Belgium, ALX Systems, Any-Shape, Cenaero, Feronyl, Hexagon Geospatial, IDRONECT, Lambda-X, ML2Grow, Moss Composites, Optrion, Oscars, ScioTeq, Siemens, VITO-Remote Sensing, and von Karman Institute for Fluid Dynamics. Hi-resolution images of MQ-9B SkyGuardian are available to qualified media outlets from GA-ASI. About GA-ASI General Atomics Aeronautical Systems, Inc. (GA-ASI), an affiliate of General Atomics, is a leading designer and manufacturer of proven, reliable Remotely Piloted Aircraft (RPA) systems, radars, and electro-optic and related mission systems, including the Predator® RPA series and the Lynx® Multi-mode Radar. With more than six million flight hours, GA-ASI provides long-endurance, mission-capable aircraft with integrated sensor and data link systems required to deliver persistent flight that enables situational awareness and rapid strike. The company also produces a variety of ground control stations and sensor control/image analysis software, offers pilot training and support services, and develops meta-material antennas. For more information, visit www.ga-asi.com. SkyGuardian, SeaGuardian, Predator and Lynx are registered trademarks of General Atomics Aeronautical Systems, Inc. GA-ASI Media Relations General Atomics Aeronautical Systems, Inc. +1 (858) 524-8101 ASI-MediaRelations@ga-asi.com Related Images ga-asis-mq-9b-skyguardian.jpg GA-ASI's MQ-9B SkyGuardian "We're very excited to host our second Blue Magic Belgium event," said Linden Blue, CEO, GA-ASI. "Our first BMB event was a great success as we identified four Belgian companies who are now part of our SkyGuardian development team. SOURCE General Atomics Aeronautical Systems, Inc. https://www.newswire.ca/news-releases/ga-asi-selects-18-businesses-to-participate-in-virtual-blue-magic-belgium-836568869.html
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August 13, 2020 | International, Aerospace, Land
Army validates design for future helicopter engine, remains on track despite COVID
By: Jen Judson WASHINGTON — The Army has validated its design for its future helicopter engine, and the program remains on schedule to deliver the first engine for testing in the fourth quarter of fiscal 2021, according to service officials in charge of the effort. The Improved Engine Turbine Program (ITEP) has seen a long — and often delayed — journey as the service wrestled with funding and development strategies for several years. ITEP will replace current engines in both UH-60 Black Hawk utility helicopters and AH-64 Apache attack helicopters Since awarding a contract to General Electric Aviation in February 2019, the program has pushed forward on schedule, despite a protest from a competing team comprised of Honeywell and Pratt & Whitney, which paused work for roughly three months. And, while the Coronavirus pandemic caused some anxiety among Army officials trying to keep the program on track, those in charge were able to complete the critical design review, conducted 100 percent virtually, according to Army spokesman David Hylton. The ITEP Critical Design Review (CDR) was a multi-month process that consisted of three phases, Hylton told Defense News in a written statement. The engine control system component CDR was completed on June 5, followed by the software CDR on July 17 and the engine systems CDR on July 24, he said. The Army and GE are making “tremendous efforts to keep COVID-19 impacts from delaying the program,” Hylton wrote. GE is now working toward a test readiness review ahead of the first engine test. “We are full steam ahead in terms of understanding where we need to go next with respect to the design, Col. Gregory Fortier, who is in charge of the program office for the Army's Future Attack Reconnaissance Aircraft, said during a media briefing last month. The Army has “no reason to believe we will not fly” in fiscal 2023, he said. According to FY21 Army budget request justification documents, the service plans to fly an aircraft with an ITEP engine installed in the first quarter of FY23 followed by a low-rate initial production decision in the fourth quarter of FY24. A full-rate production decision is expected in FY26. https://www.defensenews.com/land/2020/08/12/army-validates-design-for-future-helicopter-engine-remains-on-track-despite-covid/