Does Commercial Engine Tech Translate To Chinese Military Aircraft?

On the same subject

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  November 1, 2019 | International, Naval

  Fincantieri, Naval Group dub their joint venture ‘Naviris’

  By: Tom Kington ROME – Italy's Fincantieri and France's Naval Group announced the name of their new naval joint venture will be ‘Naviris' on Wednesday, the day after Fincantieri lashed out at reports that its takeover of French ship yard Chantiers de l'Atlantique faces EU anti-trust opposition. The new name for the JV was announced after a quarterly steering committee meeting of the 50-50 alliance, which was launched in June and is set to be incorporated by year's end. The two state-controlled shipbuilding firms aim to use the joint venture to build and market naval vessels, as well share supply chains, research and testing. As part of the deal, France is using an Italian design for its new logistics vessel, while the two yards will work together on upgrading the Horizon frigates jointly built by Italy and France and operated by both countries. There are also plans for the JV to work on a new European Patrol Corvette. The two yards have promoted the JV as a way to create synergies in Europe's fractured naval industry to allow it to compete globally, and it came on the heels of Fincantieri's takeover of France's Chantiers de l'Atlantique shipyard — a deal which will allow the two yards to share work on cruise ships. This month the drive for more synergy appeared be bearing fruit when Fincantieri said that it would be building forward sections for the new French logistics ships. The four vessels, part of the FLOTLOG (Flotte logistique) program, which are based on the Italian Vulcano design, are being built by a temporary consortium between Chantiers de l'Atlantique and Naval Group. Fincantieri said it would build the sections at its Castellammare di Stabia shipyard in southern Italy, with deliveries to Chantiers de l'Atlantique, which it controls, scheduled between 2021 and 2027. The only potential hitch to the cross-border cooperation is the European Union, which is studying the Fincantieri takeover of Chantiers de l'Atlantique for anti-trust violations, and has yet to give a green light. On Tuesday Fincantieri attacked press reports suggesting the anti-trust probe had been extended, claiming it “strongly disapproves of such rumors, which have also negatively affected its share price today.” In a statement, Fincantieri said that if the rumors were true, it would “firmly” disapprove of such a decision by the EU. The company challenged reports that the deal would cut the number of cruise ship builders in Europe to two, claiming the real number would be three. Correction: This story was updated on Nov. 1 to correct the name of the new joint venture. https://www.defensenews.com/global/europe/2019/10/31/fincantieri-naval-group-dub-their-joint-venture-navaris

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  November 17, 2024 | International, Land

  US defense shares, government contractors fall after Trump efficiency picks

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  September 17, 2018 | International, C4ISR

  Silicon Valley should work with the military on AI. Here’s why.

  By Editorial Board GOOGLE DECIDED after an employee backlash this summer that it no longer wanted to help the U.S. military craft artificial intelligence to help analyze drone footage. Now, the military is inviting companies and researchers across the country to become more involved in machine learning. The firms should accept the invitation. The Defense Department's Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency will invest up to $2 billion over the next five years in artificial intelligence, a significant increase for the bureau whose goal is promoting innovative research. The influx suggests the United States is preparing to start sprinting in an arms race against China. It gives companies and researchers who want to see a safer world an opportunity not only to contribute to national security but also to ensure a more ethical future for AI. The DARPA contracts will focus on helping machines operate in complex real-world scenarios. They will also tackle one of the central conundrums in AI: something insiders like to call “explainability.” Right now, what motivates the results that algorithms return and the decisions they make is something of a black box. That's worrying enough when it comes to policing posts on a social media site, but it is far scarier when lives are at stake. Military commanders are more likely to trust artificial intelligence if they know what it is “thinking,” and the better any of us understands technology, the more responsibly we can use it. There is a strong defense imperative to make AI the best it can be, whether to deter other countries from using their own machine-learning capabilities to target the United States, or to ensure the United States can effectively counter them when they do. Smarter technologies, such as improved target recognition, can save civilian lives, and allowing machines to perform some tasks instead of humans can protect service members. But patriotism is not the only reason companies should want to participate. They know better than most in government the potential these technologies have to help and to harm, and they can leverage that knowledge to maximize the former and minimize the latter. Because DARPA contracts are public, the work researchers do will be transparent in a way that Project Maven, the program that caused so much controversy at Google, was not. Employees aware of what their companies are working on can exert influence over how those innovations are used, and the public can chime in as well. DARPA contractors will probably develop products with nonlethal applications, like improved self-driving cars for convoys and autopilot programs for aircraft. But the killer robots that have many people worried are not outside the realm of technological possibility. The future of AI will require outlining principles that explain how what is possible may differ from what is right. If the best minds refuse to contribute, worse ones will. https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/silicon-valley-should-work-with-the-military-on-ai-heres-why/2018/09/12/1085caee-b534-11e8-a7b5-adaaa5b2a57f_story.html